That was gasoline on Tom’s smoldering fires. “TELL THE MAJOR TO FUCK OFF,” he suggested. He wasn’t about to trust a bunch of army doctors when the Jokertown Clinic had been dealing with the unique medical problems of aces and jokers for decades.
“I did,” Finn said. “More politely, of course.”
Danny cleared her throat. “Von Herzenhagen phoned. He wants us back at Ebbets A.S.A.P.”
Tom zoomed in on her face. She was so pretty. And right now he just wanted to grab her and shake her. “COVERT TEAM NEED ANOTHER DIVERSION? TELL HIM I DECLINE. ONE SUICIDE MISSION PER DAY, THAT’S MY LIMIT.”
This time the anger in his voice was unmistakable. Danny chewed on her lower lip thoughtfully, then turned to Finn. “Dr. Finn, would you mind? Turtle and I need to talk.”
Finn didn’t mind; there were always patients to attend to. After he had trotted back inside, Danny turned and looked straight into a camera. “What’s going on?” she asked.
Tom lowered the volume on his speakers, then found he had nothing to say to her.
“I don’t deserve this,” Danny said. “Friends don’t”
Tom interrupted. “Friends don’t lie to each other. You knew about this covert team bullshit all along.”
She didn’t deny it. “I’m the link. I had to know. One of me is with them. They’re down in the catacombs right now. Black Shadow’s been hurt, and Popinjay really isn’t--”
Tom didn’t give a fuck about any of that. “You knew, we were only a diversion, and you didn’t say a fucking word.”
This time Danny flared right back at him. “I had orders! I’m in the goddamn army; one of me is anyway; they can shoot you if you disobey a direct order.”
“I’m glad you’re a good little soldier,” Tom said. “But do me a favor, don’t talk to me about friendship.”
“What the hell would you have done?”
“I would have told my friends the truth,” Tom snapped back. “You think we would have played it the same way if we had known we were just a fucking diversion?”
“If you would have known, Bloat would have known the minute you passed the Wall,” Danny argued. “That would have compromised the whole —”
“Compromised?” Tom said. “You even talk like them. Well, fine. You kept your little secret, and we all went in there like it meant something. Nothing got compromised but our lives. Cyclone probably died thinking he was doing something real.”
“He was. And he knew the job was dangerous when he took it. We all did.”
“I killed God knows how many people at the gate,” Tom said flatly. “For nothing. For a diversion. And you let me.”
Her face filled his big screen. She was so pretty; it broke his heart. Tom could see tears in her eyes as she struggled for words. “I don’t… I didn’t mean…”
He snapped shut his shoulder harness, pushed off. The shell drifted clear of the roof. Danny looked up at him, stricken. “Turtle… don’t… where are you going?”
His shadow darkened her features, turned her eyes into deep black pools. Her ponytail was moving in the wind. He tried to answer, and the words caught in his throat. He pushed himself away from her with an effort, out over the street, across the rooftops of Jokertown. But long after the clinic was out of sight, he could feel the weight of her eyes.
“These MREs really suck,” Danny said, sticking a fork disgustedly in a congealed mass of chicken a la king.
“I know.” Ray said. He shucked off his backpack and rummaged in it for a moment, finally coming up with a foil-wrapped package. “That’s why I usually carry my own rations. Try one of these.”
He handed it to Danny, who unwrapped it, sniffed, and smiled. “Pastrami on rye,” she said. “I shouldn’t. It’s not exactly on my diet.”
“You don’t look like you have to worry much about your diet.”
“Of course I do.” She flexed a bicep. The muscles stood out like clearly defined metal cable wrapped in their veins and arteries. “The Ms. Tri-State contest is in two weeks. I’ve got to keep up the definition.”
“You’re plenty defined,” Ray said with as much gallantry as he could muster. “Besides, you can worry about that in two weeks. For now you have to eat to keep your strength up.”
“I suppose you’re right,” Danny said.
“I have some health food too.” Ray took an apple out of his pack, cut it in half with a nasty-looking dagger he took from an ankle sheath, and handed a piece to Danny.
“Thanks,” she said, and the ground suddenly shook like a giant had rolled over in his sleep.
“Earthquake!” Ray shouted, doing a little dance to keep his balance as the floor shifted under him.
Battle, leaning against a stalagmite a few feet away, slipped, fell, and rolled around like a man with pants full of ants.
“Its not a quake,” Danny said. She managed to brace herself in the angle between the chamber’s wall and floor. “They’re shelling Ellis from the battleship New Jersey. Brace yourselves! Here comes another shell!”
Battle wiped blood off his face and felt his nose gingerly where it’d been smashed against the floor. “Finish your rations and let’s get going. We can’t lollygag all day. We have a mission to accomplish. Corporal Shepherd can let us know when another shell is approaching so we can brace ourselves in time.”
Ray sketched an ironic salute and helped Shepherd to her feet. “You have another sister on the New Jersey?”
She nodded.
“How many of you are there?”
“Seven,” she said.
Seven, Ray thought. The mind boggles.
“Hold on,” Danny warned.
Okay, Ray thought, and grabbed her around the waist and anchored himself to a nearby stalagmite. She didn’t seem to mind.
Wyungare was brought abruptly back to the Tya world, the earth, by the sound of agitated voices. He entered the consciousness of being confined in the rude stone cell with a recognition of the harsh, familiar voice of Kafka.
The jailer smashed his key-ring against the bars of the woman’s cell a few meters away. “Hey!” he said. “No pets, lady. House policy.” He looked closer into the shadows. “Okay, kitty, we wondered where you disappeared to.” He selected a key and started to insert it in the lock. “Time to hit that big sandbox in the sky.”
The black cat hissed like a steam boiler hitting critical and swiped out with his right forepaw. The curved, needle-sharp claws flashed. Plated hide or not, Kafka jerked back. “All right,” he said. “Chill out. You like it here? Fine. I’ve got better things to do than argue.”
With his other hand, he held a chain looped through two prisoners’ manacles. The new arrivals were two men. Kafka pulled them along toward the cells beyond Wyungare’s own place of confinement. The bigger prisoner moved slowly. Bruises were evident on his brawny arms. The other man was bound hand and foot, carried along by two jokers.
“Welcome,” the Aborigine said to them. “The name is Wyungare.”
All three in the hall stared back at him. “Mike,” said the big prisoner, aiming a thumb at his own chest. He grinned a little crookedly. He ran the fingers of his free hand through his close-cropped blond hair. “You maybe heard of me as Detroit Steel. Right now I feel a little underdressed.”
Wyungare smiled back. The other prisoner, another European but built shorter and more compactly, nodded slightly. “This here’s good old Snotman,” said Kafka.
The brown-haired man’s teeth drew back in a snarl. “It’s Reflector,” he said. “Goddam it, Orkin-bait, you can at least call me by my right name.”