– We need to know exactly where it is. How it’s set up.
What is she talking about?
– You know where it is. You were inside.
Is she?
– We need you, Joe.
Crazy.
– You’re crazy, Lydia.
– Yeah. But tell me it’s not funny. Us needing each other. Give it to her, it’s funny.
– What’s Terry say to your little plan?
She grunts.
– Terry says there’s no point in going over there if we don’t know where we’re going. He says you’re the only one who knows. He says that even if we found you, we couldn’t trust anything you say.
– Because I’m me.
– Yes. But if you were with us, we’d know. You’d have to steer us right if you were with us.
– Because you’d kill me otherwise.
– Yes.
– Fuck, Lydia, put it like that, how can I resist. Sign me up, I’ll be right there.
– It’s the right thing to do.
I don’t laugh exactly, but I maybe chuckle.
She doesn’t.
– Fuck you, Joe.
– Yeah, yeah.
She inhales.
– You haven’t told me what kind of help you need.
I have a little whiskey at the bottom of my glass, and then, suddenly, I make it disappear.
– I’m not gonna make a deal, Lydia.
– What do you need?
More whiskey in my glass.
I signal the bartender.
– I’m looking for Chubby Freeze’s daughter.
A sound, like Lydia’s tapping her teeth with her thumbnail.
– The baby.
– Comes with the rest of the package from what I hear.
– Who wants her?
– Chubby. You meet her or her boyfriend?
More tapping.
– Terry kept them sequestered. Shaping the message was his line. But the message was already shaping. People heard about them and their baby, they started thinking fantasy. Heard some savior talk. Like that kind of belief and faith hasn’t caused the world enough pain. They had ideas of their own, I guess. Slipped off. Terry was irate. He thinks she’s important. Symbolically.
– She’s a little more than symbolically important to Chubby.
More tapping,
– Sure, but I don’t know where she is.
– I didn’t ask.
Tapping stops.
– You know where?
– I have a lead.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
– And?
– You might be able to help me get there.
– And?
I take a hit off my drink.
– Ever talk to Sela these days?
– No.
– Too bad.
– No. I mean, no. I mean, not there. Is she there? Is that where she? With the baby?
– Could be. Last place she was headed.
– Joe. That place. Joe. It’s gone wrong in there.
– Yeah, Predo’s trying to starve them out.
– No. It was already going wrong. Joe. Some of our people who joined up, they tried to leave Cure. We got word from them. There are things happening in there. Chubby’s daughter. The baby. They can’t. Are you sure?
– Lydia.
– Get them out, Joe. Get them out.
– I don’t even know how to get in.
– You.
She raises her voice more than just a bit.
– You fucking asshole! You go through the front fucking door, you asshole!
– Coalition.
– It’s East Seventy-third between First and Second, you asshole! Take a fucking cab, jump out, run up to the door and start knocking! What the fuck are they going to do, shoot you in the middle of their own fucking turf? Fuck!
She may be onto something.
– Hey, Lydia.
– Fuck. What?
– So I was right, calling you, you did kind of help.
– Fuck you.
– Sure. And something for you too, sweetheart.
She’s catching her breath after all the excitement.
– What?
I measure it once, start to measure it again, making sure I want to cut before I do, but hell with that. I just chop the fucker up.
– You want to launch a raid on that hole. You might try asking Terry for directions.
She’s all caught up with her breath now.
– Terry.
– Yeah. Him.
– Don’t fuck around, Joe.
– Hey, lady, like you said, I was there. I saw it.
I finish my drink.
– Trust me, I’m not fucking around.
– Terry.
– Just saying you should ask.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
– You know, Joe, there’s a second half to that joke.
– Don’t say.
– Sure. Goes, How do you know when a gay guy is on a second date?
– Tell it.
– What second date?
We don’t laugh, either of us, but it doesn’t mean we aren’t amused.
– See ya around, Lydia.
– What’s really funny?
– What?
– I almost hope that’s true. She hangs up. Lydia Miles.
A sense of humor. The world must truly be coming to an end.
I celebrate with a last drink, pay my tab, roll a cigarette for the walk to the Impala, hit the sidewalk, smell bleach, take a second to wonder why the guy scrubbing the sidewalk with a push broom is wearing such nice shoes with his coveralls, and then another guy in coveralls and nice shoes pops up and points a bright orange toy rocket launcher at me and I just finish reading the words LESS LETHAL printed on the weapon’s stock before he pulls the trigger and a 40mm shell loaded with five wood slugs hits my chest, breaks a few ribs, slams me into the wall, puts me on my ass, and keeps me there while he shoots me a couple more times. Not that he needs to.
So, turns out the Coalition doesn’t have any problem with shooting it up on their own turf after all. I’ll give them points on restraint to the extent they used the riot gun, but it was still quite the spectacle. And it hurt plenty. Generally, a gun like that, you want to be at least twenty or thirty feet from your target, skip the rounds off the ground so they break up and pepper the legs of your average unruly mob. It’ll leave a mark, but who can’t live with a charley horse? From five feet out, put square in your chest, things get a little intense.
I move, feel the loose ends of ribs grating against each other, and stop moving.
A few of the wood slugs bounced upward off my chest and got me in the face. When I open my eyes I feel dry blood crack, same when I open my lips.
I’m looking at a concrete ceiling, fluorescent lights. Smells like gasoline, exhaust fumes and motor oil. I hear an engine starting somewhere, echoing, squeal of rubber.
Parking garage.
– Asshole.
I turn my head. It hurts. All I get for the trouble is confirmation that I was right, I am in a parking garage. Black SUV nearby. Couple limos farther away. A ramp coming from a lower level. No ramp heading up. We’re at the top.
– Asshole.
Oh yeah, and I also get a look at the guy who shot me.
He’s out of his coveralls now, stripped down to black suit. Just a little of the bleach smell they used to cover their Vyrus scent clings to him. But he still has the orange riot gun, and he’s still pointing it at me.
– Asshole.
I finish casing the situation and look at him.
– Are you talking to yourself?
He nods.
– Funny, asshole.
He shoulders the gun, takes a bead on my face.
– Next round is pepper juice.
– Got it.
– Do anything I don’t like, gonna get it in the face.
– Got it.
– Find out what a face full of pepper juice feels like.
– Said, I got it.
– One move I don’t like, bang!
– Yeah, like I said, I got it. Clear on the pepper juice in the face. Now will you shut the fuck up so I can lie here and think quietly about how good it’s going to feel when I shove the barrel of that thing in your mouth and empty it down your throat.
Bang!
It’s a new one on me, shell full of pepper juice in the face. Blinds my good eye. Goes up my nose, gets in my ears, in my mouth, so much of it I swallow some. I vomit and that sure helps my ribs out. It hurts so much I have to move. I crawl in little blind circles, screams echoing, blotting out the sounds of the cars below.