My cell rang. “Nik,” I answered, “stay put and don’t worry. Hell, Rafferty rewrote Catcher’s frigging DNA. All I have is pneumonia.” I coughed yet again and began to shake as the temperature of the room felt as if it had plummeted thirty degrees in a single moment. “It reminds me, though.” My teeth chattered as I glanced at my office mate again. What’s blue and purple and dead all over? Hell, you had to be philosophical there. The pork clogging his arteries would’ve gotten him before too much longer anyway. “You know that goddamn Stephen King killed off my favorite character? Did I put that in the book report?” I smothered another cough. It was the last. Suddenly there was barely enough air to use to cough and the rattle had become a rising tide of thick mud.
And I was sleepy. I was sitting next to a deceased motel clerk-at least I wouldn’t have to worry about paying for the headboard that Delilah had ripped off the bed-and I was sleepy. That didn’t seem quite right.
“Stephen King…? I remember. It was a good book, though, Cal, wasn’t it?” His voice was solid and firm, something to hold on to as the waves of tiredness crept over me. “And nearly a hundred times longer than any other book you’ve read-before or since.” His voice began to drag toward the end, the words crawling into my ear.
Fast, I thought again. The disease moving through me so damn fast-while everything around me was getting slower and slower.
“I’ll never go to Vegas. The devil lives in Vegas,” I slurred. “Think the Elvises would’ve kicked his ass.” I stopped for a few seconds to drag in air. I wasn’t too successful. “Or is it Elvi? Sounds better… like that. More… snooty. More… scientific.” Niko would like that. He liked science. He liked anything boring and academic-like the dead guy. I focused on him. He was pretty academic now-ancient history and uninteresting.
My gaze drifted back toward the door. Rafferty looked as if he were running in slow motion, and around him the air began to spark red. Pinpoint explosions of light. Viruses biting the big one. By the time he reached the door, he was surrounded by a massive halo of scarlet light flashing brighter and brighter. I closed my eyes. It didn’t help. I tried to block the light with my arm across my eyes. I lost my balance when I did, sliding down the desk and falling onto my side. The oxygen fought its way through the swamp sludge that had filled my lungs in a matter of seconds. “ Cal?” The cell phone had fallen from my other hand to the floor next to my ear. “ Cal? The book, it was a good one, wasn’t it? Tell me. Cal, tell me.”
Trying to keep me there, keep me with him. “Scared… shit… out… of… me. Me… the… monster.”
“You’re not a monster. You’re an annoying, messy, kid brother who might be twenty-one, might be an adult finally.” I didn’t think it was delirium that made me think he emphasized “finally” so strongly. “But you still don’t listen to those who are smarter than you. Now sit up, you son of a bitch. I can see you lying down on the job from here. Sit up now.”
Easier said than done. But I did try… for my brother, who always made me try whether I wanted to or not. I took my arm from my eyes and I did. I did try.
I failed miserably, which wasn’t usual for me. Ordinarily I failed spectacularly with explosions, splattered body parts, holes ripped in time and space, and other equally entertaining things. This time I just failed in a typically ordinary way. I slid back down, this time flat on my face. With an effort so huge it was ridiculous in its pathetic result, I turned my head… but I only managed enough to see the door.
It was the same door that opened as the entire room disappeared in a shock wave of crimson so bright I thought the world was on fire. The earth had hit the sun or vice versa and there was not one damn Elvis around when you needed one.
“Suyolak, you bastard.” There was respect there-loathing and disgust, but respect too. If Rafferty thought someone was close to half as good as he was, that was bad news. If Rafferty actually had enough regard for Suyolak’s talents to curse him for it, then we were fucked as they came. I twitched my fingers at the healer in the best attempt at a wave I could pull off. I could see the blue tinge to them as the red faded from the air. Blue didn’t seem right. But I was tired, more than tired, and I didn’t much care.
Rafferty dropped to his knees beside me. He was faintly blue himself, but in a second he was back to his normal color as he turned me over onto my back. He then laid his hand on my chest. There was already an anchor sitting on it. His hand didn’t add much weight. When you couldn’t breathe, it didn’t matter whether it was an anchor or an elephant.
“I’d say hang in there, Cal, but it sounds goddamn stupid on every TV show I hear it on. Doubt it’ll sound any better here.” His hand was warm, warmer, and as my eyelids began to slide closed, it became fiery hot. That woke me up. My eyes widened as the heat passed through me. Every vein and artery carried liquid fire; every cell burned like an incendiary round. If I’d had any air left in my lungs, I would’ve screamed in agony. And if I could’ve moved, I would’ve kicked Rafferty in the balls while I was screaming. Multitasker-that was me.
But since I couldn’t do either, I lay there and burned. My vision went in and out as I went in and out. Eventually I was more there than not and the burning faded. I blinked once, saw Rafferty’s face, but I still couldn’t breathe-not until Rafferty lifted me and turned me over as I hung uselessly, his arms wrapped around my stomach to hold me off the floor. I would’ve been on all fours if I could’ve borne any of my own weight. “I’m sure you’ve puked a time or two in your day, Cal,” he said brusquely. “Think of this as your lungs vomiting instead of your stomach.”
It was a good description. You didn’t quite get the range you did with vomiting, but the sensation of your lungs turning almost inside out made up for the lack of distance. It couldn’t have been a gallon, but it felt like it coming out and looked like it puddled on the carpet. Green, yellow, and extremely repugnant. I coughed harshly several times, before getting enough strength back to wipe at my mouth with my jacket sleeve. That was when I noticed I was breathing again, which, now that I thought about it, was really underrated. Great hobby. Couldn’t get enough of it.
“That’s… just… not right,” I said, coughing again. “Couldn’t you just… have gotten rid of it?”
“I did,” Rafferty responded with exasperation at my ear.
“I meant, just make it disappear. Poof.” He helped me stand upright and steadied me when I staggered.
“I’m a healer, not Houdini,” he grunted. “And that’s the second time I’ve saved your life. Show a little gratitude, you thankless jackass.”
“Maybe I’d be more grateful if you, Mr. Super Healer, had noticed all this shit sooner. You know, not been watching your cousin Sir Hump- a-Lot giving Delilah the eye and wanting to give her a whole lot more.” I staggered back away from the pool of stinking fluids. Jesus, I could still taste it. I needed gum… toothpaste… anything.
“It was your Kibbles ’n’ Tits that started that scene,” he snorted.
My legs stabilized under me and I quirked my lips at the picture of Delilah’s face if she’d heard that one. “It’s good to be among my own kind.”
“And what’s that?” he asked suspiciously.
“Assholes.” I grinned ruefully. I looked down at the ruined carpet at my feet. “I need to get rid of my DNA. Niko’s been paranoid for a while about the government’s accidentally finding a random mutant gene of mine floating around somewhere, starting a manhunt, and beginning to clone me to sell.”
“For what? Soldiers?” He went behind the counter, rummaged around, and returned with half a bottle of vodka.
“Come on. Borderline psychotic. Do anything for the right price. Half-fiendish monster.” I squatted down. “Supersoldiers, nope. More like an army of congress-men.” Pulling out one of my knives, I cut a circle in the flat, worn carpet. By the time I was out the door, a matter of seconds, and tossing it on the asphalt of the parking lot, Niko was there to watch me use the vodka and my lighter to burn it.