Tashjian took her hand."You've got a way with things, Ms. Senna."
"Gayle. Call me Gayle. Or just call me."
She was not flirting with… Was she flirting with Tashjian?
Soledad, off a shake of her head: "Jesus Fuc… Christ." Then she gave a little smile.
Sitting, fuming, Rysher watched the exchange, watched how easily Gayle flowed among people. Rysher knew then, from first off, if he'd ever had a chance it wasn't one in a thousand.
"Good luck to you, Soledad." And Gayle left the office.
Soledad darted after Gayle, calling her lawyer's name.
Gayle stopped, turned.
"I just wanted to thank you for everything. I don't know if you want to… Why don't we go out and have ourselves a—"
Gayle smiled."Don't thank me."
"I mean it. I could have taken a lot, but them saying I had anything to do with what happened to Reese…"
Still smiling."And I mean it too. Don't thank me. What I did, I did for my reasons; I did it because it serves me. I meant it when I told you that. But the next time you and I meet up we're not going to be sitting beside each other, and what I just did in there is nothing compared to what I'm going to throw at you and every other cop who lifted a finger against innocent people. Same as I did to your lieutenant, I promise I'll do to you."
Gayle walked on. Talking while she moved, tossing back over her shoulder: "My office'll be in touch about your bill."
You could say, and it would be the truth, that the governor of the state of California saved my life. Being a cop, an MTac, is all there is for me. I know in a way that sounds pathetic. I don't care. I'm wired the way I'm wired, my job is my life, that's the way it is. And, yeah, I have Ian now. Sort of. But neither of us knows for certain what we're really about. So if I didn't have my job, if I couldn't fight for the things I believe in…
But that's what Harry Norquist was about: saving lives. He was flying back to San Francisco when Bludlust took the city hostage. Most people didn't even pay any mind to what was going on. Bludlust? Oh, Pharos will handle him. Nubian Princess'll take care of things. Scalawag will save the day.
Harry Norquist wasn't depending on anyone else. Harry Norquist hopped the first plane from that Mayors' Conference in Washington to get back to San Francisco, to do… something. Like there was something he could do Pharos couldn't. Probably not. Definitely not. But unlike the rest of us, Harry Norquist wasn't satisfied sitting on his ass.
He never made it back to San Francisco.
Lucky him. If he had, he probably would've been among the 623, 316 who were killed when Bludlust's whatever went off.
Unlucky him. Among those 600, 000-plus were one woman and two children who were Norquist's family.
Guilt. Guilt like nobody ever knew. That's what Governor, then-Mayor, Norquist felt. He felt guilty because he wasn't there when his city needed him most. He felt guilty because early on, when Nightshift first appeared, Norquist made him welcome; deputized him, gave him special judicial powers, called him in on all the tough cases. Norquist thought he was doing some good for the city. He thought he was giving aid to a new breed of
crime fighter and peacekeeper. All he was doing was making the rest of us lazy and putting power in the hands of a bunch of freaks. Easy to second-guess him now, but none of us saw things any differently. Back then that was the dawn of the age of the supermen, and we all waded in their glow.
Not anymore.
And Harry Norquist was the first to take the blame, the first to condemn them and the first to pledge to stamp the freaks out. He got swept into Sacramento on a vow to make California a metanormal-free zone. And as always, as goes California, so goes the country.
Events dominoed: The EO, the MTacs were formed, the freaks went underground or to Europe.
You know, I really hate those Europeans.
So now I get to go back on the force. So now I get to hunt freaks, maybe get killed, so that the rest of the normals, the rest of humanity, has a shot at staying alive.
Wouldn't have it any other way.
The governor of the state of California saved my life.
There're a lot of tattoo parlors on Sunset Boulevard. East of La Cienega're all the ones for the rock 'n' rollers and night crawlers who got body art as a form of self-expression: rage against culture. Even though body art had become pop culture. West of La Cienega were parlors for all the Hollywood industry glamourbots who got themselves tattooed because Maxim or Vanity Fair or Details magazine told them they should either get a tattoo or start taking yoga.
Soledad went for an east-of-La-Cienega parlor. The guy at the counter was thin, white. A walking billboard for his business. His head was shaved. He looked like he might've been front man for the White Aryan Resistance, except that his voice and manner seemed like they'd just come off a limited engagement on Broadway.
"Helloooo," he said to Soledad.
Soledad was to the point."I want a tattoo."
"And you've got the skin for it, honey. That's what I call canvas."
The gay skinhead started to reach out for Soledad's arm.
Her look told him to do otherwise.
Soledad took out a couple of photos. Showed them to the guy. Asked: "Can you do this?"
Screwing up his lips: "Uhhh. You want to talk about bad skin? Sweetie, you need to get your friend to Malibu."
In the background was the buzz, hum-hum of tattooing equipment and the low moans of someone getting etched.
"The tattoo: Can you do it?"
The man flipped his hands in the air as if all Soledad was asking him to do was breathe or blink."I'm sure."
"I want it to look just like this one."
"I should color it in a little bit. And how about…" He looked behind himself to the wall. Art samples hung there."How about twenty-three? A nice skull. That'd look killer."
"I want what's in the picture."
"Every letter should be a different color, like a rainbow thing."
"I want—"
"A rainbow, or bloodred. But I don't know if bloodred is going to read so well on you."
"Hey!"
The man shut up, quit trying to sell. The man listened.
"What'd I say?"
"You said you want a tattoo like the one in the picture."
"What do I want?"
"… A tattoo like the one in—"
"What are you going to give me?"
"I, uh… I'll go get the ink ready."
Over the years the bald-headed gay guy had etched somewhere near twelve hundred tattoos. He'd done so many that for him the job had gone from making individual pieces of art to doing punch mold assembly line work: want something that'll show your fierce inner strength as well as your passion for nonconformity? Sure. Number thirty-eight in blue. Stick out your arm and let's go.
The bald-headed gay guy wasn't like that with Soledad. Everything about her said, quiet but very firm: Get it right.
Yes.
Using the photo as blueprint, working intently, Baldy copied in exacting detail the tattoo of the person with the ashen skin. Not much tattooing to be done. Just some letters. But the bald-headed gay guy took his time in re-creating them. The bald-headed gay guy got it right.
He wiped away the last of the blood from Soledad's shoulder. He said: "I'm done."
Soledad checked the tattoo in a mirror, checked it against the tattoo in the photo. Reese's tattoo.
It was the same. A bunch of letters. Five words.
Tough words. BAMF words. For Soledad they were a way of life and a memorial to a fallen comrade. For every freak left in America they were a warning.
The words, the tattoo: we don't need another hero.
Soledad welcomed herself back to MTac.
Yarborough couldn't believe what he was hearing.
Yar said: I don't believe this."
Bo smiled at that. Yarborough's disbelief was amusing to him. Things in general were more lighthearted for Bo. Life was good. Bo said again for Yarborough, for Soledad and Vin, who were also sitting with him in the ready room—Whitaker, upon Soledad's return, had been transferred to Valley MTac, the new Valley MTac—"I'm leaving G Platoon. I'm leaving active duty, at least."