Blood Ties

by Robert J. Crane

  She shook her head. “And have you trace their IP address?”

  “You know I’m not that sophisticated.”

  “I suspect,” she said, “but I’m not going to bet my bosses’ lives on it.” She shook her head, folded her arms in front of her. “You’re on your own from here, Nealon. Best of luck.” She gave me a little salute...

  Then she left me with the cops and paramedics.

  25.

  “Good heavens, are you all right?” Mendelsohn found me propped against the giant rock a few minutes later, standing, but leaning heavily.

  Everything was hurting. Everything. Even my toenails, somehow. Maybe Grendel had stepped on them when we danced, I dunno.

  “I’ve had better days,” I said, looking at the shredded mess of my shirt, which was covered over by an emergency blanket. I was already a little warm from the cauterization, but now I was positively cooking inside the blanket. I felt like I was going to sweat to death, which was marginally better than being impaled to death, probably.

  Mendelsohn looked absolutely horrified, his ever-present smile gone, replaced with a look of deep concern that mashed his lips together in a perfect O. “We should get you to the hospital.”

  I shook my head. “Veronika cauterized the wounds. I’m good to go.”

  Mendelsohn blinked a few times. “Beg pardon? Cauterized?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” I said, waving him off. “Or I will be. At some point.” I cringed as I shifted. “Have the cops said anything to you?”

  “No,” Mendelsohn said. “Why?”

  “I was just wondering if anyone had seen the Grendel,” I said. My knees were a little weak. “I haven’t been approached by anyone here—police, FBI. They didn’t even stop you at the crime scene tape?”

  “I think they’re probably too busy to stop someone who looks like me,” Mendelsohn said, wearing a self-deprecating smile. That was an easy way of saying a skinny, nerdy Jewish guy probably wasn’t high on the cops’ threat radar right now.

  But he should have been, since no one actually knew what Grendel looked like in his un-Grendel’d form.

  “I need to talk to whoever’s in charge here,” I said, and tried to push off the rock, failed, and thumped back against it. “But in a minute. When my balance comes back.”

  “So you were carrying around a Gatling gun in that case,” Mendelsohn said, hovering just a few inches from me, like he’d catch me if I fell.

  “Yeah. What did you think it was?”

  “I thought maybe a rocket launcher.”

  “I wish,” I said. “The FBI draws the line at explosives.”

  Mendelsohn smiled, but it was balanced by his concern as I cringed again. “But you don’t?”

  “Habitually, I don’t draw many lines when it comes to stopping vicious things that have killed me.” One last attempt to find a more comfortable position failed, convincing me that, indeed, the uncomfortable, slouching-against-the-rock position I’d started in must have been the most comfortable of all the options available. “It’s a self-preservation thing.” I did start thinking about Grendel and his vulnerability to heat, though. Maybe the FBI would let me borrow a flame thrower...?

  Yeah, probably not.

  “So your fight didn’t go well.” Mendelsohn still wore a tight look of worry in spite of my protestations of being fine. He knew a lie when he heard one.

  “I like that you can take one look at me and not bother to turn that into a question.”

  It was Mendelsohn’s turn to cringe. “Sorry.”

  “That I lost the fight?” I dabbed a corner of the blanket against the first wound Veronika had cauterized, experimentally. I couldn’t feel it. “Or that you brought it up?”

  “Both. Neither.”

  “When you’re in as many fights as I am,” I said, “you lose sometimes. That’s not something to be bashful about. I have laid more ass-whoopings on more people than maybe anyone in America. But I’ve also gotten mine handed to me rather spectacularly at times. Hazard of the biz.”

  “I suppose they say something similar about start-up ventures,” Mendelsohn said. “About not being in the game never resulting in success. Still, the lessons learned seem somewhat more painful in your arena.” He peered at the burnt skin just south of my collarbone. “How much does that hurt?”

  “Quite a lot,” I said. “Did our driver flee in all the chaos?”

  “No, he’s outside the police perimeter. I checked on him before I came back in.”

  “Oh, good,” I said. “Because if the authorities in charge don’t talk to me soon, I’m going to go ahead and leave, and it’d be better if you could have him drive me somewhere in case I pass out.” His blank look invited further explanation. “Because if I pass out in a random Uber, they’ll take me to the hospital instead of just letting me sleep it off, which is what I need most.”

  “Oh, okay,” Mendelsohn said, then shifted his attention to the lump on the floor that was Friday. “What about him?”

  “Oh, yeah, he’s fine, too,” I said. “Breathing, wounds dealt with. He might wake up screaming, though, knowing him.” I peered at Friday, whose chest was moving up and down in a steady motion. I’d wanted to go over and check on him, but I hadn’t been able to, well, move yet. At least not without risking passing out and collapsing.

  But as I stared at him, I noticed his chest was moving up and down in an irregular pattern, and I was suddenly aware—under the distant sirens and chatter of emergency personnel as they combed the Inquest campus for injuries and survivors—Friday was...singing?

  Very quietly, but he was:

  “I’m dropping deuces-deuces

  Tied up like shoelaces-es

  In empty spaces-es-es—”

  “Friday, what the hell are you doing?” I asked, raising my voice so that he would definitely hear it over the background chatter.

  “Working on the lyrics of my debut single,” Friday said, craning his neck to look at me. “I like to use uncomfortable moments like this as personal reflection time to improve my art.”

  “Do you have a lot of moments like this?” Mendelsohn asked, beating me to the question because I was busy being gobsmacked that Friday had a) art and b) that the words I’d heard him singing could be classed as such. “You know, in which to reflect?”

  “It happens,” Friday said, rolling over. His belly was horrific-looking, and I say this as someone who was the recipient of several blackened sections of skin myself. His, though, was one long scar that stretched the width of his overlarge, swollen belly. It looked distended, too, like Veronika had sealed it up without bothering to cauterize the individual veins, canals and intestines that might have been torn up inside him. “I should actually work that into the verse: Shit happens-happens/and now I’m fappin’-fappin’—”

  “Stop, please stop,” I said, closing my eyes.

  “You need to respect my lyrical mastery,” Friday said. “I’m top shelf. My debut will be epic. Chart-topping.” He clutched his distended midsection and grunted. “But seriously, art is imitating life, because I think I need to drop an actual deuce right now.”

  “Goodness.” Mendelsohn just stared at him.

  “It’s a beautiful and natural moment of life,” Friday said, rising haltingly to his feet. “I don’t understand why people would hate on that. It’s like these jerkoffs who don’t want women to breastfeed in public. Don’t let your puritanism deprive a baby of a meal, or deprive the rest of us of a great view of boobies.” He held his stomach tightly. “Oh, man. I think I might need to go right here.”

  I tried not to let my brain snap trying to square that logical circle. “You are going to fit right in in San Francisco.”

  “Never mind, gonna go,” Friday said, dragging himself toward the door, very slowly, as a local plainclothes lady cop came up. She gave him a curious look, which he did not bother to return as he hobbled away, bent double and still hugely over-muscled.

  “Ms. Nealon?” she asked, like there wa
s any doubt who I was.

  “Present,” I said.

  “Detective Gerst,” she said, offering a hand. I waved her off; she took the hint. I was in no mood to try and stand upright or shake at this point. “Looks like the suspect fled on foot. We’ve searched the campus here and have nothing.”

  “Yeah, he pulled a similar disappearing act in New York,” I said. “After killing an FBI agent.”

  Gerst nodded. “We did find one interesting thing, though—out in the loop, there’s a moped that was reported stolen this morning in LA. I was thinking maybe that’s how the suspect got here?”

  In the distance, I heard the moped’s engine fire up and just prayed no one who knew it was stolen was standing around watching Friday get on it. “I don’t think so,” I said, shaking my head slowly. How the hell was I supposed to explain this one? “I’m guessing they’re unrelated.”

  “What makes you say that?” Gerst asked. She had a small notebook in hand, and was peering at me intently.

  I listened to Friday’s moped engine recede in the distance as I tried desperately to ignore the pain long enough to craft a reasonable explanation. I couldn’t come up with one. “Just a suspicion,” I said lamely, hoping against hope Gerst wouldn’t see through it and Mendelsohn wouldn’t rat me out. “Just a suspicion.”

  26.

  Friday

  “That was a doozy of a two-sie,” Friday said as he shut the Starbucks bathroom door. It had come out entirely unpleasant, but hey, like his song was going to say, shit had happened. That was the important part. He’d taken his bathroom selfie and uploaded it, too, making sure to append all the appropriate hashtags, plus one more: “#droppindeuces.” That was going to be his hashtag, and he needed to own it before his single dropped.

  “That’s the women’s restroom,” some harpy with green hair and big glasses said, all up in his face as he put away his phone.

  “I identify as a non-binary, gender-fluid, pan-awesome being,” Friday said. That would get the bitch off his back.

  “Oh,” she said, immediately more pliable. “Okay.”

  Friday stepped out of the way, gesturing to the door. “All yours.” Then he hurried back into the main store area before she opened it. He heard the retching start as he hit the store’s exit door and stepped back into the cool sunshine. Served her right.

  His guts still ached like crazy, but he’d offloaded some pain and suffering in that bathroom. Whatever Veronika had done to fix him after the Grendel had ripped him up, it hadn’t resulted in anything good.

  But dammit, he was a man, despite whatever he’d just told Green Hair back there. There were certain standards of masculinity and stoicism required. Because you couldn’t just walk around everywhere dripping your feelings on everyone. That was girly.

  “Excuse me?” came a voice from behind him. “Are you—”

  “In so much pain,” he said, doubling over. His resolve crumpled instantly with the least little ask. He’d tried really, really hard to hold it all in. “Please. Please. Just hold me. Stroke the back of my mask. Maybe walk a hand down below the belt and give me some relief, like that old guy in Abducted in Plain Sight.” He looked up at the person who’d spoken to him.

  It was a meter maid who was probably all of four and a half feet tall, wearing the little hat and the yellow vest. She peered down at him, partially revolted, and shuddered. “Uhm, no. Just...no. I was going to ask—is this your moped?”

  Friday opened an eye. It was indeed. “No. I would never be caught driving such a sporty yet emission-friendly conveyance. Someone else must have left that here. Someone less impressively masculine.” A sharp rumble ran through his stomach, like he’d been stabbed in the belly.

  “Are you okay, sir?”

  “How dare you assume my gender,” Friday moaned. She needed to leave, and he had an idea of how to make her. “Why, I ought to get your badge number and report you.”

  “I’m so sorry, sir—”

  “IT’S MA’AM,” Friday rumbled, and sure enough, the meter maid ran for it. He shoved himself upright, knocking over the moped in the process. Damned thing was terrible for balance anyway. “Come back and give me your badge number!” But she didn’t turn around.

  Friday settled on the sidewalk, crawling back under the Starbucks window. Maybe if he slept it off, the wounds would take care of themselves. Then he’d feel better.

  He took out his phone and checked. Wow. The photo he’d just posted already had a hundred likes on Socialite. Hell yeah. He was getting some traction on social media, finally. If he could get to a hundred thousand followers, he’d make it to Influencer status. The rich rewards at that level would be badass. Hot chicks in bikinis. All the chicken wings he could eat. A multi-platinum debut album. Maybe an endorsement deal with Nike. He already had the tagline: Believe in awesomeness. Especially when it’s TOTALLY KITTENS. All caps, bold. Like him.

  He glanced around. The Starbucks did a steady traffic, and people were walking by now, ignoring him huddled here, beneath the big pane glass window. Yeah, this was a good place. Coffee shops were bastions of femme-ness. Plus, it didn’t feel too bad here in the sun. Better to collapse here than show weakness somewhere that it mattered.

  With that in mind, he drifted right off, letting the stabbing pains guide him to a sweet, sweet peace of dreams somewhere beyond the pain.

  27.

  Sienna

  “Would you mind answering a question for me?” Mendelsohn asked as the limo inched along somewhere in Menlo Park or Palo Alto or some such South Bay town. I was curled up in a seat across from him, my gat left behind because why bother hauling it when it hadn’t stopped the bad guy? This coupled with my curled-up posture made the limo seem positively huge. Certainly large enough to let his rhetorical question bounce around awkwardly a couple times in the silence before I felt compelled to answer it.

  “Sure, why not?” I brushed a finger against the long, black scab of crusted skin where Grendel had ripped me open from trapezius to collarbone. “Maybe it’ll distract me from the pain.”

  “You’ve done one interview in your public life,” he said, that same pensive, contemplative, professorial bent to his speech. “Admittedly, it didn’t go well. But why stop there?”

  I peered out at him through thinly slitted eyes. “Hey, man, I know when I’m beat, okay?”

  Mendelsohn chuckled. “You just got torn into, quite violently, by a monster with bone claws.”

  I perked up at that. “You saw it?”

  He nodded. “Yes. It came out the front when it left. I caught a very clear view of its amber skin as it ran off. Felt like the earth itself shook with every step it took.”

  “Yeah, he brings a real Jurassic Park vibe with him, that guy.” I stared at the blackened strips of skin at my exposed midriff, where I’d lifted my shirt to take a look at the damage.

  “You didn’t hesitate to throw yourself into battle with him,” Mendelsohn said. “Even though he killed you yesterday?”

  “Hey, it’s the job,” I said.

  “But an interview isn’t?”

  “Definitely not, right now,” I said. “The FBI has barred me from media contact.”

  “But you were free to talk to them for years before that,” Mendelsohn said. “You could have reached out during that time you were in exile, being hunted by the law. Could have tried to clear your name that way.”

  “Didn’t have the evidence then.”

  “Or just told your story to a reporter,” he said. “I mean, you didn’t even fight the narrative they were establishing.”

  “For some reason, at that point, I just didn’t trust the press.” I met his steady gaze. “Can you blame me? They swallowed the government lies about me hook, line, and sinker.”

  “Which brings up an interesting question I have that seems to be lost in the shuffle,” Mendelsohn said, leaning forward. “Why did the government lie about you trying to kill those reporters? And write off the fact that those escaped prisoners tried t
o kill you? Because to me it looked like a self-defense situation all the way.”

  “Once you saw the video, sure,” I said. “But what did it seem like to you before that?”

  “I wasn’t sure what to make of it before that,” Mendelsohn said. “All we had was a very limited amount of actual information buried in a sea of press speculation.”

  “You didn’t rush to judgment? Welcome to the tiny minority,” I said. “Because pretty much everyone else did a flying leap right to the conclusion offered by the Harmon administration and the reporters on scene: I was a violent, vicious criminal out to destroy all goodness in the world.”

  Mendelsohn’s eyebrows crept up his forehead. “Was that your intent? Destroying goodness in the world?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Sad that I have to clarify, but no. I have no animus toward the people of the world. Not any class of people based on their race, religion, whatever, nor the whole of humanity. I only have animus toward people for bad actions.”

  “Seems an eminently fair-minded position to me.” Mendelsohn smiled.

  “Thanks for taking me at my word,” I said.

  Mendelsohn crinkled his brow. “Why wouldn’t I?”

  I shrugged and it hurt, putting me off my answer for a few seconds. “There seems to be a pronounced trend these days toward thinking everyone is lying, always, if they’ve crossed you in any way.”

  He nodded. “I know what you mean. There’s a presumption of bad faith that pervades the discourse these days. I mostly see it related to politics, but you’re right, it does creep into the conversation in other ways, too.” He shifted in his seat. “I’m actually trying to figure out how to bridge that divide. Some of it is, I think, owing to the way we interact now—”

  “You mean social media,” I said, thinking my way through another article I’d read a while back.

  “I do,” he said. “But more than that. There’s a dehumanizing effect from being distant to your target. A great example would be road rage incidents—”