Stories: All-New Tales ngss-1

by Neil Gaiman

  I decided on the path of self-employment because this is against the nature of my being. Creatures like me are supposed to be hidden in the night, secreted away from the world in general. We’re supposed to live off humanity, not aid people with their real and imagined plights.

  It was time for me to go against the tide of my fate.

  My business hours are from sunset to dawn, and I will listen to any problem, any problem at all-from severe acne to the threat of death or imprisonment. I accept and reject jobs, collect fees based on the client’s ability to pay, and spend every weekend with Iridia.

  I find missing persons, cure a variety of minor illnesses, and even save a life now and then.

  Tarver Lamone hates me, but I don’t worry about him. I can usually sense danger when it’s near and it’s pretty hard to do me harm. I worry about Iridia sometimes, but she is so certain about right and wrong, and her own indecipherable path, that I have not figured out how to say no to her.

  And I am addicted to her nearness. Once, when she had to go home to California for three weeks, I fell into a state of near catatonia that lasted for almost a month. It took Iridia and Montrose breaking into my subterranean condo and her sitting with me for hours to bring me back to consciousness.

  IT DOESN’T SOUND LIKE the good life, I know, but it has its bright sides. Every day I get calls from people who need someone like me. I’ve helped children with their homework and ladies shake their stalkers. I cured one man of acrophobia and permanently paralyzed a serial killer who wanted to stop his trade.

  Everything was going fine until one early morning, at six minutes past twelve, when a woman walked into my office.

  I’m six feet and one half inch in height. She was quite a bit taller than I, with skin whiter than maggots’ flesh. Her hair was luxurious, long and black. She might have been beautiful if it hadn’t been for the intensity of her laser green eyes. The gown she wore was either black or green, maybe both, and her high-heeled shoes seemed to be made from red glass.

  “Mr. Nyx?” she asked.

  “Yes,” I said, feeling an unfamiliar wave of fear.

  “You’re young.”

  “I’m older than I look.”

  She glanced around my office. The décor was much like my underground home. There were three straight-backed oak chairs and a small round oak table under the window that looked out on Brooklyn. The only decoration that hung on the wall was a watercolor of a patch of weeds in the bright sun.

  “May I sit?” she asked. Her voice was neither masculine nor feminine, hardly was it human, it sounded so rich and deep.

  “Certainly,” I said.

  She lowered herself into the closest chair and I sat across from her. She looked into my eyes and I concentrated on not looking away. This made her smile. It was a predatory smile-on this subject I consider myself an expert.

  She was beautiful in the way that fire is, dangerous and untouchable.

  Her nostrils flared and then, after a minute had passed, she handed me a card that read ÒËÓ¤Í Î. ¯¤Ò¡ÌË in red lettering at the lower left-hand corner.

  That was all, no job title, profession, address, or phone. There was no e-mail or emblem. If you didn’t know what that name meant, then you didn’t know anything.

  “How can I help you, Ms. Demola?”

  She smiled and stared for another spate of seconds.

  “The painting surprises me,” she said at last.

  “Why?”

  “Your hours, your profession. You don’t seem like a sun worshipper.”

  “My girlfriend’s a painter. She gave me that for an office-warming present.”

  “Serious?” she said.

  “Come again?”

  “Is it serious between you?”

  “Why are you here, Ms. Demola?”

  “I’ve lost my pet.” Her smile would seduce emperors and frighten children.

  “Dog?”

  “A rare breed, large and quite vicious.”

  “I don’t know…”

  “I worry that Reynard may be dangerous.”

  The light in her eyes shifted, and either I was made to pay attention or the words themselves moved me.

  “Dangerous how?”

  “He’s a carnivore and he’s large,” she said in way of explanation.

  “If a dog’s attacking people in the city, I’m sure animal control will be out after it.”

  “Reynard is a sewer rat in spite of his size. I believe that he’s found his way into the abandoned subway tunnels under the city. There are, I believe, people living down there, people who might not be on the radar of your animal control.”

  I’d spent some time in the various abandoned catacombs beneath the city. I’ve hunted there and spent some relaxing days deep under the ground, away from the sounds of the city.

  “How big are we talking?”

  “Big.”

  Mahey carried a large white bag that looked to be made of some kind of naked flesh. From the sack she took a blue velvet roll, maybe a foot and a half in length. This she handed to me.

  I unfurled the cloth, revealing a simple black knife, somewhat less than a foot long. The handle was part and parcel of the metal blade.

  “Carry this with you,” she said.

  “I didn’t say I was taking the job.”

  “Don’t let’s be coy, Mr. Nyx.”

  I wanted to argue further, but instead I rolled the dark metal blade back up and stood.

  “I guess I better be getting to work then.”

  “You can see me to my car downstairs,” she said, a little less formal than she had been.

  When we got into the close quarters of the elevator, I was assailed by the odor of deep woods. It wasn’t a sweet smell, but there was lightness and dark, decay and new growth. It was almost overpowering.

  On the street there was a cherry red Lincoln Town Car parked at the front door. A short, porcine man in a bright green suit stood at the ready, waiting for Ms. Demola.

  As we approached him, someone shouted, “Hey, Nyx!”

  He was jogging across the street, coming right at me. It was Tarver Lamone wearing white exercise pants and a gray sweatshirt. He was moving pretty quickly when he pulled a pistol out of the pouch of the sweatshirt. I was so surprised that I didn’t move immediately. The chauffeur was taken off guard also, but Mahey was anything but slow. She reached out and put four fingers on the forearm of Tarver’s gun hand. The whole arm turned to spaghetti and hung down, lifeless.

  “He is not yours to kill,” she said in an almost matter-of-fact tone. “Not tonight.”

  Tarver dropped the pistol and screamed. He turned and ran away. His gait was odd because the right arm was still hanging loosely at his side.

  I turned away from him to stare at my Amazonian client.

  “What was that?” I asked.

  “You were not made for love, Mr. Nyx,” she said. “Its spikes and spines will stake you as certainly as Reynard’s great teeth.”

  With those words she moved toward the car door, now held open by the piggish driver.

  I watched them drive away and wondered, for the first time, if this rebellion against my nature was a good thing.

  GRAND CENTRAL STATION WAS pretty much empty at one in the morning. I moved to the entrance of the IRT and made it to the downtown platform, populated with a few midnight commuters: young lovers and drunks, street punks and the homeless. A local train came and almost everyone got on.

  I went to the far end of the platform and jumped down to the track. I was moving pretty fast, and so even if anyone saw anything, they wouldn’t have been able to stop me.

  Half a mile north there was a metal ladder that led down to a network of sub-subterranean tunnels and corridors. One of these led to a crawl space that took me even farther down, to another set of passageways and access tunnels. Some of these paths led to offices and utility stockrooms used by subway workers for storage and relaxation. There were forgotten conduits also, some of which br
ought underground travelers to places that made up a city below the city.

  I had been walking down a completely darkened tunnel for half an hour when a sudden stench almost brought me to my knees. I lit a match. Usually I can move in the dark with no light at all. It’s one of the abilities I developed after meeting Julia. But though I can move without bumping into things, I can’t really see.

  The match revealed a rotting, decimated corpse. It had been human, but I couldn’t tell if it was man or woman. The groin, belly, and chest had been ripped out and the face was chewed off completely. Much of the flesh was gone. Only the hands were somewhat intact, but they were gnarled and filthy.

  Whoever it was, they hadn’t been dead for long, but down under the subway there was lots of life that sought out dead flesh. Roaches, rats, and flies swarmed around the corpse. I staggered away wondering about Mahey X. Demola’s pet.

  Along the path I discovered six more corpses. The odor was cloying. The scuttling sounds in the darkness were upsetting, even for me.

  I was headed for the underground commune called the City of Light, named for the electric hookup a man named Nathan Charles had connected years before. There were lamps, fans, video players, and even computers in the cavern down under East Seventy-Third Street. I had been down here before during my nocturnal wanderings, had gotten to know some of the people who inhabited this strange place.

  As I made my way toward the underground cooperative, I feared that there would be more bodies-many more.

  “Who’s there?” a man asked and a bright light shone in my night eyes.

  All my senses were temporarily blinded by the glare, but I’d recognized the voice.

  “It’s me, Lester, Juvenal.”

  “Juvy?” The light moved away. “What you doin’ down here, son?”

  “I heard that there was some kinda dog down here attacking your people. I thought I’d come down and help.”

  “Help yourself an’ get your ass outta here,” one of my few friends told me. “Whatever it is down here attackin’ us, it ain’t no dog. It’s a fuckin’ monster, man. Shit. It ripped off Lonnie Bingham’s arm wit’ just one swipe. He died screamin’.”

  With the light out of my face, I could see my friend Lester. He was my age (and therefore looked much older), tall like me, black, and bald. I’d met him on one of my sojourns in the underground caverns. I liked him because he hadn’t been to the surface in thirty years. He ran the City of Light, a beneficent mayor of the out crowd.

  “How many people have died?” I asked.

  “There’s a dozen missin’. We made us a bunker in the north quarter. Everybody’s there right now. The thing cain’t get in, but we ain’t been able to get out to bring down food and supplies. We need a big gun too.”

  There came a howl through the vast network of tunnels, caves, and caverns. The sound entered all of my senses: a sour taste and acrid smells assailed me, my skin ached, and visions of violent screams danced before me. My entire body tingled, then suddenly my attention was drawn to a spot up ahead.

  “That’s it,” Lester said. “That’s the beast.”

  “It’s up ahead,” I said. “You go on, L. Go get your supplies and weapons. I’m gonna take care of this here dog.”

  “You crazy, Juvy? You just a kid, man. You cain’t hurt that thing. I shot it point-blank wit’ my twenty-two pistol an’ he hardly even slowed down.”

  Lester grabbed my arm and I pushed him away. I’m much stronger than normal men. Lester hit the ground and rolled a few feet. I turned my back on him and kept going.

  The thing wailed again. This cry brought on hallucinations. I could see people running from beasts of all sorts. I smelled death and the stars themselves began to cry. I saw men and women being raped then slaughtered-then eaten. Their attackers were vicious beings who looked like children but who were older than the oldest trees in the forest.

  When the vision ended I found myself on my knees with a pain like a spike through my brain.

  I got up and moved quickly toward the City of Light.

  IT WAS LESS THAN even a shantytown in a hollowed-out grotto of stone. There were tents and lean-tos, fire cans and furniture under the electric light that had christened the town of eighty or so. At the far end from the entrance was a huge metal door. No one knew what the vault was for. Now it held the remainder of Lester’s people.

  Above it on a natural stone ledge crouched Mahey X. Demola’s pet. He was covered with golden fur except for the snout, which was a striped black and blood red. His paws were nearly hands, and though he squatted down on all fours I believed that he could stand upright and tall.

  A growl sounded in my throat. All rational thought fled my mind. A rage, deep and frightening, sang through my muscles, and the beast above me howled.

  I saw an eye in the darkness above Mahey’s dog. It stared at me and wondered while the creature leaped from its ledge.

  I saw the golden blur coming. I wanted to dive and roll, then grab and rend and bite and tear. But instead I was dazzled by that eye, wondering what it could mean…

  Reynard slammed into me and I went flying. He was hard as stone, and I was, for the first time in decades, merely human. Reynard swiped at me, raking his claws first across my face and then on my chest.

  I hit him with both fists and had no effect whatever. He bit into my arm then butted me with his high crown. I fell to the ground, senseless but still hating. Reynard hovered above me, his mouth a stench-filled yawn of hunger, hatred, and vicious anticipation.

  There came seven small pops. I thought for an instant that it was the sound of Reynard ripping off one of my limbs, but then I heard a gurgling cry. It was my name being spoken.

  Juvenal.

  The thoughts cascading at that moment didn’t have a linear progression. Lester’s face was there and his.22 pistol-that had made the pops. He used his weapon to try to save me, dooming us both in the process. The small-caliber gun was his only weapon.

  The black iron knife, shoved in my belt, was mine.

  I didn’t try to unroll the blue velvet. While Reynard looked up to see what was stinging his face, I plunged the blue roll into his chest.

  His howl was what I can only call a cacophony of exploding stars. I was falling, careening through an emptiness that was unending. I was impossible and so was the idea of me. I was bleeding and hating, killing…

  “Juvy, stop!” Lester yelled. He was trying to pull me off the beast’s corpse. I was plunging the knife into its inert body again and again. I was outraged by the visions he’d shown me. I wanted him to take them back.

  “He’s dead, man!” Lester cried and he managed to pull me back.

  I was weakened by the wounds and loss of blood, but the rage still filled me.

  The knife pulsed in my grip and I turned away.

  “Juvenal,” Lester called.

  “Not now, man,” I said. “Not now.”

  I STAGGERED AWAY DOWN tunnel after tunnel, having no idea where I was going. The iron knife thrummed in my hand. It felt good. It felt diseased. It felt alive and angry, like a bumblebee clenched in your fist.

  I came across an abandoned campsite in a recess in a wall. There I pulled out a soiled trench coat. I put it on to hide my bloody wounds and held the blade up in the sleeve of the coat.

  I climbed up into the subway and made it to the Twenty-Eighth Street stop. I climbed out and staggered into the gathering dawn.

  “Mr. Nyx,” a gruff voice, which maybe shouldn’t have spoken in words at all, called.

  It was Mahey’s piggish chauffeur standing next to the cherry red limo.

  He held the back door open and I didn’t have the strength to refuse.

  “Hello, Mr. Nyx,” Mahey said when I fell into the seat beside her.

  I didn’t respond.

  “Did you find Reynard?”

  “Yeah. You didn’t say what you wanted me to do, so I killed him.”

  “Just so. Do you have the knife?”

  It was t
hrobbing against my forearm. I didn’t want to give it up. But those green lights would not be denied. I pulled out the blade and handed it to her. She took a plastic sheet from her skin purse and took the thing without actually touching it.

  She placed the knife in the bag and gave me a smile that was supposed to be friendly. Then she produced a wad of cash and handed it to me.

  “Where can I drop you, Mr. Nyx?”

  I SLEPT ON MY office floor for more than sixty hours.

  My small suite of offices has a bathroom with a change of clothes hanging in the closet. After two and a half days of comatose sleep, I washed off at the sink and dressed. Then I went to sit in a chair at the window and thanked the night that I was still alive.

  My physical wounds were almost healed, but the memories still pained me. Reynard and I had something in common. He was a creature like me. His howls carried knowledge and his stench spoke of an alternate history to the evolutionary blunderings of known life.

  And Mahey also was part of my hidden lineage. I was sure of this. And what was that black blade that she wouldn’t touch? And that eye which I imagined but am also sure of its existence?

  There came a knock on the door.

  I wondered for a moment if it was Tarver with his gun or maybe Mahey, or one of her henchmen, with a pulsating black knife.

  A creature like Reynard would not knock.

  “Who is it?”

  “Eerie,” she said.

  I opened the door and the woman I loved all the way down to the molecular level stood there before me dressed in yellow and white.

  She looked me in the eye and I looked back.

  “We have to talk,” she said.

  I ushered her in.

  Perched in chairs across from each other, it was the first time in months that we’d come together without a kiss.

  “Yes?” I said.

  “Tarver’s in a mental ward, out of his head and with his right arm completely paralyzed.”

  “Uh-huh?”

  “He goes in and out, but at one point he said that you did this to him.”

  “Oh. Well, you see-”

  “What’s going on?” Iridia asked.

  “Tarver came here with a pistol,” I said.

  “What?”