by Al Ewing
"Warhol's dreampunk ideas are the new thing in the art world. Détournment is out. The futureheads that are clinging on to the movement are being co-opted by extremist groups. Which means Untergang, of course. All roads of that nature eventually lead to Berlin." He shook his head. "E.R.A.M.T.H.G.I.N. will mutate into something else. Evolve. Or devolve. Pranksters and tricksters, nipping at the nose of culture - so long as there's a culture to nip at, we won't see the last of them. I hope we never do... I like the idea of a world where the worst thing I have to fight is somebody's joke."
Maya nodded. "Meanwhile, you were there for the final dissolution of the Lomax-Venger Team."
"I was." Doc gazed out of the window, remembering. "Paris. City of romance..."
"Mmmm... such a specimen. So very pretty-pretty-pretty..."
The voice seemed to melt, spilling over the tongue like rich liquid chocolate, as Doc Thunder found himself staring into eyes of brilliant gold, unblinking as a serpent's and possessed of a malevolent playfulness that sent a chill down his spine even as the long, perfectly painted fingernails brushed slowly over his naked chest.
He was bound, of course. Great steel anchor chains stretched from the ceiling of the ornate Parisian drawing-room to shackles that held his wrists, while his ankles were secured to the base of the strange contraption he'd been placed on - like a shaped metal saddle secured to a stout pole. It was an uncomfortable predicament, and more than a little humiliating, especially considering the Silken Dragon hadn't allowed him to keep his clothes.
She was like that.
She was the daughter of the Velvet Dragon, N.I.G.H.T.M.A.R.E.'s first leader, a cold, brilliant and debonair psychopath who had died attempting to hurl Jack Scorpio Senior from the top of the Eiffel Tower. He had raised her to think of the world as a plaything, a bauble to be toyed with and claimed as her own whenever she pleased, and all the creatures in it as her slaves. Anyone looking at her would only see the surface at first; a stunningly beautiful woman of mixed French and Oriental descent, possessed of a bountiful figure, which seemed always on the verge of spilling out of the shimmering golden corset she wore, and a luscious, oozing sexuality, a wickedly deviant mind that glittered in her golden eyes, a merciless confidence that revelled in breaking the strong and taming the weak. By the time they realised the true danger - the sheer, ruthless evil hidden beneath the perfume of her skin, an evil that thought nothing of taking the entire planet as a hostage - it was far too late.
"So pretty-pretty-pretty..." she purred, raking her nails once more down Thunder's sculpted abdominal muscles, brushing them lightly through the thicket of his-
"Stop right there." Maya frowned, irritated. "You were flirting with her, weren't you?"
"I wasn't flirting, she's an evil-"
"Oh, please! Like she's not your type! Chain you to a dungeon wall and you're anybody's, I should know. Let me guess - did you tell her that beneath her iridescent beauty her evil shone cold and hard as a diamond?"
"Well, I didn't say that exactly..."
- her tongue teased against his for a moment before their lips parted. "Am I not beautiful, my pretty-pretty-pretty? Am I not to be desired by all who look on me?"
"You're as beautiful and desirable as a diamond." Thunder breathed, eyes stern. "And like a diamond, you're cold, and hard... and flawed."
"You dare to call me flawed?" her voice grew icy as her teeth met at his earlobe, a serpentine hiss in his ear. "You will die for that, my pretty-pretty, inch by inch."
"Your evil is your flaw. And all of your beauty can't hide it." Thunder hissed, before another brutal, claiming kiss sealed his lips.
"Oh, good grief. You're incorrigible. I can't believe I fell for that line." Maya grew thoughtful for a moment. "She does sound interesting, though. It is a shame we couldn't have met her on a more informal -"
"It would have been harbouring an international fugitive. Sorry. Also, she was completely insane."
Maya sighed. "Well, you can tell me all about that part later. Skip to the relevant bit."
Doc frowned. "Lomax. And Venger."
"I hope I'm not interrupting..." Lomax smiled, walking into the drawing room with a Polish vodka-martini in one hand and a cigar in the other. "My God. You've actually wounded him. What is that?"
Silken Dragon smiled, twirling the barbed flogger in her hand lazily, before leaning to run her tongue along the bloody gashes she'd carved in Thunder's back. "My scientists developed it. An alloy that can actually pierce the good Doctor's skin. We call it inexorium. It makes torture so much more... enjoyable, when you can see the pretty pattern of scars form on the skin. So pretty-pretty-pretty..."
"Good Lord." His eyes widened, looking at the glittering metal as he took a long sip of the martini. "Tell me you've made a bullet with it. We can end this here and now."
"Where would the pleasure be in that? Anyway, inexorium is so very pricy, and so difficult to make. Just the barbs on the tips of this flogger cost me over a million dollars. And they're just tiny scraps of barbed metal... but so effective, aren't they? So wonderfully cruel." She pouted. "Am I very cruel, Lars?"
"You're as crazy as an outhouse rat is what you are, my dear, and quite frankly - I love it." Lomax grinned, puffing on the stogie before exhaling a cloud of smoke. "Tastes like victory, Thunder. You really should take up the habit."
Doc Thunder winced, testing his chains again. No weak link, but perhaps... "You don't need another bad habit, Lomax. You've got enough already - aahh!" He gritted his teeth, crying out as the barbed flogger struck across his back, criss-crossing the cuts it had already left.
"Bad pretty-pretty," the Silken Dragon hissed, her golden eyes dancing with a merciless delight. "Speaking is a privilege, not a right. Will I have to muzzle you, my new pet?"
Lomax waved his hand expansively. "Nonsense. It wouldn't be Thunder if he wasn't ready with a sanctimonious little quip, would it? Where's Maya, by the way? I was looking forward to a game of chess."
"Far away from you." Doc's eyes narrowed.
Lomax sighed. "You're still mad at me for kidnapping her the last time, aren't you? And you should be. I beat her five games to one. At one point she asked to switch to backgammon. Backgammon! Let me tell you, there was blood on the chessboard." He looked at Thunder's gaze for a moment. "Not literally. You know I'm never going to hurt her, Thunder. Never. She's off limits. Know why?"
Doc didn't say anything.
"I mean, I'm a sucker for the whole Lost City vibe, it's so... kitsch. And she's a great chess player. But the real reason I'd never lay a finger on her?" He smiled, blowing smoke in Doc's face. "One day she's going to hurt you, big man. She doesn't know it, but I can tell just by looking at her. She's got all the time in the world, and all the possibilities that gives her, and one day you're going to lie to her, or do something stupid, or just not be enough anymore, and she's going to go live her eternal life somewhere else. With somebody else. And that..." He grinned, knowing he'd struck home. "That's going to break your heart in two."
Doc scowled.
"You and Maya? Unsustainable. I'm going to love seeing her go back to her temple. That's going to crush you. I might send her a fruit basket after it happens with a little thank-you note. Neither of you know it, but she's on my team." He laughed, taking another long sip. "If I were you, I'd get ready for a fall, Thunder. But if I were you... well, I'd do a lot of things differently."
"You've got a poor opinion of love, Lomax - aaahh!" Another cruel blow to the flesh of his back. Silken Dragon laughed, softly.
Lomax smiled. "You think it's love. Cute. So where is she?"
"Busy dealing with the diversion you created in Venice."
"Ah, E.R.A.M.T.H.G.I.N.! Easily rooked and manipulated to help goad idiotic numbskulls... like Jack Scorpio and his collection of morons. Which reminds me, what does N.I.G.H.T.M.A.R.E. stand for?"
"Why, it stands for the total domination of the weak by the strong, of course. What else?" Silken Dragon flicked the whip against
Thunder's hide again, making him jerk and the chains rattle.
"I'll drink to that." Lomax took a swig of his martini. "You know, I never really thought of myself as the mercenary type, but I really have enjoyed working with your organisation, Ms. Dragon. The pay is good, but the fringe benefits..." He took in Thunder's helpless, tortured body. "...they're something else."
"You have no idea." The golden eyes glittered.
"You're a little too rough for me, kid. Besides, I never mix business with pleasure. Apart from chess, of course. Fancy a game?"
"Why not?" she grinned. "I'll carve out a board on his chest and make the pieces from his finger-bones." She leant close, tasting the sweat on Doc Thunder's neck. "I will teach you to adore me, pretty-pretty-pretty. If it kills you, you will tell me how much you want to please me with your final breath."
"And if it doesn't... well, part of my fee is that I get to finish off whatever's left when she's bored of you. Not as direct as I'd like, but that's life in the rat race." He laughed. "And speaking of rats..."
Lomax walked to a speaking tube in the wall, flipping open the cover to yell into it. "Venger! Get up here! It's time to meet that business partner I talked about!" He turned back to Doc, smiling ruefully. "He'd never have agreed if he'd known I was in cahoots with N.I.G.H.T.M.A.R.E. He's still a little mad at them about his unfortunate condition. But we need him for the next phase." He checked his watch. "You see, right now, Jack Scorpio has a condition-red emergency to deal with in Venice, and he's under the mistaken impression that his old pal Doc Thunder is protecting the President. He's not aware that you're here, indulging your little predilection for the wronger side of the tracks." He chuckled, finishing the martini. "Nice work if you can get it. Meanwhile, thanks to a slight communications foul-up I may have arranged, our mutual acquaintance President Garner is expecting Jack Scorpio to bodyguard him during this time of international crisis... enter Anton."
Doc Thunder shook his head. "You seem like a third wheel on this one, Lars. This is the kind of thing Venger could have cooked up all by himself."
Lomax almost choked. "Anton Venger? The man's a pawn! God, you don't believe all this 'team' nonsense, do you? I just say that to make the ugly little weirdo feel better. Without my genius, he'd be one more freak at the circus-"
"What?"
The door to the room was open, and there Venger stood, his blank, sagging, blue-white face betraying no emotion, his voice a hoarse, rasping monotone. But in his eyes, there blazed a terrible, baleful hate.
Lomax smiled, throwing his arms wide. "Anton, Anton, Anton... "
"What is she doing here?" He turned, looking Lomax right in the eye. "She's the one who did this to me! You allied us with her?"
"Anton, baby-" Lomax's voice adopted the smooth, slick tone of a Broadway producer. "You change your mind about who did 'that' to you every day of the week. Eventually you're going to have to admit you just did it to yourself." He turned to the Silken Dragon, smiling reassuringly. "Tough love. Works wonders."
"No!" Venger backed away, the cry sounding all the more terrible for coming in his emotionless monotone, from a face that never seemed to change expression. "We're meant to be equals! Partners! A team! I - I thought we were - you can't-" His flesh seemed to bubble slightly, the only sign of his emotion. "You can't do this!"
'"I already did it. Come on, Anton, old buddy. You've got to admit she brightens up the office a little."
"We're meant to be a team! The Lomax-Venger Team! You betrayed me!" His face was bubbling now, starting to melt and flow like hot wax. The sight was so unnerving that Doc Thunder found himself totally captivated by it - the sheer horror of seeing a man's tortured, disfigured soul displayed for all to see on his suppurating flesh.
"Well, if it was the Venger-Lomax Team I might have consulted you, but probably not." He turned to Thunder and mouthed the words prima donna. "Look, are you going to impersonate Jack Scorpio or not?"
"Never! Never for her!" Even his scream was a monotone.
"Well, we can't do it without you, pal. Why, I'd have to make an incredibly convincing mask using skin cultures I'd grown from samples of your hideous fizzog that I'd secretly taken while you slept!" He paused. "Oh wait, I did! Looks like you're expendable, old pal. Ciao for now."
He took the cigar out of his mouth and squeezed it lightly, sending a dart bursting out of the lit end and into Venger's neck. The man with the Face Of Fear gasped, eyes wide, took a couple of steps forward and then collapsed.
"How about that?" Lomax grinned. "I guess these really are bad for your health. Plan B, Thunder. Never leave home without it."
"You're a monster, Lomax." Thunder growled, the chains clinking as he strained on them again. "That man needed psychological help."
"Yeah, yeah. Wait until you see Plan C. It'll knock you sideways." Lomax surreptitiously watched Silken Dragon's legs as her high heels clicked across the wooden floor and she bent at the waist to take Venger's pulse.
"Quite dead. Do you have any more of those cigars, Lars?"
"I've got more insurance, if that's what you're saying, so no funny business. If you want a box of your own - I'll trade it for the recipe for that inexorium you were talking about."
Silken Dragon smirked. "Not at that price. Perhaps in lieu of your fee for the President's assassination."
"It's a thought." Lomax motioned towards the body. "Bring that thing to my lab. I'll harvest the face and throw the rest away."
"Proud of yourself, Lars?" Doc Thunder's voice was acid.
"As a matter of fact, I am. I'll leave you to the tender mercies of my lovely employer, shall I?"
"Mmmmm..." Silken Dragon purred, licking her full lips. "Such a shame I have none, pretty-pretty-pretty. I will take you to the depths of Hell, and there you will learn that I own you. And when I am bored of my plaything, I will ask my wonderful new friend Lars to slit your throat, so that I may bathe my perfect body in your blood. And you... as the life drains from you into my ornate bathtub... you will thank me."
"Sounds like a charming evening. But I have plans. Raincheck?" Doc Thunder flexed again, the veins on his muscles standing out as he gritted his teeth, putting all his strength into pulling on the massive chains. The beautiful, merciless woman in front of him only laughed.
"Oh, my wonderful toy, you will never break free. Those chains could hold an elephant. My foolish pretty-pretty-pretty."
Doc grinned, and the grin was savage.
"Who said anything about the chains?"
A piece of plaster fell from the ceiling.
"They hadn't reinforced the room. The ends of the chains on my wrists were bolted to the ceiling, but the ceiling itself was the weak point. So, suddenly, I had two big chunks of plaster and concrete on the ends of free-swinging chains. Two giant maces..."
Maya laughed. "I remember you telling me about that part. Lomax ended up with a skull fracture. Six months in the prison hospital."
Doc nodded, and sighed. "They both escaped, of course, but I really thought Venger was dead. I checked the body myself. No pulse. And five years after that, Lomax died, and Miles Hamilton changed so completely that our friendship couldn't survive. He became left-handed, emotionless..." He slammed a fist into his palm. "It's so obvious now... why didn't I see it?"
"Because people don't come back from the dead." Maya said, and Doc laughed, mirthlessly.
"Donner did. And Venger makes two. That's two in two days, and that worries me. Because Silken Dragon's supposed to be dead, too..."
He shook his head, looking off into the distance.
"And, unlike Lars Lomax, we never found the body."
Chapter Nine
The Case of The Red Mask
Marlene Lang lay on the couch in her apartment, sipping a Brandy Alexander in her nightgown and waiting for the phone to ring.
She had no doubt it would. Rarely did an evening go by without a gentleman caller, and she'd built up quite a stable of admirers.
It might be David, be
gging her to come around for another shoot, proclaiming in his broken tones that she was the only model who could possibly do, telling her that he understood that he'd been in the wrong. In which case she would smile sweetly, tell him that she was dreadfully busy this evening, and then go and take a long, luxurious bath. David had to learn not to sulk.
It might be Jack - lovely Jack, her one-eyed sailor, her grizzled soldier, back from Uzbekistan or Antarctica or London, catching a night between one delightfully top secret mission and another to ravish her expertly on the balcony, treat her to oysters and champagne in bed and then fly off on a cavorite wing-pack like something out of a radio serial. Jack called rarely, but his brief visits always left her drifting in a pink haze for weeks.
It might be Easton, cool, calm and collected Easton, asking her out to a sushi bar in Japantown to drink cheap sake and help him forget some tragedy. She loved the way he looked at her; that mixture of need, sorrow and contempt, like she was an addiction he couldn't shake, a poison he didn't want a cure for. It was all so wonderfully noir.
It might be Timothy - gentle Timothy, living in his moldy, fetid bedsit in the Village, occasionally slipping out to O'Malley's bar, terrified of the police. Sleeping with him was like charity, like slumming with an underclass of one, and yet there was something in him, a fire that sparked and possessed him; all the fire and spine and strength that David lacked. Dear Timothy Larson, her most secret lover.
It might be Parker, of course. Parker wasn't quite as exciting as Jack or Easton or even David - who had the most wonderfully wicked imagination if not the spine to match - but he had a cruel streak and hidden depths underneath the frosty surface. She enjoyed their verbal jousting, the sexual tension, and most of all his air of cold amusement, as if there was something he knew that she didn't, a secret all his own beyond the ones they shared. Also, she had to admit - and the thought made her instinctively flex her bottom - it had been rather an awfully long time since she had been properly spanked.
