The Man Who Crossed Worlds (A Miles Franco Urban Fantasy)

by Chris Strange

  She stared into his eyes, and I could swear his expression softened. Maybe the big bad gangster had a heart somewhere in there after all. What kind of screwed up relationship was this?

  With one final glance at me, Caterina turned away and strode down the hallway. I watched her go, feeling like I’d been punched in the gut. So much for my telepathic cries for help.

  Andrews sighed and pulled the doors to the casino shut after her, then faced me again.

  “Well, Mr. Franco, I believe you were saying something.”

  I screwed up my eyes, trying to get my thoughts together. “A deal. You don’t want Chroma on the streets under someone else’s control. Will it be the Gravediggers who cut you down? The Silk Dragons?”

  O’Neil let out a little noise, something that might almost have been a giggle. Andrews ran a tongue over his teeth. “You offer me protection from the scary gangs? Me?”

  “Chroma hits the streets, that’s bad for you. Bad for me, too. I don’t much like you, and I know you sure as hell aren’t fond of me, but maybe we can form a working relationship.”

  My heart twisted as I said it, even though I had zero intention of following through. Even the thought of making a deal with this man made me sick.

  By the smile spreading over Andrews’ face, it didn’t look like I’d have long to feel guilty.

  “You know nothing,” he said slowly. “I see it in your eyes. You have no idea who Doctor Dee is working for, do you? When Peterson called me, ranting and raving like a mad person, I thought you were a threat. A pity for you.”

  He lifted his hands in front of my face. For a moment, I had the strangest idea that he was going to squeeze my cheeks like on overly affectionate old lady.

  But then I realized his fingers were changing.

  I watched in shock, heart hammering, as his fingers grew longer, longer. In less than a second they were as long as his forearm, slender and jointed in too many places. Butch held me tight as cruel claws emerged from the tips of Andrews’ fingers, stretching toward me. Aw, hell.

  “Good-bye, Mr. Franco,” he said, pressing the claws against my throat. “It has been a pleasure.”

  My cell phone rang.

  The sound of it nearly sent me jumping out of my skin, and it seemed to have scared Ugly as well. He’d got his pistol halfway out from under his jacket, and was staring at my jacket pocket like he was contemplating putting a bullet in it.

  I sucked in a breath and twisted to look at John Andrews’ hands, but they were normal Vei hands again, as if nothing had ever happened. Christ. That shouldn’t have been possible.

  I recovered myself, trying to control my breathing, and nodded toward my pocket. “Do you mind?”

  Ugly glanced at Andrews, who frowned, then nodded. He returned his hands to his side, and I tried not to stare at them. Ugly reached into my pocket, flipped open the aging phone, and pressed it to my ear.

  “Miles here,” I said.

  “Mr. Franco.” It took me a second, then I recognized Detective Reed’s voice. She sounded pissed. “Where the hell are you?”

  “Hi Vivian. I’m at John Andrew’s strip club. If I don’t call you in an hour—”

  Butch’s hand clamped over my mouth, and Ugly ripped the phone away. Andrews stepped up to me, sharp teeth inches from my face. “That was very foolish, Tunneler.”

  I twisted my head away from Butch’s hand, and he released me. “It’s the cops. They want to talk to you.”

  Andrews stared at the phone like it was a loaded gun. I could still hear Vivian squawking. Andrews took the phone from Ugly and pressed it against my face. “You will tell them you are safe.”

  I kept my mouth shut. Detective Reed’s call had rattled him more than I would’ve expected it to, but I wasn’t complaining. Hell, maybe he was just afraid to find cops sniffing around his business for once. Most of the force was in his pocket, and the rest were too scared to do their jobs. Whatever else they were, Detectives Reed and Todd had giant brass balls.

  Something dark burned in Andrew’s remaining eye. For a moment I thought he might kill me there, and to hell with the police, but he brought the phone back to his ear and said, “He will call you back.”

  He snapped the phone shut and tucked it into the side pocket of my jacket. “This is not over, Mr. Franco.” He clicked his fingers, and Butch shoved me toward the door. I walked, obedient, on a high. O’Neil watched me, still seated, her expression blank. I met her eyes, but saw nothing there.

  Ugly opened the door for me and let me through. I was getting out alive. Sweet Jesus, I was still breathing.

  “Wait,” John Andrews said. My heart plummeted. “Mr. Franco has upset me this night. Make him hurt before he leaves.”

  They took me out to the parking lot and beat me like a goddamn bongo drum. It was still dark out, and I crawled in the puddles, soaking wet with rain, while they kicked me again and again in the gut. A couple of times I thought I was going to pass out, but then one asshole or other would deliver a blow that sent fire up my back, shocking me back to reality. I think the bouncer might have joined in the fun for a bit.

  Just when I thought I couldn’t take any more, the blows stopped. I lay on the ground, unable to stop coughing, blood in my mouth. My vision was blurred, but I could make out Ugly bending down in front of me, smoking another cigarette despite the pouring rain.

  “Never call me a lumpfish again.” He reached into my pocket, found my knife, and held it up. “Try cutting yourself free without this, asshole.”

  I groaned into the concrete, pain coursing through every inch of my skin, and tried not to think about how badly I’d failed.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  I think I must have passed out for a while, because when I came to the rain was easing and the first fingers of light were spreading over the horizon, like God reaching over Bluegate to crush the last of the life out of it.

  My arms were still bound. I tried to reach into my pockets before I remembered Ugly had taken my knife. I glanced back at the strip club, but even the bouncer was gone now. It was just me, alone, in the damp parking lot. I tried to get to my feet, but the world spun and I stumbled back down again.

  It was hopeless. I had fucked up. I had really fucked up. For a moment I was filled with rage, rage at the cops, at Todd for his dumbass plan to talk to Peterson. But I was too tired and sore, and the anger quickly burned out. It had been me who’d stumbled around like the drunkest man at the party, picking fights and saying dumb things.

  It wasn’t like this was my fight, not really. This sort of shit was what the cops were for. They got money, they got guns, they got support. Me, I was just their damn dog.

  John Andrews had been scared of the cops. Maybe I should be too. Screw this Chroma rubbish. So what if there was another drug out there? Bluegate was a goddamn graveyard already, full of the skeletons of abandoned buildings. Maybe it’d be kinder to let it die.

  Not for the innocent ones, a little voice whispered. Not for people like Tania. My job led me to see the bad side of Bluegate, but that wasn’t all there was to it.

  Not that it mattered now. I’d failed. Andrews knew something about Chroma, but I hadn’t even been close to getting it out of him. I supposed I should be thankful I got out of there alive, but given the way my ribs ached, I wasn’t exactly in a grateful mood.

  Part of me was tempted to lie here. I could barely think, I could barely move. Hell, the smart thing to do was sit tight and wait until the pain went away. If that meant the big sleep, then so be it.

  But I couldn’t. I wasn’t finished yet. I couldn’t wait here for John Andrews and his gangsters to come out and finish me off. I’d tempted fate enough tonight.

  I said before that a Pin Hole needed Kemia to operate. That’s not entirely true. Kemia is a powerful catalyst, but it is possible to open a Pin Hole without any. Trouble is, it’ll be weak, and it won’t last long before collapsing again. If I was much further from the Bore, it would be totally impossible, but I was close eno
ugh to see the blue light peeking between the buildings alongside the river, and I thought I could just manage something.

  Making a Pin Hole isn’t hard once you’ve got the hang of it, at least not the physical construction of it. The coins in my pocket—the ones I’d had to hassle the cops to get back—all had premade Pin Holes scratched into their surface, but nothing that would help me now. Scratching the circle into stone or metal works best, but you can draw the circle using chalk or viscous fluid in a pinch.

  I used my blood. It seemed poetic. And there was certainly an abundance of it trickling down my fingers, ready to use.

  Just as each Tunnel has to be specially constructed for the people using it, each Pin Hole is designed to serve a certain purpose. It’s not really about memorizing the right design to use, it’s about crafting each component of the circle with a specific intention. Like the old cliché goes, it’s an art.

  I may be broke and prone to getting the shit kicked out of me, but I’m a damn good Tunneler. I applied for a job at Immigration when I first left university, with my brand-new Tunneler’s license ready to be framed and nailed to the wall. I got through every interview, every shortlist.

  Sure, I got turned down by Human Resources at the last minute, but it was probably just because all my competitors were so well dressed it looked like they’d even ironed their hair, while I showed up smelling of whiskey and wearing a trench coat that was outdated the day I was born.

  I didn’t want the job anyway. Immigration were a bunch of assholes.

  The point is this: I was a damn good Tunneler. Even so, Tunneling without Kemia was damn hard. Tunneling without Kemia when your arms were tied behind your back and you were aching all over was an absolute bitch. It took three tries before I finally got a complete circle with all the symbols in the right place. Then came the hard part.

  I closed my eyes to help with my concentration. Laypeople seemed to think Tunneling was about clearing your mind, and focusing. That’d be exactly the wrong thing to do. Clearing your mind was about order, about structure. Tunneling was about chaos. It was about carving open an impossible hole in reality, to connect this world to a world where nothing is fixed and reality is fluid. Trying to bring order to that would drive anyone crazy.

  Instead, I let my mind wander free. The closest thing I could compare it to is that moment when you’re half-awake and half-dreaming, and your mind flits from thought to thought, unbound by logic or rules or constraints.

  As my mind drifted, I became aware of a pressure, a crackling of energy coming from the Pin Hole. I didn’t have to draw the instability into reality. It wanted to be there, it wanted chaos instead of order. Thermodynamics and entropy and all that, I guess. All it took was an investment of energy on my part to tear open the Pin Hole. Then it was just a matter of letting chaos trickle into the real world.

  I hummed as I worked, a nonsense tune, more out of habit than any necessary part of the procedure. I gathered what strength I had left after the beating while pressure grew behind my eyes, and fired it into the circle with a slash of released energy.

  Without Kemia, it was only barely enough to prick open the Pin Hole, but it did the job. A sense of confusion—madness, almost—came over me, before I cleared my head again. It had worked.

  I couldn’t completely untie my bonds. With Kemia, I could have turned the rope into handcuffs or snakes or a hundred other things, but right then all I could do was change the knot slightly.

  It was enough. I twisted my hands around, catching the loose loop that had appeared in the knot, and tugged on it. With a few agonizing contortions of my wrists, the rope came loose and dropped to the concrete.

  Blood rushed back into my hands, giving me the world’s worst pins and needles. I shook my hands in the air, trying to get them working properly again, then massaged the bruises on my wrists.

  With an exhalation and a refocusing of my mind, the Pin Hole closed. It would draw energy from me to keep the Pin Hole open, and in my current condition I didn’t know if I could keep the necessary state of mind anyway. The rope seemed to shimmer for a moment, then it was back in a loop the size of my wrists, tied up just as tightly as it had been when it was holding my wrists behind my back. That was the problem with transmuting stuff. It just didn’t last.

  I got on my hands and knees, tried to ignore the pain shooting through my ribs and stomach, and pushed myself up. My head spun like a merry-go-round cranked to high gear, but I didn’t fall. It felt good to be on my feet, aside from the nausea that threatened to send me heaving my guts into the gutter.

  I risked one glance back at the strip club. I could have sworn I saw a blind move in an upper floor window, but hell, everything seemed to be moving right now. I threw a contemptuous sneer at the window just in case, then started stumbling away down the street.

  My legs screamed in pain, but they did what I asked of them. The rain had become a light drizzle, just enough to wash some of the blood that graced my face down my neck, staining my white shirt. I was too out of it to care. I didn’t have a clear idea where I was, but the central city’s skyline was to the south, so that’s the direction I went.

  Cars drove past me, headlights scattering off the mist of raindrops like a million tiny fairies. None of them stopped to help when I stumbled to my knees and retched the pitiful contents of my stomach into a storm-water drain.

  I didn’t blame them. I wouldn’t have stopped either.

  Luckily, I’d barely eaten in the last day or so, so it didn’t take me long before I could continue on my merry way.

  The journey passed in snatches of memory and darkness. I might have been sleeping part of the way. I blacked out again, embraced by the wonderful painless arms of unconsciousness, and when I came to there was a blue sedan pulling up beside me.

  I made a move to run, but I already knew it was hopeless. If it was Andrews having second thoughts, I was dead anyway. I was too tired, too sore. I just stood at the side of the road, eyes half-closed, and prayed for a miracle.

  The car’s electric window lowered, but no gun appeared to put me down. Instead, there was a woman’s face.

  I wondered again if I was seeing things. I stared blankly at the woman, swaying slightly on the spot, her face slipping in and out of focus.

  The woman’s red hair was what triggered my memory. Caterina Andrews stared at me silently, eyes aged beyond her years.

  I stumbled to the car, my legs moving on automatic, pulled open the door, and slid inside. It was so warm in the car, so warm and dry I didn’t even care who it was picking me up. It could have been Satan himself offering me a ride and I would have accepted.

  “Jesus,” the gangster’s wife said. She reached a hand toward my face, then froze and let her arm drop. A whiff of lavender hung in the air. “What did they do to you?”

  I wasn’t in the mood for recounting the beating. I wasn’t in the mood for anything. “Can you take me home?” I could hear the desperation in my voice, but I didn’t care anymore.

  She bit her lip in a way that I thought was incredibly cute, despite my injuries, the pale pink flesh becoming tinged with white. It made me think of the flowers in one of my foster mothers’ window box. Strange. I hadn’t thought of her in years. Dimly, I was aware I was slipping back into unconsciousness.

  “Where do you live?” she finally asked, snapping me awake long enough to tell her my address.

  She nodded, started the car, and pulled out into a gap in the traffic. The rumble of the car engine relaxed me like a massage.

  More comfortable than I ever thought I’d be again, I fell asleep.

  When I woke, Caterina had parked outside my apartment building and was unbuckling her seatbelt. I fumbled for my own seatbelt, realized I’d never buckled it in the first place, and grunted.

  “Thank you,” I said, my voice croaking and painful. “I can manage from here.”

  She smiled at the steering wheel, a soft smile, and shook her head. “What floor do you live on?”
/>   “The ninth.”

  She opened her door. “I’ll help you. Come on.”

  Now that I was slightly more rested and feeling less like I wanted to throw up, having the gangster’s wife help me was a bit of a blow to my ego. Not enough of a blow to refuse her help altogether, though.

  She came around to my side of the car and helped me out. It had finally stopped raining, but I was soaked to the core.

  “Aw hell,” I said as I went to push the door closed. “I’ve got blood all over your seat.”

  She shrugged and slipped a soft shoulder under my arm. Her hair smelled of floral shampoo. “It’ll come out. John has chemical cleaners that’ll get blood out of anything.”

  I shivered and blamed my wet clothes for it, then let Caterina help me to the door of my apartment. I was putting more weight on her than I intended, but she didn’t complain. My shaking fingers tried and failed to put the keys in the door, then Caterina took them from me and opened the door herself, without the problems I usually have.

  It took us twenty minutes to get up the stairs. I had to rest after every flight, while Caterina waited in silence. Tania didn’t appear on the stairway this time, thank God, and neither did her mother. I think a barreling about late rent payments might be the thing to cause me to keel over and die.

  “What’s your name?” she asked while I wheezed and tried to catch my breath after the sixth flight of stairs.

  “Miles,” I said between breaths. “Miles Franco.”

  She didn’t offer to tell me her name. I think she knew I was well aware who she was.

  When we eventually reached my apartment, Caterina again unlocked the door and got me inside. She sat me down on my couch and started rummaging through my kitchen cupboards.

  “Why the hell did you stop and pick me up?” I asked, massaging my forehead where the pain was worst. “More importantly, what’s your husband going to think?