Our Lady of Pain was laid out in a glass coffin. She was dressed in virginal white and there was a large gold medallion around her neck. Her body rested on red satin.
Michelle glanced at the corpse and suspected that it wasn’t an actual body, but a wax figure. But then Our Lady of Pain’s hand moved, and she had to keep herself from jerking backward. She heard a snicker behind her.
“Joey,” she hissed. “Cut that out.”
“No can do, boss. This is too much fun.”
The corpse shot Michelle the finger, and then Our Lady of Pain’s hand dropped back to the crimson satin pallet. Luckily, the rest of the tour was on the other side of the glass casket.
“Don’t do that again,” Michelle whispered. “Ever.”
“You’re no fucking fun at all,” said Joey.
Somewhere over the Pacific Ocean
The Airplane hummed and shook. Out the window, the ocean was a featureless darkness below them. The flight attendant-a Vietnamese woman who looked about twelve-passed by trying not to stare at the severed human head in the window seat on its cushion of bright green wasps. Bugsy felt the urge to yawn, but with his torso broken down, there was no breath behind it.
Nick, beside him, slapped at Ellen’s arm, pushed up the brim of the nasty swamp-water fedora, and scowled. Bugsy smiled apologetically and drew the stray wasp back into the pile. “Do you have to do that?” Nick asked.
Bugsy re-formed his chest enough to speak, pulling the button-down blue shirt up as he did. Arms, legs, anything below his diaphragm, he left as insects. “It’s way more comfortable,” he said. “These really long flights I get a kink in my back.”
Nick shook his head. “You really don’t care about anybody else, do you?” he said.
“What?”
“Do you know how uncomfortable it makes people when you do that?”
“Jeez, sorry. But do you know how uncomfortable it makes me when I don’t?” Bugsy crossed his arms, bands of wasps making a rough approximation of normal anatomy. “Look, Nick, whatever it is, why don’t you say it, okay?”
“I am saying it. You treat being an ace like it gives you permission to ignore other people. When I drew my ace-”
“No, Nick. No, this isn’t about great power coming with great responsibility, all right? Let’s get down to it. You’re jealous.”
Now Nick crossed his arms. The airplane dropped like an express elevator, then steadied. The fasten seat belts light went on with a chime. “And what exactly is it that I have to be jealous about?”
“Hey, I feel for you,” Bugsy said. “It’s not really like it’s Ellen I’m with when Aliyah and I hook up, but Ellen’s in there someplace. It’s her body, and I know she feels what we’re doing. She’s thinking about you, but whatever. Of the four of us, you’re the only one who never gets any action, and I’m really sorry about that. But I didn’t kill you or Aliyah. I didn’t make the rules about how Ellen’s powers work. And I don’t think-”
“This is crap,” Nick said. “I’m not the jealous one. You are. You hate it that she brought me along and not just your girlfriend’s earring.”
Bugsy felt his annoyance bump up toward anger. The conversation about which artifacts-if either-to bring on the trip to Saigon had been between him and Ellen. That Nick was talking about the details of it meant that once again the two of them had been having internal conversations about him. “All I said was that Aliyah’s earring wouldn’t look out of place, and your hat might.”
“You mean my ‘sad-ass lump of felt and weeds’?” Nick asked, quoting the fight verbatim.
“I just meant that the hat’s been through a lot,” Bugsy said. Some of the wasps started moving around, making little hopping flights, growing agitated. “Ellen’s a very attractive woman, and we’re going to stand out here anyway.”
“And you didn’t want her bringing me back every time you were in the hotel,” Nick said.
“Well, no, actually I didn’t,” Bugsy said. “Matter of fact, I like being with Aliyah. I enjoy her company. I enjoy sex with her on those occasions when Ellen isn’t plopping you on her head the second she walks through the door.”
Nick smiled. Bugsy thought the expression was nastier than usual. “So why don’t you tell me some more about how you’re not jealous.”
Bugsy chuckled because the alternative was to start yelling. He pulled the remaining wasps back in, filling out the arms of his shirt, the legs of his pants. His anger was starting to send them a little too far afield, and unintentionally stinging some poor bastard three rows up wasn’t going to make the trip any better.
“Look-” he began.
“You have a lot to learn about women,” Nick said. “You have a lot to learn about people, for that matter.”
Bugsy didn’t precisely mean to do what he did next. It was like it just happened, his arm moving of its own accord, his fingers closing on the ruined fedora. Nick’s eyes had a moment to widen, and then they were Ellen’s. The storm in her expression was full-on category five.
“Look,” he said, before she could speak, “this isn’t the place for me and him to work out our shit, okay? This is a really unpleasant, complicated set of relationships, and we’re heading for Vietnam with about an inch and a half of legroom each. If you want to kick my ass, wait until we’re on the ground.”
Ellen snatched the fedora back from his hand, but she didn’t put it on. “We will have this conversation again,” she said.
And you will take his side, Bugsy thought. He didn’t say anything, only nodded. Ellen turned away, putting the tiny airline pillow onto her shoulder, her back toward Jonathan.
“You know,” he said, “space is really tight. If you put the earring in, we could stretch out together, and-”
“In your dreams,” Ellen said.
Congo River
Kongoville, Congo
People’s Paradise of Africa
The brakes hissed as the bus slowed to a stop at the end of a long pier leading to a murky green-brown expanse of water. There were vendors set up along the edge of the pier with jewelry, baskets, T-shirts, and hand-carved doodads. Filing off the bus with the rest of the tourists, Michelle and Joey were immediately hit with the earthy smell of the Congo.
The guide started talking, but Michelle tuned him out. She was feeling an incredible urge to get on the river and head north. It itched across her mind. She turned around to talk to Joey, but Joey had vanished.
Michelle skirted several piers, looking for Joey as she went. Plenty of people stared at her, but no one stopped her, so she kept going. She’d tried to dress nondescriptly in khakis, a white button-down shirt, and tennis shoes. But being a six-foot-tall platinum blonde made her stand out no matter what.
“Joey,” she hissed. “You miserable brat!”
“Bubbles.” A hand landed on her shoulder. She swung around-hands up-ready to bubble.
“Jesus! Joey, you little shit.”
“It’s time to rock and roll. I found a way upriver. Boat’s close by.”
Michelle considered for a moment. “Joey, the Committee really screwed the pooch when they passed on you.”
“Yeah,” Joey said bitterly. “I’m fucking handy.”
Impulsively, Michelle hugged her. “You’re extremely handy.” But then she remembered the night she and Joey had spent together, and pulled away. “So where’s this boat?”
“Follow me.”
The man appeared out of nowhere. Michelle would have bubbled him if Joey had not caught her arm. He smiled at Joey in a way that creeped Michelle out, and motioned for them to follow.
Tied to a short pier was a beat-up twenty-five-foot boat. It had a large motor on the back. Two men with guns emerged from the small cabin. They eyed Michelle and Joey.
“Which one is her?” asked one in French.
Michelle understood him. But doing runway in Paris had given her more of an ability to understand French than to speak it.
Their guide pointed to Michelle.
The guide repeated what the man on the boat had said.
“She’s not your fucking dog,” Joey snarled. “She don’t perform on command.”
Their guide translated. The man in the boat shrugged and turned to go back into the cabin.
“I’ll show them,” Michelle said.
“Fuck that, Bubbles,” Joey replied. “We’re paying them an assload of money. They don’t need a show.”
“Christ.” Michelle opened her hand and created a bubble. It was soft and rubbery. His partner stared gape-mouthed as the bubble formed, and he hit the deck when she let it fly. Then she sent it flying into the back of the man who wanted to see her power. There was a loud “oof” as the bubble hit. The man pitched forward, and his gun flew out of his hand and clattered to the deck.
Michelle started another bubble. This one was for show. When the man she’d hit turned around and saw her, he held up his hands. In her very rough French she said, “I would rather be friends. This is business, yes? We want to go upriver.” She closed her hand, popping the bubble, and felt a rush as she absorbed its energy. “I’m Michelle.”
“Gaetan,” he said, jabbing a thumb into his own chest. Then he pointed to his partner. “Kengo.”
“Can we come aboard now?”
Gaetan nodded. Michelle turned to Joey. “Are we good to go?” Joey brushed past her and climbed into the boat.
Ministry of Joy
Kongoville, Congo
People’s Paradise of Africa
“Tom,” Alicia Nshombo said, settling her bulk in its stressed white-and-blue floral-print dress in her chair behind her tiny white desk with its ormolu trim after an embrace of greeting. “We need you.”
He dropped into a chair across from her and rubbed his jaw. Stubble rasped. The insides of his eyeballs felt just like that. He hadn’t been sleeping well. “What?” he asked. He bobbed back and forth in the chair.
Alicia’s office was in an old colonial-era building downtown on the Kinshasa side, Belgian-built in the time when King Leopold was treating the natives in a way that’d get an antebellum southern plantation owner prosecuted for treating his slaves. Doc Prez wanted her to have her digs in the new compound but she wanted to assert independence. And what Sis wanted, Sis got. The decor was frou frou to the max: all white and flowers and swirly gold. The walls teemed with pictures. One stuck out: a photo of Alicia in polo outfit, straddling a clearly dubious horse that looked as if it would be more at home pulling a beer wagon. The thought of Alicia playing polo blew Tom’s mind, but he’d bet she never lost.
“Enemies have violated the People’s Paradise,” Alicia was saying. “Near Nyunzu. Terrorists attacked one of our special facilities. They’ve murdered my babies.”
“Shit,” Tom said. That Alicia didn’t chide Tom for his language showed how freaked-out she was. “Who?”
“That is one of the things we need to find out. Tom, it would be very bad if these terrorists were to escape with any of my babies. Such lies they would tell. The world would never understand.”
You’d have a shitstorm on your hands, you mean, Tom thought. “I can take care of it.”
“Oh, I’m sure you could,” Alicia said, “but this is such a wonderful opportunity to see what our young volunteers can do. I want you to take a few of them to Nyunzu, Tom. This will be another test for them, a chance for them to show us how brave they are, and loyal. Let them avenge their murdered brothers and sisters!”
Sofiensaal Concert Hall
Vienna, Austria
“You were wonderful,” Niobe said as Noel emptied the hidden pockets in his coat. There was still some applause from the audience that remained in the Sofiensaal concert hall.
Noel kissed her. “Thank you, my dear, but you are biased.”
“The critics will agree. You’ll see when you read the reviews tomorrow.” She sat down to wait while he changed.
Unlike more old-fashioned magicians, Noel didn’t perform in the tailcoat. He wore a black leather jacket, black silk shirt, black slacks, and black boots. It was actually his usual mode of dress, but tonight he opted for a hand-knitted Nordic sweater and an overcoat. Vienna was gripped in the icy claws of a wind raging out of the Russian steppes, across the Hungarian plain, and screaming, bansheelike, through the city.
Despite the cold there was a knot of woman gathered at the stage door. Niobe hung back while Noel signed program books and kept up his flirtatious, practiced banter. Finally they were gone. The limo driver held open the back door of the car.
“Darling, I’m restless, I’d like to walk back to the hotel. It’s not that far,” Noel said.
Niobe tucked her gloved hand beneath his arms. “Then I’ll walk with you.”
“Are you sure that’s wise?”
“Exercise is good for me. Dr. Finn says so.” She poked him in the ribs. “And he told you not to coddle me.”
“My prerogative.” But he gave in and waved away the driver.
Their route took them past the twisting columns of the Karlskirche, modeled on Trajan’s column in the Roman Forum. An old man pushed a chestnut-roasting cart down the sidewalk on the other side of the street. The rich, loamy scent of chestnuts and the sharp bite of charcoal had Noel suddenly ravenous. He ran across the street to see if the man had anything left.
He had only a few, cooked until the shells were black, but he was happy to pluck the chestnuts out with gnarled fingers and load them in a paper cone. Noel ran back to Niobe and thrust the cone into her hands. “You’ll like these. And not just to eat, they’re better than mittens.”
They shelled and ate chestnuts, watched their breaths steam, and just before the wind became too brutal they reached the hotel. They had a suite, and a room-service dinner was waiting for them. Niobe settled onto the couch, sighed, laid a hand over her belly. “I still can’t believe this is my life.”
Noel leaned down and kissed her. “Happy?”
“Very.”
On the Lukuga River, Congo
People’s Paradise of Africa
Wally didn’t realize just how much he’d come to depend on Jerusha until she was gone. Somehow, she’d made it possible to endure the sorrow that threatened to crumple up his heart like so much tin foil. But now Wally had only his thoughts for company. He didn’t know how to bear the guilt and grief over Lucien’s death all by himself.
After Jerusha left with the kids back toward Tanzania, Wally started working his way west, farther up the Lukuga. She erased their tracks with new plants, while Wally went out of his way to leave the most obvious trail he could. He ripped down everything in his path; he tore branches and leaves; he stomped his feet, pounding perfect footprints into the soft earth; he littered his trail with banana peels, mango rinds, granola-bar wrappers, and even the occasional smear of peanut butter. He did his best to make it look like he was a whole bunch of people.
His clues wouldn’t last long in the jungle, especially the food. But they didn’t have to. Just until folks came to investigate the sudden destruction of the Nyunzu lab. They’d follow his path because it was the only path to find. He wondered, too, how long it would take Jerusha and the kids to get to Lake Tanganyika.
Twin pangs of worry and loneliness fueled another surge through the thick growth along the river. He kept as close to the river’s edge as he could manage. That way he could be spotted from a passing boat. And he kept an eye open for the barge that carried supplies of the wild card virus.
Dusk fell. As it did every evening, the sounds of the jungle-what little he could hear over the constant crash, crack, crunch of his passage-changed. The noise of life, raucous and loud, birdcalls and primate vocalizations and other things he couldn’t begin to identify, gave way to more subtle things: the buzz of insects, the gurgle of a stream, the whisper of a breeze through the foliage, the rustle of leaves as something slinked past. With practice, he’d be able to tell the time entirely from the jungle noises.
>
Though he didn’t need it, he built a fire that evening. The biggest he could manage. It took a lot of work, because everything was so damp. But it was visible, he hoped, from quite a ways. He got the idea by trying to think like Jerusha. She was smart, and always had good ideas.
She would’ve been proud of him.
She’d kissed him.
Another pang. Oh, nuts, Jerusha. Please take care of yourself. ’Cause I gotta see you again, when this is over.
The Grinzing
Vienna, Austria
The grinzing was a pretty, old-fashioned, and rather rural section of town situated in the foothills. It was like a welcome mat for the Vienna Woods, and with its array of small weinstubes, Biergartens, and restaurants it was a perfect place to end a ramble through those woods. It was very late, but the small green lamps still glowed at several restaurants, indicating they were open.
Noel’s contact had named a particular Weinstuben. It wasn’t the most savory-looking establishment, but then, Noel reflected, his contact wasn’t all that savory. After dinner Noel begged off coming right to bed and instead taken a shower. As he’d hoped, the combination of a late night, late dinner, and pregnancy had Niobe sleeping deeply. She hadn’t even stirred when he let himself out of the room.
One customer, an older man, sat at a corner table. A carafe of white wine was in front of him, and a Wiener schnitzel the size of a place mat hung off the sides of a plate. Potatoes and a basket of heavy brown farmer’s bread completed the carb-loaded meal. It took a minute for Noel’s eyes to adjust to the gloom. Once they had he studied the man’s features-thin face with a network of wrinkles around the eyes and mouth, a ropy neck, and swollen knuckles, a symptom of creeping rheumatoid arthritis-yes, it was definitely Ffodor Mathias, aka Karolus Kowach, aka Nicolao Tholdy, aka Blackhole.
He was wanted by Interpol, known to the Silver Helix, he’d been convicted five times, but he was a hard man to keep locked up, given his ability to bend light waves and make himself invisible. He bent them using gravity. Which meant he could also make heavy objects light and light objects heavy.
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