Shadow Child

by Graeme Smith

  * * *

  May 06, 1937 – Lakehurst (New Jersey), May 06, 1937

  The man in the black leather duster tightened the last bracing wire. The wires didn't actually need to snap – they just needed to look like they could have snapped. The one he'd already broken hung where he'd left it, the tear he'd put in the hydrogen cell above it on a path the broken wire could have made. He checked he could still see the photographer's flashbulb, wired to a dry cell battery and a radio receiver, tied to the edge of the rip in the gas cell.

  The cell had been leaking hydrogen for a good ten minutes or so. It was nearly time.

  The landing delay wasn't going to help any. Jack was supposed to be well clear of the ship before the Big got into Bang. It was going to be tight. But landing activity had started, and the rigger should be along soon. Jack clipped a line onto the walkway running under Gas Cell 4, rolled off the walkway and waited. He'd been doing it for three days since he'd sneaked on at Rio. A little more wouldn't hurt. He waited some more. The sound of the rigger's footsteps on the gangway was all he needed. Young Eric didn't know it, but his head was about to make a great hat-rack. As Spehl came under the torn hydrogen cell, Jack triggered the radio transmitter. The battery circuit closed and the flashbulb did its job. Jack crawled back along the gangway, the burning hydrogen playing tag with his heels. As LZ 129 fell from the sky, Jack jumped to the landing gantry and made his way to the rendezvous. He waited some more.

  After a while, the Countess' agent arrived, still dressed in her nurse's uniform. “So, Shadow. Let's see how you did, shall we?” She was pissed. She pulled out her file. “First, Spehl didn't die. You were supposed to kill him. I had to take care of it myself. That's twenty points off, right there.” The nurse made note in her file.

  Jack shrugged. “One more dead body isn't very interesting. You wanted everyone looking elsewhere. I gave him a post-hypnotic suggestion. He was going to write a suicide note confessing. Better headlines.”

  “You changed the plan?”

  Jack shrugged again. “I changed the plan.”

  “You're not allowed to change the plan! He might have resisted! He might not have written...”

  Jack reached into his pocket. The nurse flinched. Jack smiled. The nurse flinched again. She hadn't believed the stories about this trainee. She was beginning to wish she had. Jack handed her a sheet of handwritten paper. She read it – and crossed out the number on her file. “OK. So you're a hot-shot. Not hot enough to see me following you, trainee. That's another...” she looked at the 100 on her file sheet, the 20 points she'd taken off added again. “OK, so it's still twenty points off.. I've been on your ass since...”

  Jack sighed. “You got on in Rio...”

  “How do you know I got on in Rio? You boarded at Frankfurt!”

  Jack shook his head. “Of course I did. I'm a good little boy, and I did as I was told. I didn't get on early, and I didn't see you in your pink Schiaparelli. By the way. That Empress Eugenie hat really didn't work for you.” Jack's grin got even colder. “You switched to the Norman Hartnell in Frankfurt. I think you looked better in the night camo, while you were watching me do all the hard work in the gas bag. Oh, here's a list of the contents of your underwear drawer from the Rio run. The second sheet’s got the Frankfurt. For the record, you snore. Loudly. Oh, and...” Jack reached into his other pocket and took out a glass vial “... here's the antidote.”

  The nurse blanched. “Antidote?”

  “To the delayed action poison I injected you with last night. In case you...” Jack glanced at the file in the nurse's hands “... turned out to be a hostile.”

  “So you knew I was there.” The nurse's voice was flat. “You knew I was there all along, and you poisoned me.”

  Jack shrugged. His cold eyes never left the nurse's.

  The nurse sighed. “You're a bastard, Shadow.” She scribbled over the new 80 on her file, replaced it with a 100. “You're a bastard, but you're ready for field ops, I guess.” She raised an eyebrow, and smiled. “So what do you think? Maybe we should celebrate? I'd love to get out of this dumb uniform.” She smiled. “And maybe some other things.”

  Jack reached out, pulled the nurse close. She opened her lips for the kiss. Jack's forehead slammed forward, and he dropped the unconscious woman to the ground. He searched her pockets, and pulled out the flask. He looked down at the nurse. “Well. I could sure use a drink.” He took the cap off the flask. The smell of Unicorn horn filled the air. Then he was gone.

  * * *

  … that made it a training run. He watched the little old bag lady who wasn't a bag lady drink what the wind said was Unicorn Horn. Then she was gone. Jack expected the mage currently Shifted to a traffic cop to do the same. He didn’t. He looked round and didn’t see Jack, just like all the other times he hadn’t seen him. He walked away. Nobody ever saw Jack – or at least, they never remembered seeing him if they did.

  Sometimes Jack didn’t even have to kill them to help them forget.

  Jack followed. As the cop turned a corner, he took a ring from his pocket and Shifted into a teen-punk. The punk walked into a side alley. He checked his six, and Jack wrapped Shadow round himself. The mage who’d shown him how to do it had talked about ‘partial-temporal-dislocation’. Jack had called it ‘wrapping Shadow’, and the mage had limped off, muttering about technical philistines. The punk took a sheet of paper from his pocket, and taped it to the wall. He wrote on it with a thick felt marker, then took a red gem from his pocket. He looked at it, and swore. Which, Jack thought, was also interesting. He’d bet very few people in the current world knew enough Old Saxon to say ‘Good Morning’, never mind ‘shit in a church’. Jack did – but that was just business. He remembered Corfe, and the snap of Edward’s arm as Jack pulled him from his horse. The punk swore again. He tore the paper off the wall and stomped out of the alley. Jack followed him. Watched him as he picked his target - another down and out in another alley. Watched him as he pushed the red gem against the down and out’s head, as he pushed a knife through her eye and into her brain. The gem filled with a dull red glow. The punk taped the sheet of paper to the alley wall and began to chant. The spell didn’t take long – but his scream took longer as a burning fire filled the gem in his hand. Now dull eyed, he held the gem tight. He leaned in to read the sheet of paper, then tore it from the wall. He took a flask from his pocket, and the smell of Unicorn Horn filled the air. The teen punk drank – and was gone.

  Jack frowned. That made two too many people getting horny for Jack's liking. But things were working out. Someone wanted to know if the girl was ready for something. She wasn't. Not quite. Jack was willing to bet the tail had a file. And he'd bet that file had a number in it the girl wasn't going to like. Jack did. That number meant he'd have another chance to find her. To find her, and to find who wanted the girl to be ready to give Jack a 357 blow job. Jack grinned. He and the girl had some talking to do. Talking they'd do Jack's way. He took his flask out – and the smell of Unicorn horn filled the air.

  Chapter Eleven

  Back to the Future

  “Sixty! What do you mean, sixty? I got more than that in tenth grade English! And I’d never even heard of Coleridge!”

  “Coleridge? What’s Coleridge got to do with…?” CG looked down at the clipboard in his hand, then up. Then down again at the numbers on his pad. He was looking like he was trying out for the Confused Olympics.

  I didn’t give a shit. I was pissed. “OK, smartass. So tell me.”

  “Yes, Ealdric. Do tell. I’m quite fascinated. AS I’M SURE AGENT MAYA IS. Isn’t that right, darling?”

  I hadn’t heard Mom come in. That wasn’t good. Because nobody creeps up on me. I remembered the bug I’d had in my ear during the mission. Well. Probably nobody. So if Mom had, I hadn’t been paying attention. That wasn’t just not good. It could get me dead. So it was time to stop being pissed, and start being smart. Of course, that wouldn’t stop me kicking CG’s ass later. Yup, pissed and smar
t. I shrugged. “OK, boss.” I looked at CG. “So hit me, C.”

  “I wish.” CG probably thought he’d said that under his breath. Mom winked at me, and smiled. I wondered if that meant she had or she hadn’t already dug a hole for me out in the desert. CG turned to look at Mom. “Field report on Agent Maya, preliminary field assessment mission.”

  Mom raised an eyebrow. “Preliminary?”

  CG shrugged. “I regret to inform my esteemed boss that Agent Maya failed to attain a passing grade. Just, I will refrain from reminding my esteemed boss, as I told you she would, boss.”

  “Don’t be a smartass, Ealdric.” Mom’s voice could have chilled the vodka I wouldn’t have turned down right now quite nicely.

  CG blanched. “No, ma’am. My apologies, ma’am.”

  “Boss will do Ealdric.” Mom smiled. I wondered what frozen vodka actually tasted like. “Report.”

  “Yes, ma’… er, boss.” CG consulted his notes. “Agent Maya completed the mission as per specification, L. The target was terminated, and the method was indeed suitably loud. However, as a primary issue, she did not detect me following her. So that’s twenty points off, right there. Second, she was sloppy with the video files. I know for a fact there were a couple of times the tape showed her on the stairs as the guard while it showed the guard somewhere else at the same time. Mind you…” CG sounded puzzled. “I checked the tape just before she blew the building. It was clean. No twin brother for Mr Warren. How did you do that, Maya?”

  “Maybe if you don’t know, you should be thinking about that number some, huh?” I grinned. I wasn't as good as Mom yet, but my vodka wouldn’t be needing any ice cubes. Problem was – I was faking. I really had missed the tapes. And whoever the hell had fixed them, it sure wasn’t me. So if it hadn’t been CG, that meant there’s been someone else I missed on my ass. Someone who had my back. I wondered what for. I could almost feel a target painted there – I just didn’t know who was holding the gun.

  “Agent Maya has a point, don’t you think Ealdric?” I could tell Mom was amused. “On the other hand, Agent Maya, I really do think you should have detected Ealdric’s presence. Don’t you, dear?”

  I winced. Like always, Mom didn’t really care who won the battles. Either way, she knew she was going to win the war. “Yes, Mom. I…”

  “Boss will do, dear. We are at the office, after all.”

  It’s hard for a few words to drop the temperature in a room thirty degrees. I swear, Mom’s could do fifty and give a dollar change. I winced again. “Yes boss.”

  CG scribbled on his clipboard. He crossed out the 60, and wrote a neat 70. “There was also the matter of the target. Agent Maya let her go to work, and relied on the explosion to terminate her. She then had to wait, to make sure the target didn’t escape the building. While there was no sign of her, and indeed later reports confirmed her termination, in my view it would have been better for Agent Maya to eliminate the target herself the previous evening, and then place her body in the explosion, and…”

  I laughed. “And that’s why you’re Rear Echelon, CG. Not Field.” I grinned. I had this one cold. “Mom? Er, boss?” Mom tilted her head, and nodded, very slightly. But she was grinning too. It was looking like I might even get to drink that vodka. “CG, your way, sure. I wouldn’t have had to wait for her to come out. But there’d have been too many flags.”

  “Flags?” Cg’s Olympic Gold was looking like a done deal. His voice already had him on the podium.

  “Yeah. Flags. Like, the guy she sees on the street every morning on the way to work, walking his dog. The guy she always says hi to. The guy who never saw her that day, and remembers when the cop comes round and ask him questions, because she always gives his dog a treat. Or the lady in the coffee shop she always buys her morning coffee from, who remembers her because she’s a lousy tipper, and remembers she didn’t come in that day. Or…”

  “There aren’t any such people! They’re not in the file!” CG grabbed the target file and started flipping through it.

  I put my hand on his arm. “It’s OK, CG. Calm down. They’re not there. I mean, I have no idea who they are. There might not be a dog, or a coffee shop. But there’s always someone. Actually, someone-s. Little people, little things. Things that get missed from the file. Things dumb cops pounding beats they could walk in their sleep find right away. Things that raise questions. Flags. So my way was better.” I didn’t even look up from CG. “Right, boss?”

  “Absolutely, dear.” I could hear Mom was grinning. CG wasn’t. He scrubbed the 70, and wrote a neat 80. I raised an eyebrow. He crossed out the 80, and wrote 85.

  “But you still missed Ealdric, dear. So I think you need another job, before we can – well, before we move on. Something to make sure you know how to remain properly aware of your surroundings. And I think you’ve given me an idea. Ealdric? My office please. Oh, and do be a dear. There’s a book I’d like you to bring. Number 978-1236735959, I believe.” She grinned. “And Maya? Well done. Very well done indeed.” She smiled. The smile told me I’d been right, Back Then. Something really was fucked. And it was starting to feel even more like it was me.

  Sonata

  Sviluppo - Quarto Movimento

  Washington D.C. - 350 And Down

  “So she works for... for someone who wants you dead.” Prowess wasn't playing the piano. Mostly, she was hitting things. Anything that wasn't her piano.

  “Yup.” The man in the black leather duster unloaded his gun. Then he reloaded it.

  “So they're training her.” Prowess kicked the wall. “Then when she does what they want – they kill her! It doesn't make sense!”

  “Sure it does.” The click of bullets in a magazine echoed in the room. Then the click of them being removed.

  “Not to me!”

  “She’s me. She's me, and the kid's Jack.”

  “You? She can’t be! And the kid - we left Jack at Baie St Marie! Or… what do you mean, she's you?”

  “Me? What are you talking about, P?”

  “You said she’s you, Jack! And you said the kid's Jack!” Prowess’ lips moved as she tried to make sure she had enough Jack’s between them and not one too many. Either way, she didn’t look as though the ones she had tasted too good.

  Jack sighed. “Right. She's me, and the kid's Ruby. Jack Ruby.”

  Prowess raised her eyebrows. “You know Jack, you have way too many Jacks in your life. She paused, her brow furrowed. “But she doesn't look like any bloody Jack I ever knew. Oh damn. You made me say a Bad Word! You happy now Jack? And if she's you, then who are you?”

  Jack sighed again. “Me? I'm John K. I'm the President of...” He paused. “Well, probably not. Be kind of hard being a President nobody noticed. And most everybody noticed John K. No. Even Dallas wasn't that confusing. But she’s still me. See, I mean it’s like the Kennedy thing. Like Dallas.”

  “You mean - Jack, did you shoot Kennedy?”

  “Me? No. Well, or yes. One of those. See, he was Dragon, Kennedy was. Right through the middle. Dragon heard he was going to get retired. So they sent me to find whoever shot him. Persuade whoever it was not to. Permanently. Thing is, I did.”

  “You stopped him? Jack, I hate to tell you this – but you didn’t. Kennedy was assassinated.”

  “Oh, I know that, P. No. I didn’t stop him. But I found him. Right before he pulled the trigger.”

  “So you saw Oswald? Why didn’t you stop him Jack?”

  “Oswald? Who said anything about Oswald?”

  “You did! You said you saw Oswald going to shoot Kennedy!”

  Jack sighed a third time. He’d obviously had a lot of practice. “No I didn’t, P. I said I saw who shot Kennedy. And that wasn't Oswald. Oswald was just a patsy.”

  “Patsy? You mean Oswald was a girl? Like Nixon? But…”

  “Girl? Who said Oswald was a….?”

  It was Prowess' turn to sigh. “You did, Jack. You said Oswald was really Patsy. Like Nixon was really Lucy, right?”r />
  Jack shook his head. “Not Patsy. A patsy. See, it was like this...

  * * *

  Some Where. Some When.

  “So there it is, Shadow. Someone's going to give Agent Kennedy a six and a half millimeter headache. A rather permanent one, unfortunately.” A faint look of disgust marred the lips of the man with the silver topped cane. “Millimeters, Shadow. I'd ask you what the world was coming to if it wasn't exactly what we were making it.” The man with the silver topped cane curled his lip. “Millimeters. If the inch was good enough for Edward the Third, it should be good enough for anyone.” He sighed. “But as I said, there it is. And there you are, Shadow. Or you'd better be. Find whoever it is, and get them out of our business. Just remember – forget Oswald. It's the Knoll. We don't know much, but we know that.” The man with the cane raised an eyebrow. “So why are you still here?”

  Jack didn't look up from the mission file, or the map and photographs spread on the table. He sighed. Umbrellas. Tramps. Magic bullets. OK, so maybe magic bullets. The rest was – messy. Busy. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble to make a mystery – and to make one where no mystery needed to be. Which meant a total amateur – or someone really good at what they did. Which didn't matter. However good they might be, Jack was better. He took the flask from the table, and let Dealey Plaza soak into him. He could almost feel the Paradox Storm round him. He uncapped the flask – and the smell of Unicorn Horn filled the room. Then he was gone.