Not the kind of guy you wanted to take home to meet the parents, unless you were trying to induce a couple of heart attacks to get an early inheritance. I was pretty confident in my ability to take care of myself. Some nitpickers might even call me arrogant. But the only way I’d take on a troll was with artillery from the next county.
We finally arrived at our destination. A block of row houses, half of them fallen down, and a huge, squat building that I guessed used to be a store of some kind. I wasn’t impressed, except by the size of the rat sitting on a pile of rubble, daring me to get out of the van.
Alscher wasn’t daunted, throwing open the door and climbing out into the street. The rat held its ground, but didn’t attack. I wasn’t fooled. Where there was one rat, there were a million, and that had all the signs of an ambush.
“We’re here. Come on,” Alscher said.
“What about the wildlife?” I asked, fingering my pistol in my purse.
“Huh?” He looked around as though he hadn’t noticed there was a rat half the size of a German Shepard ten feet away. “Don’t worry,” he said, turning back to me. “They don’t attack adults.”
I wanted to ask how they told the difference. Did they ask to see identification? I crawled out of the van, keeping Alscher between me and the rat king, and followed the driver into the old store. Most of the glass was missing, so the wind whistled through the place. It seemed to go on forever. We proceeded across the floor to a stairwell that led down.
It was dark at the bottom except for two pairs of glowing animal eyes. When my sight adjusted, I realized the eyes belonged to an orange tabby cat and his calico companion, both larger than the rat. One of them yawned, revealing teeth like daggers.
Proceeding through a door, we found light and people. The place looked a bit like a bar in a bomb shelter, though there were some cots and beds. Music played from a radio.
Alscher pulled a couple of beers from a cooler on a long table, popped the tops off the bottles, and handed me one. “I’ve sent word to Carly. She’ll come when she can.”
I looked around and wandered over to sit at an empty table. Alscher didn’t follow me. None of the people who kidnapped me seemed to pay much attention to me. I guessed they didn’t worry about me escaping, with good reason. Where would I go? Outside with the rats? I knew approximately where I was in relation to where I’d been and to the lake, but I had no idea how to get back or tell Mike where I was.
Most of the people, about fifty or sixty, were obviously mutants or had congenital abnormalities. Lycans—also called wolfmen—with lots of hair, people with scales, vamps, and a woman with two heads flirting with two different guys, mixed in with people who looked normal, but probably weren’t.
The conversations around me ranged from a discussion of a classic novel, to an argument about revolutionary tactics, to a guy trying to seduce a woman who didn’t act very interested.
About half an hour after we arrived, a tall man a bit older than I was pulled a chair next to mine and dropped into it. I noticed there was webbing between his long fingers, and his face seemed elongated, his mouth extending far beyond his short, broad nose. In my mind, I labeled him Horseface. I wasn’t interested in ever learning his real name.
“Hi, sweet thing. What’s your name?”
“Leave me alone,” I said, turning away from him and looking for Alscher. He was standing across the room, talking to three other men.
“That’s not a very friendly attitude,” Horseface said, putting one arm around my shoulders and sticking his other hand between my legs. “You need to be friendly, otherwise you won’t do very well around here.”
I smiled at him, batted my eyes, and laid my hand on his arm. He took it as encouragement and, with a smirking leer, squeezed me hard enough to make me gasp. Taking hold of his wrist, I pulled his hand out of my crotch and gently placed his hand on the table. Then I pinned his arm to the table with a stiletto.
He cursed, jumping up and away from me. The table tipped over, dragging his arm down, and he shrieked in pain.
Stepping toward him, I grabbed his shoulders and drove my knee between his legs as hard as I could. His eyes bulged and he dropped moaning to his knees. I knelt beside him and pressed the muzzle of my pistol against his temple.
“You know how you feel when you knock a woman down,” I said into his ear, “and then you stand over her, unbuckle your belt, and unzip your pants? You know how that feels, don’t you?”
He took a sobbing breath.
“Don’t you?” I insisted.
“Yes,” he said in a ragged voice.
“You like forcing women, don’t you?” I continued in a soft, crooning voice. “It makes you feel strong and powerful, doesn’t it? Come on, you can tell me. Doesn’t it make you feel fantastic? Don’t you hate them? Isn’t it great to see them grovel before you? The fear in their eyes is even better than the sex, isn’t it?”
He took several deep, panting breaths, then whispered, “Yes.”
“Well, I’m going to blow your brains out,” I said. He whimpered. “Now you know how those women felt. This is for all of them.”
I looked beyond him, adjusted the angle of my pistol a little, and pulled the trigger. Blood and brains sprayed the floor and the wall beyond.
Dead silence descended on the room. No one even breathed.
“I keep my promises,” I told Alscher as I walked to the cooler, pulled out another beer, and went over to a table with three couples and an empty chair.
“Anyone using this chair?”
Everyone shook their heads.
“I hate rapists,” I said. The eyes of two of the women slid to their companions, then back toward me. The men stared at me in fear and revulsion, leaning back in their seats to get as far away from me as possible.
The third woman simply stared at me. I was fascinated by her exotic beauty. Pale golden skin with fine, tiny scales, straight black hair to her waist, and delicate seashell ears that were half the size of a normal human’s. The pupils of her eyes were vertical slits, like a cat. Her anger was almost palpable, but I didn’t think it was aimed at me. Hopefully, I’d made one ally.
I took a sip of my beer and looked around. Every eye in the place was on me. While I was trying to project an air of nonchalant kick-ass, I was actually terrified. I didn’t know if I had ensured my safety or signed my death certificate. It was getting late, and I’d have to sleep sooner or later.
Chapter 19
Carly showed up around midnight.
“Libby, what a surprise. I didn’t know you were here.”
“Really? Your buddy Alscher said he told you I was here.”
The confused look on her face told me everything I needed to know.
“No, but I don’t carry a phone, so he might have tried to get word to me. It’s good to see you. Did you think about what I said? Are you going to help us?”
Deep sigh. She looked so hopeful. “Help you do what?”
“We need a leader, someone who can mobilize the masses, give them direction, get them working together.”
“I have no idea why you think I would be good at that sort of thing,” I said. “I thought you were the leader here.” I waved my hand to indicate the room. “Everybody here seems to follow you.”
“I’m the prophet,” she said enthusiastically. “I see things. I see through things. Delusions, illusions, lies. Like I can see through your disguises. And sometimes I see the future. I’ve seen you, seen you lead our people to freedom.”
She seemed like such a sweet girl. It was disheartening to realize she was delusional. Stark raving mad. Bat-shit crazy.
“Carly, do you ever take anything to help you see your visions?” I asked.
Again, she looked confused. “You mean like drugs? No, never. Sometimes I eat some mushrooms. They help me to relax and lower the veils. But they aren’t drugs. Gustav grows them.”
Ah. I glanced over to where Alscher sat watching us.
“Carly, I didn�
��t come here by accident,” I started.
“I know. It’s part of the cosmic plan,” she said. I could see where her enthusiasm might be contagious, especially amongst a bunch of losers without much hope.
“No, that’s not what I meant. Gustav and a gang of toughs with guns kidnapped me. They threatened to kill the people I was with if I didn’t comply.”
She shot Alscher a startled glance, but her certainty wasn’t shaken for long. “Well, the universe has to work through people. That’s why it needs you. God helps those who help themselves, you know.”
I tried not to roll my eyes. After a while, Carly and Alscher led me to one of the row houses nearby and showed me to a room on the second floor with a pile of rags in the corner. I assumed that was supposed to be a bed. The chances I would crawl in with the bedbugs and whatever else might be living there were nil.
Luckily, I didn’t have to brave outdoors to find the outhouse. They had dug a pit in the basement and placed a board over it to sit on. The stench was lovely, quite in keeping with the rest of the décor. But they also afforded me some privacy, so I called Mike.
If I had a normal phone, he would have been able to track me. But, as I’d told Wil about Margarita Martinez, I used a hardened phone, with every privacy feature known to modern technology.
“Libby?” Mike answered.
“Yeah, it’s me.”
“Thank God. Where are you?”
“Not entirely sure. Area looks like a war zone.” I described my general location as best I could. Then Wil got on the phone.
“Describe that abandoned store,” he said.
After a while, he told me, “I’m pretty sure I know where you are. Can you get free? Go outside, I mean?”
“Sure. When? Wil, there are rats out there the size of dinosaurs, and God only knows what else. Some of the cockroaches have saddles. And there are trolls.”
I thought I heard a snicker.
“It’s not funny, damn it. I saw a cat the size of a tiger. This is a scary place.”
“Give us an hour, then go outside. We’ll pick you up.”
“I hope you’re bringing a battalion with you. I’m in the fourth row house from the corner, a block from the parking lot around that old store. One hour from right now. Don’t be late.”
I went back to my room. Pushing the small table there against the wall, I sat on it and leaned back. It wasn’t comfortable, but it was the best I could do. Sounds in the rest of the building soon ceased, and I listened to the serenade of a cat and a rat having a disagreement outside.
When the hour was up, I pried loose a couple of the boards covering the window, blurred my shape, and crawled out onto the roof covering the front porch. I hung by my arms while I gathered my courage, then dropped the fifteen feet or so to the ground. I landed awkwardly on the uneven surface, letting myself fall and roll while I covered my face and head with my arms. Graceful it wasn’t, and I hurt like hell in several places.
I limped out to the street and looked around. No one but Carly could see me, but I didn’t know if blending into the background affected my scent. I assumed the rats hunted by smell. I’d much rather fight a bunch of thugs than a pack of rats.
My chrono showed that I was on time. I didn’t see any movement on the street leading into the neighborhood. Then I happened to look up. About a hundred feet above me, an aircar blocked out part of the stars. I unblurred my form and pulled out my phone.
“I’m right below you,” I said when Mike answered.
The sense of relief as I watched the aircar descend was on a par with getting out of the Chicago jail. I was really beginning to hate that town.
A shout came from behind me to my right. I cast a glance that way as the aircar settled on the street twenty feet in front of me. A figure in a dark, hooded cloak ran toward me. I ran to the open door of the aircar.
I jumped in and reached out to pull the door closed when I saw the person running toward us push their hood back. It was the woman with the gold-scaled skin.
“Wait!” I shouted as the aircar began to rise. “Wil, we have another passenger.”
One of the things I liked about Wil, when the action got heated, he didn’t argue or hesitate, he just got the job done. The aircar dropped back to the pavement.
She reached us and looked up at me, breathing heavily. “Take…take me with…with you,” she panted.
I reached out my hand, took hers, and pulled her in over me, then slammed the door. “Go!”
The aircar rose, circled once over the area, then headed north toward a more civilized part of town.
I looked at the hand I held in mine. In addition to the scales covering her skin, webbing connected her long, clawed fingers.
Mike turned from the front seat and gave the woman a thorough inspection, then glanced at me.
“My name’s Libby,” I told her. “I don’t believe we were introduced.”
“Miriam,” she said. “Miriam al-Azadi. Thank you.” She had an accent. Arabic maybe? Softer than what I associated with Arabic.
“Couldn’t you have left any time?” I asked. “Were you a prisoner?”
“Alscher’s pet. Carly’s handmaiden. A plaything. They told me that I couldn’t go out in normal society because I’m a monster and they would kill me or lock me away in a zoo. But when you looked at me, and I saw your eyes, I knew they’d lied.” The accent was fairly strong, her pronunciation sibilant as she drew out her S’s and rolled her R’s.
“I don’t understand. What did you see in my eyes?”
“It’s what I didn’t see. No horror, no revulsion, no pity. You weren’t even curious. You looked at me in exactly the same way as you looked at the woman beside me.”
“Where are you from?”
“I was born north of the Himalayas in Central Asia. My parents sold me when I was very young, and then I was sold again and again. Alscher bought me seventeen years ago in the part of Ukraine called Moldova.”
“How old were you when Alscher bought you?” Mike asked in a quiet voice.
“Fourteen, I think. He took me to Africa, then to South America. That’s where he found Carly. She was just a girl, then.”
Slavery was outlawed everywhere, but we all knew it still existed.
“Where are we going?” Wil asked.
“We need to retrieve our things from our hotel,” I said. “Then we’re open to suggestions. Not the place where you and Tarden Corporation have a million bugs planted, and definitely someplace far from any mutie areas.”
Mike gave Wil directions, and he took us to the hotel. We collected our equipment and clothes in less than half an hour, including the time to defuse all the booby traps, cameras, and listening devices I’d installed.
“The Chamber has a safe house,” Wil suggested.
“And you don’t mind if I short out all of your electronics?” I asked with as sweet a smile as I could muster.
His expression didn’t indicate a great deal of support for the idea.
Mike wandered off and made a phone call. When he came back, he gave Wil an address and received a surprised response.
“Are you serious?”
“Oh, yes. We’ll be fine there,” Mike said.
Wil gave me a look, then looked back to Mike.
“I’m fine with anything Mike sets up,” I said.
So, we ended up at Jezebel’s House of Pleasure. The grand lady herself met us at the back door, giving Mike a hug and me a big smile. “My, have you grown up.”
“Hi, Doreen,” I said. “It’s been a while.” Doreen, or Jezebel, had worked for my mom as a dominatrix when I was in middle school.
She gave us a couple of spare rooms, I paid her a boatload of money, and for the first time in weeks, I went to bed feeling safe. Brothels didn’t stint on personal security. It would be easier to break into a bank.
Mike woke me four hours later.
“Do you have a death wish?” I asked him as I tried to pry one eye open. It was awfully bright. I sho
uld have closed the curtains before I went to bed.
“Margarita Martinez left home for her hairdresser’s,” he said.
“I hope she dies of electrical shock from a hair dryer,” I grumbled, rolling over and pulling a pillow over my head.
“Wil called and said he thinks he has a line on the Frenchmen.”
I popped up and headed for the washroom. “Why didn’t you say so?”
Twenty minutes later, showered and dressed, I joined Miriam and Mike downstairs shortly before Wil showed up. Doreen had tossed Miriam’s rags and found some reasonably decent clothes for her to wear. We jumped in Wil’s fancy car, and he drove us to his office at Chamber headquarters.
“First thing,” Wil said to Miriam when we arrived, “I have several people who would like to meet with Miss al-Azadi to discuss Gustav Alscher and Democracy Now. Is that all right with you?”
She moved closer to me, her eyes asking me for guidance.
“She’s not in any trouble, is she?” I asked Wil. My trust in him wasn’t at an all-time high.
“Oh, no.”
“You just want to talk to her as an expert consultant, is that right?” I pressed.
“Exactly.”
“And the rate you’ll pay her is how much per hour?”
He gave me as startled a look as she did.
“What are your standard witness fees?” I asked.
“Fifty an hour.”
I turned to Miriam. “Is that acceptable?” I doubted she had ever had fifty credits of her own in her entire life. She’d probably never had a bank account or a credit card.
Wide eyed, she nodded.
I winked at Wil. “I think we have a deal. Just tell your people to remember to feed her. Neither of us has had breakfast yet.”
Wil chuckled. “Is that a hint?”
“I certainly hope so,” I said.
He was pretty good at taking hints, leading us to the building’s cafeteria. It was a déjà vu moment for me, with Miriam’s reaction similar to the first time I took Glenda to a grocery store. She froze and just stared with her mouth open. That reaction was enough to cement my dislike for Alscher. The corporate system that gave someone like her no choices was already on my general shit list.
Chameleon Uncovered Page 15
