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“Is the girl healing?”
Chong smiled at the floor. “She heals. Medicines sold to the old
witch, Maggie, work wonders in her. The healing ‘bots closed the bleeding in
her womb and even now cleanse her of several diseases.”
“AIDS?” The fan snapped closed without regard for the
shell-like fragility of the antique ivory blades.
Chong hesitated. “Yes,” he said at last. “But, the virus is
nearly gone. Also Hepatitis 13. And signs of Killer 4.”
The old woman gasped. “He hasn’t had sex with her, yet, has
he?”
“Sue is ill. He suffers but will not allow it.”
His mistress gave Benny a sharp look. Her eyes narrowed.
“He is stronger than we believed, then. These Europeans and
their slaves are weak in that way.”
“Does my lady desire him alive or not?”
“I desire him bound and gagged and unconscious in a cage in the
Gardens of Shan Ti, if God would have him.” She tapped the fan. “Take him to
the House of Antone and leave him.
Chong gaped at her. “My lady?” He shivered and rammed his head
to the floor. “Forgive me.”
“What?” The fan snapped a few times. Then she gave a small
laugh. “Oh, look on me, Nephew. You have my permission to be at ease with
me.”
“I thank my lady,” Chong said, but didn’t move.
“When Sue is healed, take them both. Go, now.”
The agent scooped up Benny and angled out the door. He hurried
through the night to Antone’s Place before lying the man on the street. Silver
flashed, and he tapped a needle into Benny’s arm.
Tiny healing ‘bots raced through Benny’s system. He muttered a
groan, and Chong lifted his head up. Chong tapped a small button, and the clothes
changed color, growing more subdued that the matte black.
“Hey, kid,” Chong said. "Some jerk nailed you but he ran
off when he saw me. You gonna live?”
“Hm . . .” Benny’s hand reached back to the lump on his head,
and he gritted his teeth.
“I’m Roger. Will Roger,” the man said and Benny took his
hand
“Ben Wolf.”
Benny stood and pounded on the door. Jason’s face showed,
grinning.
“It da kid, mon." The grin changed. “Who that wit’
ye?”
"A friend. Will Roger.”
The door opened, and Jason held the shotgun up.
“Come on in, boys. The whiskey is hot an’ the homebrew
cold.”
Chong followed Benny in. He spotted Mike and a snoring Creel
seated back in the corner booth. His eyes widened, but the door slammed shut
behind them.
The shon:gili squatted
on the street. A man moved out of the bar bringing odors of beer and tobacco
smoke that made the shon:gili drool
with Carl’s hunger even as the demon choked on the smell of tobacco. The
clothes flickered. The shon:gili
stared, but the man disappeared into the gloom.
Dressed now in light-absorbing black, the man crossed the street
to move along the building. The shon:gili
followed him for several blocks. A door opened in the tavern. The man stopped.
Several people came from the building to walk in a huddle away from the door.
The shadow of steel showed them to all be armed.
The door slammed shut. Along the wall, the man began to move
again. The shon:gili backed into a
hole. The man stilled, staring at the shon:gili.
Night-vision goggles,
Carl whispered.
The shon:gili sought
through Carl’s memories for the term and found dozens of references, most of
them in the middle of memories of a place called Sur America and unrelieved war
in a dense, green jungle and the slums of cities there. Jivarista drug lords
fighting UN-propped governments and both battling desperate people.
The demon whispered a laugh. Necoc,
He who is Enemy-of-Both-Sides. Satan. Lucifer. The Owl. All one and the same god.
Backing deeper into the hole and ducking his head, the shon:gili
waited for the sound of footsteps. A count to ten came and went before the man
moved.
He slid out. The man was standing before a cracked, peeling door a
block away and inserting something into cracks between the rotting bricks.
A tap.
This thought from Carl shined with telephones and men in dark
clothes.
Nosing out from the hole, the shon:gili
slid down the block. The man stepped away from the building, watching him.
Muzzle raised, the shon:gili caught
the scent of tea and the smell of an unwashed body.
It was enough. He moved along the row homes and passed the man.
All over this area was the scent of the wolf’s brat. Benny was near, and Carl
was rocking and shaking with the pain of what he was to do.
Kill the brat, the demon
said, and laughed.
©2004 StoriesByEmail.com
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