Dealer's Choice Read online

  He rapped his long wooden staff against the floor. The amethyst flared.

  They were all crowded on the ledge near Bloat’s Moat. The heat from the rushing lava far below made the jumpers gasp; the ruddy light rendered the Outcast’s features fierce and stern. “I built the Rox. I shaped it. Did you think I would make it easy for them?”

  The Outcast slammed the base of his staff against the rocks. They were now arrayed along the north side of the Wall facing Manhattan. The glass eyes of the skyscrapers glittered at them mockingly; behind, the Disney-meets-Escher fairyland of the new Rox stuck out spired tongues in return. “This is our land,” the Outcast told them. “It grows every day in size and strength. Just as the Wall’s now visible, so is my power. You see it in what I’ve done with the Rox. You see it in the demons and strange things that walk in the caverns. And — I promise you this — you’ll see it if the nats are foolish enough to attack.”

  As he spoke the words, a flare shot from across the bay, near where the Wall touched the Jersey shore. It quickly resolved into a cylinder trailing a line of billowing smoke. The weapon shot directly toward them at immense speed. The jumpers cried out, but the Outcast laughed. In the instant before the glowing missile would have struck them, he waved his staff, the stone at its summit glaring, and the jumpers were showered with pink and white petals.

  “In this world, things are as I wish them to be.” The Outcast laughed and flung his arms wide.

  They were back in the hall once more. The Outcast brushed bright petals from his shoulders and folded his hands across the top of his staff, resting his chin atop his hands as he gazed at the jumpers, a hint of a smile on his lips. “I know you’re worried. I understand that. If any of you want to leave, no one here will stop you. You’re free to go if you think that’s what you should do — I’ve told you that before. But I want you to know how much we need you. I’m Bloat, your governor. I’m also the Outcast, the one who calls demons and who builds the Rox. Molly and Bodysnatcher will be back soon with more aces. Croyd will wake up any moment, and his form is very, very promising. But all that’s not enough. I need all of you. The Rox is your land; I’m asking you to stay with me to help protect it. It’s up to you.”

  “The governor says he’s ready.” Kafka gazed at Travnicek from his insect face. His expression was unreadable, but the rest of his body radiated disapproval. “All you have to do is visualize what you want.”

  Travnicek leaned back and threw out his arms. “All right, fat maggot!” he said. “You listening?” Kafka quivered in anger. Jumpers, standing in the courtyard, snickered among themselves.

  Kafka and Travnicek and Modular Man stood in the inner bailey, facing the semitransparent inner wall of the Crystal Keep with its delicate gingerbread balconies and stained-glass eyes. Mortar crews, lounging around their pits, watched from behind sandbags.

  Modular Man’s eyes focused on the inner keep wall. Something was happening there.

  Even replaying the event later he found it difficult to follow. Something shadowlike crawled up the inner wall, something silent and purposeful. One second there was nothing on radar, the next there was. But what it was wasn’t clear until a few seconds later, until it firmed from the ground up like a tree growing in fast motion.

  Travnicek gave a high cackling laugh. All the clustered organs around his neck were swollen and erect.

  “Jesus,” one of the mortar jokers said. “Never saw a neck get a hard-on before!”

  Bloat’s creation stood clear in the light of day. “Hey!” the mortar joker said. “Another goddamn boner!”

  “Not bad, eh?” Travnicek gloated. “Home away from home.”

  What it looked like was a thick tube welded to the inner wall of the keep. The tube thickened as it approached the ground, like a bulbous plant, disappeared below ground level, and on top blossomed into an armored, conical roof.

  Travnicek’s tower.

  Travnicek looked at Kafka. “Thank the Stinkworm for me. will you?” he said, then walked toward the tower. He planted a foot on its vertical surface, tested it, then began walking up the outside of the tower. His body was reflected in its glassine surface. He paused partway up and turned to Modular Man. “Come with me,” he said. “I want you to know how this works.”

  The android floated up next to him as Travnicek finished his climb, then slid through one of the upper story’s armored shutters. Modular Man followed, floating through the window feet first. The upper story consisted of a floor with a hole near the wall that led down into the tower. The heavy metal shutters could be dropped into place at the touch of a lever. Travnicek threw out his arms. “Great!” he said. “I can feel everything from here! Right to the horizon!”

  He moved to the hole in the floor and sat in it, then planted his feet against the wall again and began walking down. His voice came hollow from the hole.

  “Follow.”

  Modular Man floated down the hole. Daylight shining through the semitransparent tower wall provided enough light to see.

  “No stairs, see?” Travnicek said. “Nobody’s gonna follow me down here.”

  The tower seemed to extend some distance below ground level, where the walls became opaque black stone. The floor was bare flags. On the inner wall was a heavy metal hatch with a wheel in the center, like something from a submarine. Travnicek spun the wheel and swung the door open.

  Inside was a room about twenty feet square. There were shelves with canned goods, plastic bottles of water, candles and matches, fantastic Rox furniture, all carved baroque dragons with lolling tongues, including a bed with a headboard made of carved intertwining monsters. Even a chemical toilet behind an oriental screen. Travnicek had visualized things pretty thoroughly.

  “I can stay down here forever,” Travnicek gloated.

  The android let his boots touch the soft carpet on the floor. He glanced around. Calculations sped through his brain, slammed up against one of his hardwired imperatives.

  “Sir?” he said. “Is that door airtight?”

  “Air and watertight!” Travnicek said. “Nothing’s getting in here I don’t want in.”

  “Is there concealed ventilation?” Modular Man asked. “Because if there isn’t, you’ll smother in here. More quickly if you light any of those candles.”

  Travnicek stiffened. “Good you thought of that,” he said.

  The android really hadn’t had any choice. The welfare of his creator was his highest priority. He couldn’t not try to preserve Travnicek’s life.

  Travnicek stood stock-still, concentrating.

  The walls shimmered. Ventilation shafts appeared at head-level, leading up to the tower’s exterior.

  Travnicek cackled. “Thanks, big maggot.”

  The ventilation shafts were another problem, the android realized, another way to get in. But he didn’t think there was an alternative, and anything coming down the shafts would have to be very small.

  “Sir?” Modular Man asked. “How long are we going to stay here? You don’t actually think the governor is going to win, do you?”

  “I don’t much care who wins, toaster,” Travnicek said. “And as for how long we’ll stay” He gave one of his little laughs. “We’ll stay till it’s over. Till Bloat’s dead and can’t do these interesting things anymore.”

  “But if Bloat’s dead”

  “When Bloat’s dead, you get me out,” Travnicek said. “Nobody has to know I’ve ever been here.”

  “They’ll know I’ve been here.’

  Travnicek turned. “That’s something else I don’t care about,” he said.

  The tape ended.

  Wyungare was jerked back from the dark world, from the swamp, from the inside of the crocodile guardian’s head, from the company of Jack the alligator. He opened his eyes, blinked, looked up into the concerned faces of Cordelia and Troll.

  “How do you feel?” said the security man.

  “Like that chap in My Dinner With Andre,” said Wyungare, “except I was attemp
ting to converse with a reptile, and a famished one at that.”

  “The patient’s received plenty of nutrients.”

  “He wants meat,” said Wyungare. “I tried to bargain on that basis.”

  “And?” said Cordelia. “You really contacted him? How is he?” "He is an alligator,” said Wyungare. “There is very little of the human aspect of your uncle at home on that side. But I believe we have come to something of an agreement.”

  “Good,” said Troll, “because he’s starting to come awake. Time for me to go invisible again. I don’t know anything of what’s happening. Remember that.”

  “That’s Dr. Finn’s line,” said Cordelia.

  Troll smiled. “You’re right. Actually, I’ve got an appointment.” He started for the door. “Good luck, you two.” His tone got serious. “Don’t let him hurt anyone.” He indicated the alligator. “Except maybe Dr. Bob, that kraut son of a bitch. And don’t let him hurt himself. Please?”

  “We shall do our best,” said Wyungare.

  “I love him,” said Cordelia.

  Troll looked at them a moment longer, then turned and was gone.

  “Now what?” said Cordelia.

  Wyungare looked down at the outside window. He smiled. “The clinic deals with laundry several times a day.”

  “The clean comes in, the dirty goes out, so?”

  “There is a truck downstairs now, apparently loading soiled laundry.”

  “So?” Cordelia said. “You proposing to smuggle Uncle Jack out in a laundry hamper? That’s another movie I’ve seen more than once.”

  “I think not. He’s just a little large for a hamper.” The alligator was beginning to writhe on the bed platform. The black cat jumped onto the chair at the platform’s head and stared at the alligator, nose to snout. “We are on the third floor,” said Wyungare. “We have to get past the second to the ground floor. I saw some reconstruction going on — on the second level. We have to get Jack down there.” He quickly outlined the rest of his plans to Cordelia. “I’ll accompany you for a ways, then I will go down to the ground floor and maneuver the truck in place.”

  The Aborigine went to the alligator, whose eyes were now fully open. Fetid breath whistled in and out of the powerful jaws. Wyungare placed the heel of his hand on the reptile’s forehead. His palm seemed dwarfed by the armored plates. He concentrated for a few seconds. “All right,” he said, “let us go.”

  “Thank God,” said Cordelia, once they were out in the corridor. Jack took up a considerable amount of that corridor. Wyungare looked at her questioningly. “I’m afraid there’ll be more witnesses a floor down,” she said. “The elevator?”

  Wyungare shook his head. “I don’t think so. Your uncle’s flexible, but I don’t think he’ll bend that much.” They came to the door to the stairwell and the Aborigine pulled it open. He held it for the others.

  “We could just walk all the way down to the first floor,” said Cordelia.

  “There are many more people there,” said Wyungare. “Our answer is a floor above them.”

  “You’re the shaman,” said Cordelia, flashing him a brilliant smile. She went ahead, the cat bounding down the steps as though on point. The alligator wheezed and cantilevered his body down the concrete flight. Wyungare followed.

  The mid-floor landing was a squeeze, but the alligator got around it. The party approached the second-floor access door. Cordelia slipped it open a few inches, looked out, turned, and motioned the rest to follow. She opened the door as far as it would go. The doorway was close to the juncture of two main halls.

  “To the right,” said Wyungare, “to the renovation work.”

  “Ssh,” said Cordelia.

  The alligator’s short legs pumped and the reptile squeezed into the hallway. The other hallway led to the physicians’ office wing. The elevator bank was about halfway to the offices where they had searched in vain for Finn.

  A bell chimed and elevator doors hissed open.

  “Oh, shit,” said Cordelia.

  Three people exited the car and turned toward the offices, and away from the escape party. One of them was Finn, prancing a little as his hooves clattered on the tile. One was Troll. The other was Dr. Bob Mengele.

  Troll ushered the party along the hall, away from the escapees. Finn carefully kept his eyes to the fore. Wyungare couldn’t see Dr. Bob’s face, but it sounded as though he was talking through clenched teeth.

  “Tonight,” said Dr. Bob. “I will disassemble our Cajun friend tonight. There is no question of ethical ambiguity here. I will be vivisecting only an alligator, not a human being. I will find things out. The gay community will thank me. I may, as well, discover things of great importance to the joker community as well.”

  “I don’t think this will be possible,” Finn said.

  “It will be possible,” said Dr. Bob tightly. “Trust me.”

  The doctors and the security man reached an office door at the end of the hail. Finn and Dr. Bob went first. Wyungare was sure he saw a flash of one huge Troll eye winking back at him. Then the door closed.

  He started, realizing the explosive rush of fetid air beside him was because the alligator had been holding his breath too.

  “You can take Jack the rest of the way,” said Wyungare. “I will find another stairwell and go to the ground. Wait for my signal.”

  Cordelia nodded. She looked appraisingly at the alligator and then kissed Wyungare. “Hurry,” she said.

  The Aborigine sprinted down to the end of the corridor, noting with approval the placement of the mouth of the waste chute to the street. He found the stairwell access and sped down the concrete steps silently.

  On the ground floor, he found the street exit. Outside, the laundry truck was still there, and only a few yards from the spot he wanted. Wyungare sprang into the back and started throwing armloads of dirty linens out onto the street. He had a small mountain of soiled laundry piled up when the driver came out of the clinic.

  “Hey, muthuh!” he yelled. The driver was short and spindly, skin looking like it had been crisped in a waffle iron.

  Wyungare grunted and tossed another armload of sheets out the back. “Please leave me alone,” he grunted. He fixed the driver’s eyes and grinned in what he hoped was a maniacal way.

  “Urn, sure, man,” said the driver. “Take all the filthy sheets you want. No problem.” He turned and walked toward the clinic door. “Honk when you’re done. I’m gonna shoot up some Java.”

  Wyungare was done. He glanced up at the second floor, then reached forward past the driver’s seat and punched the horn rim three times. Then he got out and waited.

  Like many other buildings renovating on the cheap in Manhattan, the builders used a simple plank-and-timber chute to convey all the broken wallboard and plaster and scrap down to the street, where it could be carted off.

  Wyungare saw the snout of the alligator first, then the rest of him as he wiggled into the chute and started to flow downward like a mossy, green tidal wave. The alligator hit the mounded laundry with an audible whoof and an impact that shook the sidewalk.

  The Aborigine saw Cordelia staring down from a window. He motioned to her. Then he stood clear as the large reptile whipped his tail back and forth, struggling free of the sheets and towels.

  “Let’s go, my cousin,” said Wyungare. He glanced about, getting his bearings. He knew which way was the Rox.

  Cordelia and the black cat burst out through the door of the clinic and followed after them, on the run. Wyungare was trotting now. “Uncle Jack can really motor,” gasped Cordelia, catching up.

  Man, woman, alligator, and cat, they escaped together. Nobody seemed to notice.

  After all, this was Jokertown.

  And it was New York.

  Do whatever the Great White Worm wants, Travnicek had said. Just check with me every couple hours.

  What the Great White Worm wanted was information.

  “Your memory is very detailed, yes?” Kafka leaned forward to p
eer at Modular Man from only a few inches away. The android had noticed that Kafka kept his distance from everyone else but didn’t seem to mind getting close to him. Maybe he liked machines, Modular Man thought. Or disliked people.

  “Yes,” Modular Man said. “My memory is very detailed, though I frequently edit unimportant parts to save space.”

  “And you’ve been in Zappa’s headquarters.”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you see the maps?”

  “Yes.”

  “Describe them.”

  “I wasn’t paying any particular attention to them.”

  “But the memories are very detailed. Pay attention to them.”

  “I will.” He brought the images scrolling out of his memory banks. “I don’t know what most of the symbols mean,” he added.

  “That doesn’t matter. We do.”

  Modular Man, since the rout of the peace mission, had spent most of the afternoon being debriefed by Bloat’s assistants. Zappa’s plans for overwhelming the Rox with a barrage of missiles had both impressed and angered them. It appeared they had been expecting another attack by ground troops, much like the last.

  “Come with me,” Kafka said. “I’ll show you our maps.”

  Kafka led Modular Man up several flights of stairs, into a part of the castle made of gray stone instead of glass, and then down a long corridor tiled in black-and-white slate. Graceful Romanesque window arches were supported by columns painted in spirals of white and blue. Stained-glass windows showed heroic, legendary scenes, identified in strong Roman letters: LOHENGRIN DISPLAYS THE GRAIL, YSVELT MOVRNS FOR TRISTRAM, THEODEN DEFEATS THE ORCS OF SARVMAN. The panicked, screaming ores all looked like jokers in armor. Kafka didn’t seem to notice.

  The end of the corridor was less impressive — the bare stone was fused and scabbed, as if it had been melted, and a misshapen door was set into it. Apparently Bloat hadn’t thought out this part of the building very thoroughly. Kafka led Modular Man inside. Inside, high in a tower, was what looked like a medieval version of Zappa’s headquarters. Communications equipment was stacked on shelves; maps were pinned to the wall; a large reel-to-reel tape recorder spun on a desktop; an intent four-eyed joker worked a court reporter’s stenography machine; a legless joker in a wheelchair frowned at pins in a map. Light was provided by fluorescents and cross-shaped arrow slits.