Fantasmagoria (29 page)

“But . . .” Vernal stuttered. Lie? Or truth? “Okay, I was ly--”

“Zen-ji!” Erasmus called.

Everyone moved to the side as the floor shook and the giant samurai strode into the office.

“Jack and I were gonna meet downtown. LaMana’s territory, where you couldn’t get us.”

“He doesn’t know where Jack is. No tricks with this one. Make it clean.”

In one move, Zen-ji drew his sword and sliced through Vernal and the chair. The strike separated Vernal’s abdomen from his torso and severed his arms just below the elbow. Loosed from his bonds, the scoundrel’s handless upper half tumbled to the floor.

Whether it was shock, remnants of the numbing stirge, or both, Vernal didn’t scream. He didn’t flail. All he could do was drag himself by the stubs of his arms across the floor toward the giant painting of the Riming Temple.

Everyone in the room watched in silence as Vernal the Infernal grunted and slid and bled into the fabric.

“He’s ruining the carpet,” Erasmus complained.

Vernal sneered. He stared at the painting and its throngs of huddled pilgrims winding up a mountainside to seek salvation at the top. Vernal squinted. He was close, so close to the Genix. It was just behind that wall. Escape, the fruition of his master plan, the path to everything he wanted in the world was

just . . .

behind . . .

that . . .

Three feet from the painting, ten feet from his heart’s desire, and with bloody nubs still outstretched, Vernal Wort died.

Sciever snickered and moved toward the body.

“No.” Erasmus was grim. “Leave it. I want Jack to see. Right before we take his head.”

Zen-ji had already wiped and sheathed his sword. He walked out, stood by the door, and waited.

(THIRTY-ONE) Bigger Problems

Jack dragged his foot through the swinging, rusted gates of Hoosegow Prison. He stopped to look at the concrete hulk, like a half-buried head in the ground. It even had a large window near the door like an empty eye.

A lot of bad things had happened at Hoosegow. He wasn’t happy to be back.

Jack had spent the afternoon in Imperial custody along with every other mechanoid in the city who vaguely matched his description. He’d stood in lineup after lineup as unseen accusers whispered behind two-way mirrors. While he was waiting in a fluorescent hall between sessions, he saw Imperial soldiers carrying Pugs from one of the observation rooms. The little rat-dog was dressed in an orange straight jacket and muzzle and looked like a diminutive cannibal. It was probably the only way they could shut him up.

Pugs hadn’t recognized Jack, not with his new skin job. Vernal had been smart to make him get it.

Vernal.

Jack wondered where he was.

He walked down the abandoned, leaf-littered steps of Hoosegow and through the secret door that led to the sublevel. He jumped back when something fluttered in his face. “Ah!” It was small, black, eyeless. He swatted at it.

“Jack!” Gilbert raised his arms from the macabre floor below.

Jack had almost forgotten the piles—parts of his people were everywhere. It was the last place in the world he wanted to be.

“Jack. You made it. I thought for sure I was alone.” Gilbert ran to greet him. His broken arm was bandaged in a splint. He shook’s Jack’s hand.

“What is that thing?” Jack nodded to the flying creature.

Gilbert beamed. “It’s a withering sprite. It’s been living here, eating the dried bodies of my fairy collection.”

“Huh?”

“It doesn’t matter.” Gilbert was flushed and couldn’t stop smiling. “I thought--well, I thought I was all alone. Come on, Jack. I got it all ready.”

“Got what ready?” Jack scowled at the sprite, which hissed back.

“I’ll show you. I needed something to do while I waited. If I just sat here, I probably would have--never mind.”

“Right.”

“So, I got everything ready. I found parts, and I made a harness so I could lift you up to work. I got all my tools out.”

“Nice fire.” Jack nodded to one of the old ovens, which was glowing deep red.

“Well, it’s a little cool down here.”

Jack looked at the standing harness.

“Do you want anything? I mean, I know you don’t need to drink or anything, but I found some fresh water. And I have food. Pimpernel’s people really did pack everything from my apartment. Even my groceries. Isn’t that silly? I made sandwiches.”

Jack shrugged. “Let’s do it.”

“Now?”

Jack nodded. “I spent the whole day waiting.”

“What about this?” Gilbert produced the key.

Jack stared at it. He took it over to the oven and reached to open it.

“Don’t!” Gilbert yelled.

Jack turned.

“I opened it earlier and it almost burned the place down.”

Jack scowled and slid the key through a small vent in the door. He watched it heat up inside. Soon, it started to glow. Jack turned and saw the withering sprite sitting on the frame of the harness. “Is that your pet?” He walked over, through the piles of metal decay.

“Not really. Climb in and wrap those straps over your arms. I think he hangs around because I keep feeding him.”

Jack did as he was told. “Strays know a good thing when they see it.”

Gilbert climbed up a ladder and shooed the withering out of the way. “What happened to you?”

“The Empire showed up. Took me downtown.”

“You were arrested?”

Jack nodded.

“Oh, try not to nod please. I’m going to look in your head.”

“My head?”

“Yeah. To see if your memory was tampered with, like you said.”

“Right.”

“How did you escape?”

“I didn’t. They let anyone without a charge go. Something happened, I think. Half the city’s without power, and I heard automatic gunfire on the way over. Sirens.”

“I heard an explosion a while back.” Gilbert was quiet. “What do you think it means?”

“Don’t know. Didn’t ask.”

“Wow.”

“What?”

“You were right, Jack. I think someone’s been messing around in here.”

Jack squinted.

Gilbert had lifted the gunslinger’s cranial cap, under his wig, and was peering inside the metal man’s head with a flashlight. “There’s a control gear. It’s got some scratches. And there’s a restraining bolt that looks like it doesn’t belong.”

“Can you remove it?”

The withering landed on Jack’s head and mimicked Gilbert, who shooed it away again.

“Not with these tools. I mean, I could try, but most of the gears in your head are . . . microscopic. Nano-sized, really. You have a completely mechanical brain. It’s amazing.”

“So I’ve heard.”

“I bet if I hit it with a hammer now, your gears and switches would fly away like dust. That’s how small they are. I don’t wanna break it.”

“Then just fix my limbs so I can get the hell outta here.”

“Okay.” Gilbert closed the skull.

“Gil?”

“Yeah?”

Jack took a breath. “Thanks.”

Gilbert smiled. “You’re welcome.” He had forgotten what it was like to have friends.

“I mean it. I wasn’t sure you’d wait around. I’m glad you did.”

“Thanks.” Gilbert blushed.

“I owe you. For this, and for helping me out in the Arcade.”

“It’s okay. After all the shit that’s happened, I don’t know. I guess it feels good to help someone.” He sniffed.

Jack couldn’t see Gilbert’s face. “You okay?”

The withering settled on the table and started eating Gilbert’s lunch.

“I don’t know.” He sniffed again. He wiped his nose and went back to work on Jack’s arm. “I guess I’m finally realizing how much everything was a joke, ya know? How much Pugs used me.”

“Don’t beat yourself up too much. These people are professional liars.”

“Yeah, but it’s just… It’s enough to just make you wanna give up. Just let them win. All of them.”

“Yeah.”

“Why haven’t you?”

“Given up?”

“Yeah.”

Jack frowned. “Came close a couple times.”

“What happened?”

Jack clenched his brow. “Somebody told me recently that what matters isn’t the choices you make when things are easy. It’s what you do when times are tough. That seemed right to me.” He paused. “If I gave up just because Erasmus was making things difficult, well--”

Something snapped in Jack’s arm.

“Ow.”

“Sorry. Arm’s all better. Let’s see that leg.”

Jack moved his arm in circles. It was perfect.

Gilbert grabbed a pile of metal rings he’d left on a chair and shooed the withering from his food, but the sprite hissed at him and took the sandwich under the table.

Gilbert sat on a crate at Jack’s dangling feet. “I know what you mean. Sometimes I think I’m never going to find a cure. I mean, it’s been fourteen years, and I’m no closer than I was at day one.”

“How did it happen?”

“The accident?”

Jack nodded.

“A cooling valve failed. We had redundancies, but when I was down there fixing it, three more failed. The core melted, and I was trapped under the reactor for almost eighteen hours.”

“Bad luck.”

“I always thought so, too.”

“It wasn’t?”

Gilbert shrugged. “It might have been sabotage.”

“Sabotage?”

Gilbert nodded. “Done.” He pulled the stitches taut. “All fixed up. You just had a busted O-ring. But your exoskeleton, it’s really strong.”

Jack dropped from the harness, clenched his fists, and flexed his draw arm.

“How does that feel?”

“Like I was just forged.” Jack lifted his leg. “Thanks.”

“No problem.”

“I mean it,” Jack insisted as he flexed his hip. “I owe you.”

“I’m just glad I got to talk to someone for awhile without that stupid hood.” Gilbert smiled.

Jack practiced his draws. It was so fast, Gilbert couldn’t see his arm move. It hummed through the air like the after-rime of a bell.

“Wow . . .”

Jack looked down at the thick wire stitching that zigzagged across his chest. “I must look pretty ridiculous.”

“You look damn scary to me. A real monster.”

“That’s what she said.”

“Are you going to get a new skin job?”

“I don’t know.” Jack looked down. “This one’s kinda growing on me.” It was the only skin he’d had that touched a woman.

“Well, you’re complete now, as much as anyone can make you, anyway.”

Jack shook his head. “Not yet. Still one more thing.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m not much of a gunslinger without my gun.”

“Where is it?”

Jack walked over to a pile of clothes that had been sitting for a century and a half. They were caked in dust.

“You aren’t going to wear those, are you?” Gilbert scoffed.

Jack looked up. “Why not?”

“Because!” Gilbert objected. “Those people are dead. It’s kind of . . .”

“What?”

“Disrespectful.”

“I don’t know.” Jack pulled out a thick collared shirt and leather bomber jacket. He put them on. “I bet these folks would like to see this stuff get some use.” He dusted himself off.

There was a distant rumble, like thunder.

Jack looked at Gilbert. “That sounded like an explosion.”

“It was.”

Jack and Gilbert swung around. The withering sprite crawled from under the table into Gilbert’s suit. He scowled but didn’t take his eyes off Colonel Sryn, who emerged from a tunnel with a squadron of black-uniformed soldiers. Rifles were raised. Hammers were cocked. But the Amazons kept their distance. Gilbert’s head was exposed.