In Hero Years... I'm Dead Delux Edition (26 page)

Kim stood, opening his arms. “I took his research and learned everything I could. I mapped out everywhere you appeared and tried to triangulate on your location. Didn’t work. Then I had a programming class and applied some Chaos theory to the problem. Figured out you had
several
bases.”

Terry blew a smoke ring. “You devil. So this was your C4 base?”

“No, this was the poker game base.”

Kid Coyote smiled. “He had at least two dummies. There’s that guy who signs stuff, claiming to be you. He knew about the headquarters in that shipping container buried in the landfill across the river. And there was one in an abandoned warehouse on the Lower East Side. It had access to the Parkway for the Chaser, right?”

“When did they make the warehouses over into condos?”

“Twelve years ago. I bought some odd stuff off one of the construction workers. Looks like the Chartreuse Kobold might have used it after you.”

“It was compromised, which is why I abandoned it.” I looked back at Terry. “This one was nice because it had multiple ways in and out.”

“That’s what I figured.” Kim’s eyes focused distantly. “I researched underground locations and overlaid the map of your exploits. Filtered for time in three-month increments and worked backward from the point of your disappearance. Then I went exploring–worked for the CRAWL authority for a year before I hit an access point. I found it and, like I said, I hoped you wouldn’t mind. In fact… “

He trotted over toward the north side track and jumped down. He yanked the canvas cover from the Chaser. “I’ve been working on it. I did the rocket bike first, then this. I hope that’s okay.”

When we’d first gotten into the lair, I wanted to peek under the shroud. I held myself back. I expected the Chaser to be nothing but rust and rat-gnawed rubber. I mean, I knew I was older and busted up; I just didn’t want to think it was, too. I didn’t want that memory ruined.

It wasn’t.

Kim had worked hard. The Chaser had been built over the chassis of a turn of the century muscle car–the cars that looked tough until they starved for lack of gas. Light brown with darker brown accents and a Coyote in silver on the hood and doors, the car had reinforced ram bumpers, well-concealed armor plating, run-flat tires and enough on-board gadgetry to make it through a James Bond Film Festival.

He lovingly ran a hand over the hood. “I’ve refurbed the engine. I replaced the tires, checked everything else out. Redid the interior earlier this year. About the only thing I haven’t done is turn it over. The engine interlock isn’t something I want to mess with.”

Grant moved to the edge of the pit. “Imagine what Castigan could get for this?”

“Wouldn’t fit in the show room.”

Kim looked at me, stricken. “You’d sell this?”

“This side of needing a heart and lung transplant, nope.” I gave him a reassuring smile. “We came for two reasons. One, there
is
something here we’re going to sell. That’s not as important as the other reason, though.”

Grant offered him a hand and pulled him onto the CRAWL platform. “What is it you want?”

I clasped my hands at the small of my back. “You’re Kim Coughlin. You share an apartment up there with Phil Harvey, and the both of you work for your cousin, Dominic Chello, at his garage, Chello & Son. His father’s retired to Boca. Phil and Dom believe the reason you get so beat up and are out late is because you make money fighting in illegal cage fights. You even entered one and invited them as guests to prove it.”

He stared at me blankly. “I can’t figure out how you learned who I am.”

“I cheated. Remember, I knew this place was here. I cross correlated Kid Coyote’s exploits, narrowing down locations. I took video of you and created a composite image, then used a security database to match your face to images found in hundreds of security cameras in this area. Even though you’ve taken precautions, there’s simply too much data available to allow you to hide.”

I held a hand up. “More importantly, Phil and Dominic know you’re Kid Coyote.”

“What?” He shook his head. “Impossible. There’s no way.”

“They’re not stupid. Phil tried to put money down on you in a fight and had a bookie say no such person existed. Then you got beat up and a news story about Kid Coyote flashes. It was the one where you broke your ribs. The two of them put it together and have been protecting you ever since.”

Terry tapped the ash from his cigar. “Problem is that they don’t tell the same story twice, kid. They think they’re doing you a favor.”

Kim nodded, slowly comprehending. “And someday they’re going to make a slip. They’ll get hurt. I have to… What am I going to do?”

Terry nodded to me. “We worked out a plan. Tomorrow Vecktech is going to buy the Chello & Son garage. They’re going to turn it into a refueling station for a new generation of hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles. A pilot program. Dominic and Phil are going to go away for training. You’ll probably want to go out with them this evening. You won’t see them for a long time after this.”

Kim exhaled slowly. “What about my job? I mean, the hero money helps, but it’s not enough to get by on.”

I smiled. “We’re going to be working on that, but for now, given what you’ve done with the Chaser, I have an assignment for you. There’s a car in a barn upstate, just past East Carcosa. We’ll get you a map. Go up there with a car carrier, bring it back. Get Blue to help you. If he’s not available, I have two other discrete individuals for the job.”

He nodded.

“You ever hear of the Crusher?”

Kim’s eyes grew wide. “You’re kidding. Puma’s car?”

Even Grant looked surprised.

I smiled.

“Next to the Haunted Hummer, the most famous hero car there is.” Kim blinked disbelieving. “I mean, that’s a national treasure.”

“You’ll have to fix it up right. I suspect it will end up in the Hall.”

“I will. I will.” He looked at me. “Why are you doing this?”

“Everybody’s got dreams. Some folks outgrow them. Others have them taken away.” I winked. “Sometime helping someone live a dream is the right thing to do.”

“Thanks.”

“Besides, if we’d just gotten what we came for, you’d have noticed. A little detective work, and you’d have figured out some things I’d rather not have discovered.”

“Okay.” He crossed toward the armory and the armoire. “I think there’s still one uniform I haven’t modified.”

“Not here for that.” I pointed to a dark circle amid the tiles, about shoulder height. “That’s what we want.”

“A hole in the wall?”

Terry walked over to it, lit up his laser, and began to carve through the tile and reinforced concrete. “How deep do I go?”

Grant, blushing, held up his right arm. “To the elbow. Eighteen inches.”

“I’m going for two feet.” Terry tossed his cigar and snapped his faceplate down. “You were pissed.”

I looked at Kim. “He had a full house, Aces over Jacks. I had two pair.”

“But that doesn’t…”

Grant growled. “It does when both pairs are threes.”

I threw an arm over Kim’s shoulder and guided him back toward the stairs. “You better go call your friends. Do something fun. We’ll see ourselves out.”

Kim started up the stairs, then stopped and turned. “Hey, can I tell my dad I met you?”

“It would be best if you didn’t, not just yet.”

“Yeah, I guess.” He nodded a salute. “He’d want to thank you.”

“And I, him. He should be proud of you, if he knows.”

“He does and is. Thanks. Nice meeting you all.”

Terry grunted and Grant waved.

When Kim closed the door, Graviton turned to me. “You collecting strays for any particular purpose?”

“Not me. I owed Puma. That kid saved my life. I pay my debts.”

He ran a half-hand over his jaw. “Ever get that feeling there’s a big one out there you didn’t know about, and that it’s about to come due?”

“All the time.” I shivered. “And this one has twenty years of interest attached. It’s going to be hell to pay.”

Chapter Twenty-four

I don’t like being bored. I think that is part of what attracted me to the hero game. While stake-outs might be tedious, preparation and research was exciting. I loved developing new gadgets and learning all about my foes. Finding solutions to villain problems was the equivalent of putting together big three-dimensional jigsaw puzzles.

It was a huge challenge, and anything but boring.

In comparison, being a shopkeeper was pretty much the height of boredom. I had to do things just to stave boredom off. I even managed to justify most by pretending they would improve the business.

It was with this in mind that I began to look hard at the hero bidding system. I wanted to raise Kid Coyote’s profile and make him more money. The value of items associated with him would go up, and Castigan could corner the market. In addition, if I learned the system well enough–despite my misgivings about it–I could make extra money through the Superfriends leagues.

Locating information wasn’t that difficult—zero hacking involved. Villains planned capers and posted their plans to websites. Heroes bid payment percentages to win the rights to oppose the villain. He could then sub-contract portions of the caper to other heroes, retaining control over who would fight whom. Poaching someone else’s foe was considered bad form and discouraged. The Hall, which ultimately calculated points and distributed money, often ignored a poacher’s contribution to a fight.

My focus came down to finding foes for Kid Coyote that looked, in ones and zeroes, to be much tougher than he was. This would raise the power differential and spike his point production. Ideally I wanted a villain that had powder-puff minions, a huge vulnerability to electricity or a kick to the head, and tended toward flashy crimes where the chance of rescuing hostages was huge.

For example, someone like Golden Guardian–were Terry to become a villain–would be a poor choice. His armor would insulate him from the shock-rods and most of the martial arts Kim could toss at him. That latter situation would change if Kim started training with Terry–and that was a condition I imposed for his employment.

Baron Samizdat, on the other hand, would be a good choice. Kid Coyote had a history with the Zomboyz, though he’d never tackled their patron. Baron Samizdat was strong, but tended toward being slow and he’d not killed me outright with his magic. Kim would get a couple shots at him before he’d get tagged, all things being equal. With the right situation Kid Coyote could score some major points with a solo takedown.

Kim was more than willing to let me do the research and, in essence, I become his manager. He offered to cut me in for a percentage, but I refused it in return for having rights to his memorabilia. He readily agreed, and then suggested I might want to do the same thing for Blue Ninja, since the two of them worked together fairly often.

Kim set up a meeting with Blue Ninja for the day he and Diana were heading out to get Crusher. Kim never told me his partner’s name. I was good with that–I already knew enough about Blue to be able to connect the dots if I wanted to. I didn’t because it was a matter of trust with Kim. While he’d appreciated what we’d done for Dominic and Phil, it sunk in just how vulnerable he was. He became very protective of his partner and that was a good thing.

Castigan left the shop early in the afternoon and headed for the Lower East Side. Snuggled right close to the Market Square, the Asian District had been remade in my absence. As had been done with Argus Square, corporations had come in and rebuilt things into a flashing, authentic-looking but totally artificial Chinatown, including narrow winding streets and shops crowded with exotica. Countless Western commercial outlets had been remodeled to reflect their counterparts in Beijing, Tokyo or Bangkok. Each block had a different ethnic makeup. From south to north it ran along the southern edge of Asia, beginning with India and ending with China. Pakistan got grafted on to the Indonesian section to keep it away from the Indians. Tibet had even gotten a slice. I felt comfortable there, even though the monuments reflected the way they’d looked
before
I’d been through Lhasa.

I waited at a tea shop on the Chinese side of the Tiananmen Square replica, just in the shadow of a statue of Chairman Mao. The square has once been Haste Park, and still included a small monument to Thomas Haste and his wife–both of whom had been gunned down on the spot. The statue made Mao look an awful lot like a Buddha, and the reduced Haste memorial an offering by devotees.

Blue Ninja would be coming from the other side of that divide-I assumed he was ethnically Japanese. I figured I could pick him out of the tourist crowd, as most of them were
gaijin
looking to buy knock-off watches and strings of pearls at incredible discounts.

I
had
done my homework. Blue Ninja was a Felix of sorts. His swords looked to be venerable blades from Japan which had been modified to vibrate very quickly. This gave them more slicing capability. When he laid the flat of the blade against someone, the vibrations could stun and, as with most Japanese swords, clipping someone with the blade’s dull-side could just hurt without drawing blood. I wanted to assume he’d modified the blades himself, and that they were technological as opposed to magickal. Magic tends to fail when it would be most useful.