He was no ace, he had no special powers. These would have to be his power. He reached down with a thick fourfingered hand, and grabbed a handful of uncut sapphires. With these, he would locate the Embe singularity shifter, to power his transmission to the stars.
Or-at the very least-he would try.
1986
IF LOOKS COULD KILL
By Walton Simons
Picking out the right victim was always murder. They had to have plenty of cash to make the kill worthwhile, and it had to be done in an isolated place. The rent was due and killing somebody of the street made more sense than murdering the super. That might alert others to where he was, and he was tired of changing apartments.
The cold annoyed him. It seeped into his thin six-foot body and settled in his bones. He turned up the fur collar on his loose-fitting coat. Before he had died, when he was just James Spector, the New York winters had been numbing.
Now, only the agony of his death, constantly welling up inside, caused any real pain.
He walked past St. Mark's Church and headed east down Tenth Street. The neighborhood was rougher in that direction, and more likely to suit his needs.
"Shit," he said, as the snow began to fall again. The few people on the streets would likely take refuge indoors. If he could not find a victim here, he would have to try Jokertown. The thought did not please him. The flakes settled onto his dark hair and mustache. He brushed them off with a gloved hand and moved on.
Someone lit a match in a nearby doorway. Spector walked slowly up the stairs fumbling for a cigarette.
The man in the doorway was tall and powerfully built. He had pale, pockmarked skin and light blue eyes. He drew deeply on the cigarette and blew smoke into Spector's face. "Got a light?" Spector asked, undaunted.
The man frowned. "Do I know you?" He looked at Spector carefully. "No. Maybe somebody sent you, though."
"Maybe."
"Wise guy, huh." The young man smiled, revealing even, white teeth. "You'd better state your business, my man, or I'll kick your skinny ass down these stairs."
Spector decided to play a hunch. "I haven't been able to get anything for days.
My source dried up, but a friend said there was somebody around here who might be able to help." He projected need with his voice and posture.
The man patted him on the back and laughed. "This must be your lucky day. Come on in to Mike's parlor, and we'll fix you right up."
Mike's apartment smelled worse than a week-old catbox. The floor was littered with dirty clothes and pornographic magazines. "Nice place," Spector said, barely concealing his contempt.
Mike pushed him roughly against the wall and pulled Spector's hands over his head. He frisked him quickly, but thoroughly. "Now tell me what you need, and I'll tell you what it's going to cost. You make trouble, I'll blow your brains out. I've done it before." Mike pulled out a chrome-plated.38 with matching silencer and smiled again.
Spector turned slowly and stopped when his eyes met Mike's, then linked their minds. The terrible sensations of Spector's death rushed into Mike's body. He could feel the crushing weight on his chest. The muscles had involuntarily contracted with such force that bones snapped and tendons tore. The throat constricted as vomit surged into the mouth. The heart pumped wildly, forcing the contaminated blood through the body. Fiery pain screamed into his mind from dying tissues. Lungs burst and collapsed. The heart fluttered and stopped. Even after the darkness there was still pain. Spector kept their eyes locked, making Mike feel every detail, convincing the pusher's body that it was dead. He did not stop until Mike shuddered in a way he had come to recognize. Then it was over.
Mike's eyes rolled up and he toppled lifeless to the floor. A twitch of his dead finger fired the .38. The slug caught Spector in the shoulder, spinning him against the wall. He bit his lip, but otherwise ignored the wound, and flipped Mike over.
"Now you know what it's like to draw the Black Queen." He picked up the gun and clicked on the safety, then carefully stuck the weapon in his belt. "But look on the bright side. You only have to go this once. I wake up with it every morning." Spector searched the body. He took all the money, even the change.
There was just short of six hundred dollars.
"Small-time jerk. I'm so glad I could share something with you," Spector said, cracking the door to look into the hall. He saw no one, and walked quickly down the stairs. The cold and snow dampened the city's sounds, muffling its life.
His shoulder was healed by the time he reached his apartment.
He was being followed. Two men across the street were keeping pace with him, staying just far enough behind to avoid his field of vision. Spector had sensed them several blocks back. He turned south, away from his apartment, into Jokertown. It would be easier to lose them there. He walked slowly, saving his energy in case he had to make a run for it.
Maybe they were friends of Mike the pusher. Not likely; they were too well dressed, and people like Mike didn't make friends. More likely they were working for Tachyon. Out of necessity Spector had killed an orderly at the clinic the day he escaped. The little carrot-headed shit would almost certainly try to find him and send him to jail. Or worse, take him back to the clinic. The only memories he had of the Jokertown clinic were bad ones.
You little bastard, he thought, haven't you already done enough? He hated Tachyon for bringing him back. Hated him more than anyone or anything in the world. But the little alien scared him. Spector began to sweat under his heavy coat. A four-legged joker blocked the sidewalk in front of him. As he approached it moved crablike down an alley, to avoid him. He turned and looked across the street.
The two men were there. They stopped and huddled together. One crossed the street toward him. Spector could kill them, but then Tachyon would only come after him harder.
Better to lose them and hope the Takisian forgot about him. The ice-slicked streets were almost deserted. Even jokers had to respect the bitter cold.
Spector chewed on his lip. The Crystal Palace was only a block away. It was as good a place as any to try to shake them. Maybe Sascha would catch them and throw them out on their asses.
The doorman gave him a nasty look as he went in. Spector wanted to show him what a really nasty look was, but pissing off Chrysalis was the last thing he needed to do right now. Besides, so few places in Jokertown had doormen.
The interior of the Crystal Palace always made him uncomfortable. It was furnished floor to ceiling with turn-ofthe-century antiques. If he accidentally broke or damaged anything, he would probably have to kill twenty people to pay for it.
Sascha was not around, so there would be no help there. He walked quickly through the main bar and into an adjoining room which contained privacy booths.
He slid into the nearest one and pulled the heavy burgundy-colored curtains closed behind him.
"Something I can do for you?"
Spector turned slowly. The man sitting across the table from him wore a death's-head mask and black cowled cape. "I said, is there something I can do for you?"
"Well," he said, trying to buy time, "do you have anything to drink?" The mask had startled him, and Spector never needed an excuse for a drink these days.
"Only for myself, I'm afraid." The man indicated the halfempty glass before him.
"You seem to be in some kind of trouble. "
"Who isn't?" Spector disliked the fact that he was as transparent as Chrysalis's skin.
"Yes, trouble is universal. One of my closest acquaintances was eaten, devoured, by one of our extraterrestrial visitors last month." He took a sip of his drink.
"It's an uncertain world we live in."
Spector opened the curtain a crack. The two men were at the bar. The bartender was opposite them, shaking his head. "Obviously, you're being followed. Perhaps if you had some kind of disguise, you could get away without being noticed." He pulled off the cowl and cape and laid them on the table.
Spector bit his fingernails. He hated trusting anyone. "Okay. Now tell me what I have to do for you. There is something, right?"
"Just refill my glass. Brandy. The bartender will know what kind." He pulled off the mask and tossed it onto the table. Spector turned away. The man's face was identical to the mask. His skin was yellow and tightly drawn over the prominent facial bones. He had no nose. The joker stared at him with sunken bloodshot eyes. "Well . . ."
He quickly put on his disguise, then picked up the glass. "Back in a minute." He opened the drapes and stepped out. The men were sitting about twenty feet away.
They stared at him as he walked to the bar. He was sweating again.
"Refill," he said, after getting the bartender's attention. The man did as he was told. Spector walked slowly back toward the booth. Only one of the men was looking at him, but he was looking hard.
"Here you go," he said, delivering the drink. "And here I go."
"You might want to keep the outfit," said the skull-faced man, "I think you're going to need it." He pulled the curtains closed.
Spector walked with measured slowness to the door. Both men were still seated.
As soon as he stepped outside, Spector ran. He sprinted down the icy sidewalks, a caped vision of death, until his breath was gone. Slipping into an alley he took off the cape and mask and tucked them under his coat, then headed home.
He had gone to bed drunk for the third time in as many nights. It eased the pain enough for him to sleep. He was not sure if he really needed sleep anymore, but he had gotten used to it in the years before his death.
There was a clicking noise. Spector opened his eyes and took a deep breath, dimly aware that something was happening. The door opened slightly, revealing a crack of light from the outside. Spector rubbed his eyes and sat up. As he fumbled for his clothes the door stopped short, held by the chain. He backed toward the windows while pulling on his pants.
As he shrugged into his coat, he heard something hit the floor. The door closed.
Spector smelled smoke and rotting citrus. His eyes began to water and he wobbled on unsteady legs. He had to move or the gas would knock him out. He opened the window and kicked out the screen, but caught a foot on the windowledge and fell onto the fire escape. He landed off-balance and smashed his head against the snowcovered steel railing. The pain and cold air cleared his head momentarily.
There was a man above him on the fire escape, hurrying downward, and he heard another one banging up the stairs from below. They would both be on him in a moment. Spector struggled to stand. The man below had turned to climb the last flight. Spector leapt at him, catching the man offguard, driving him toward the railing. Spector heard the man's spine snap on impact. He gathered himself and ran down the stairs, leaving the man screaming on the landing.
From two stories above the street he leapt. His feet skidded on the icy pavement as he landed, and his body crumpled beneath him. He fought for breath and managed to roll over. A woman wearing mirrored sunglasses was bending toward him. She was holding a hypodermic. He recognized her just as he felt the needle sink into his flesh.
Spector came to in a hallway, his hands and feet securely bound with nylon cord.
The woman who had drugged him supervised as two men wearing heavy coats and mirrorshades carried him into a dark room. As long as they were wearing the protective glasses, he could not lock eyes with them. Spector was dumped in a hard wooden armchair. The room had an old smell, like an attic or long deserted house. "Ah, Nurse Gresham, I see you're back with our troublemaker." The voice was that of an older man; his tone was firm and cold.
"He was a handful, though. Somebody else got killed." The man clucked his tongue. "Then, he's as dangerous as you said. Let's have a good look at him, shall we?" Spector heard stone creaking as the ceiling above him opened. The moon and stars shone brightly through the skylight. He had lived in the New York City area his entire life. Smog and city lights made it hard to see the stars at all, yet here they shone hard enough to hurt his eyes. His interrogators remained outside the lighted area.
"Well, Mr. Spector, what do you have to say for yourself?" Silence. "Speak up.
Bad things happen to people who waste my time."
Spector was scared. He knew that Jane Gresham worked for Dr. Tachyon at the Jokertown clinic, but the man questioning him was definitely not Tachyon. "As far as I can tell," he said, "you people came after me for no reason at all. I'm sorry that guy got killed, but it wasn't my fault."
"That's not what we're talking about, Mr. Spector. Three nights ago you murdered one of our people for no reason. He was merely trying to satisfy your need for some drugs."
"Look, you've got everything wrong." Spector figured he must have stumbled into a big-time dope operation. Nurse Gresham could be stealing all kinds of drugs at Tachyon's clinic. "The deal went down fine. Somebody else must have done it."
There was a hum, and an old man moved forward into the light. He was seated in an electric wheelchair. His head was abnormally large and sparsely covered with white hair. His thin body was twisted, as if forces inside it were trying to move in different directions. His skin was pale, but healthy, and he wore thick glasses.
"Do you remember this?" The old man held up a coin. Spector recognized it instantly. It was an old penny that he had taken from Mike's body. Since it was the size of a half-dollar and dated 1794 he had saved it, thinking it might be worth something.
"No," he said, stalling for time.
"Really? Look at it carefully." The penny shone blood-red in the moonlight.
Spector had heard enough to know he was in deep trouble. Gresham and the old man were going to kill him. If he was going to stop them, now was the time. "Nobody move, or I'll kill this old guy the same as I offed your pusher friend." They laughed. "Look at me, Mr. Spector." The old man leaned forward. "Use your power on me."
Spector locked eyes with him and tried to share his death. He could feel it wasn't working, for whatever reason. The old man seemed to be blocking him off somehow. He slumped beaten into his chair.
"Sorry to disappoint you. You're not the only one to have extraordinary powers.
Untie him, Nurse Gresham."
The woman reluctantly did as she was told. "Be careful of him," she warned the old man. "He could still be dangerous." Spector did not feel dangerous. Whatever he had gotten himself into, it was certainly no run-of-the-mill drug operation.
"How do you know about me? What do you want?"
"Nurse Gresham kept a very complete file on you at the clinic." The old man opened a notebook and began reading. "James Spector, a failed CPA from Teaneck, New Jersey, infected by the wild card virus nine months ago. You were clinically dead upon arrival at the Jokertown clinic. Since you had no living family members to object, Dr. Tachyon revived you with a now-abandoned experimental process. You spent six months in ICU screaming uncontrollably. Finally, with the help of medications you were brought back to sanity. You disappeared approximately three months ago. Coincidentally, an orderly died mysteriously the same day. It's all here. Very complete."
"Bitch." Spector tried to locate the nurse in the darkness. "Now, now," said the old man. "If I let you live, Mr. Spector, you may get to like her."
"You'd let me live?" He realized it was the wrong way to put it. "I mean-"
"Realistically," the old man interrupted, "you have a great talent. Aces are rare, you don't just flush them down the toilet. You could be quite useful to our cause."
"What cause?"
The old man smiled. "You'll find out if we accept you into our . . . society.
But before we even consider that, you'll have to prove your value. We have a little job for you, but with your abilities and the information we'll give you, it shouldn't be too hard."
"And if I don't play ball?" Spector was scared, but he wanted to know the exact consequences.
The old man tore a sheet of paper from the notebook and handed it to him with a pen. "Write your address on that piece of paper and put it in your pocket."
Spector was confused, but did what he was told. The old man closed his eyes tightly and placed the tips of his fingers together.
Spector shivered. He felt as if cold water were being poured over his naked brain. "I feel . . ." He stopped, overcome by the sensation.
"Yes, I know. Not like anything else, is it? Now, tell me your address."
Spector opened his mouth to answer and realized he could not remember. The information was simply gone. "Selective amnesia. When a person is physically present with me, I can take out whatever I want." He raised a bushy eyebrow. "Or I can remove everything."
Spector was shaken, but knew that the old man's power might also be used to remove the memory of his death. The loss of his power would be a small price to pay to sleep nights again. "I see what you mean. I'll do whatever you say."
"You see, Nurse Gresham, he's no trouble at all. It would be stupid to kill someone who can be so useful. Inject him again and return him to his apartment before he wakes up."
"Hold on a minute. Who are you? If you don't mind telling me."
"My real name would mean even less to you than it does to me. You can call me the Astronomer."
Spector figured that anyone who called himself the Astronomer was certifiable, but this wasn't the time or place to bring it up. "Fine. Well, Astronomer, what do you want me to do for you? The only thing I'm good at is killing people." The Astronomer nodded. "Precisely."
Spector was nervous about killing a cop, especially since it was Captain McPherson. Nobody had been stupid or courageous enough to mess with the head of the Jokertown Special Forces Unit. The Astronomer had given him no choice.
McPherson's death had to appear accidental since one of the Astronomer's people was in place to succeed him. If Spector failed or tried to get away, the Astronomer would brainwipe everything but his death.