At Least It Washes Off

 

 

 

A muffled explosion put the final period to his statement.  Sam’s head went up like a racehorse waiting for the bell.  Automatically he headed for the door, hands fishing for the credentials he always carried with him.  I was right behind him.  There was no way he was leaving me alone in this godawful place, no way.

 

I had to pause long enough to put a fifty and a twenty in the leatherette folder that had been left discreetly on the table.  It was too much, but I didn’t have time to wait.  I lunged out after Sam and caught hold of his coat, and we were off to the races.

 

Sam moved like a broken field runner, dodging in and out of the crowds of evening pedestrians.  It was fairly easy to see which way were were headed.  We were following the fire engines and police cars.  Well down the block and to the west there was a pillar of black smoke rising into the sky. 

 

We were the only people besides the emergency crews that seemed to care anything at all about the burning building.  These people were New Yorkers, and it was going to take a lot more than a piddly-ass apartment building to get their attention.  They’d watched two 110-story buildings go smash, in person and on CNN, and some nondescript pile six blocks away from Central Park wasn’t worth their notice.

 

I wasn’t really very worked up by the apartment building myself except that there was some connection to Bill.  If I was any judge, there was some specific connection to Bill and the destruction of the apartment building, but I was pretty sure I was going to have a massive heart attack and die in the street before I got close enough to find out what it was.  When Sam finally stopped running and I had completed the necessary quick stop into his spine, I dropped like a stunned ox to the sidewalk, drawing in great whooping gasps of air.  I saw that we were at the back of a crowd that was gathering at the site.  It seemed that the closer they were to the scene of the disturbance, the more attention these people were willing to give it.

 

‘Man’:  Hey, lady, you okay?

 

A young man was staring down at me, wearing an expression of mild interest.  He was wearing a baseball cap cocked backwards, faded jeans and a Metallica t-shirt.  His girlfriend elbowed him hard in the midsection and shot me a look of pure distrust.

 

‘Man’:  Jeezus, Jessey, she’s old enough t’be my ma!

Clinically, I noted that his pronunciation was pure Ralph Kramden as I acknowledged that I was, indeed, old enough to be his ‘mahr.’  Jessey hauled the boy away and I wished him luck.  He was going to need as much as he could get.  I also hoped very much that I would see him when he landed on Springer, as he was bound to eventually.

 

Nobody else paid me the least notice.  Middle-aged females must have toppled over in the streets every day for as much attention as I attracted.

 

Sam was on the move again and I dragged myself to my feet to follow him.  His big shoulders carved out a path to the front of the gawkers and he came face to face with one of New York’s finest.  Several patrol officers were pushing the crowd back and planting blue and white sawhorses in front of it.  I might have given Sam some shit about his beloved perimeters but there was something attractive about keeping my head on my shoulders that kept me quiet.

 

Gerard found a gap in the sawhorses, got a grip on my arm, and started to edge through to the other side.  He had to stop when he came up against a uniform every bit as big as he was, and for a minute I thought things might get interesting.

 

Cop:  Back behind the line, mac.  No civilians.

 

Sam gave him a face full of the badge and plowed on past.  He didn’t say a word, didn’t make a sound.  The cop look pained and backed off, obviously humbled in the face of superior law-enforcementness or something.  I grinned, one of those sunny and dense grins that drove Bill up the wall because they said nothing and everything at the same time, and then I stumbled because I wasn’t moving as fast as Sam.

 

Firetrucks and ambulances were blocking most of the available right of way, and there was a uniformed officer at the outer edge keeping the traffic moving in the remaining lanes.  Residents were coming out of the building briskly and moving over to two basic life support ambulances.  The paramedics standing by there were giving quick examinations and the occasional whiff of oxygen for those they felt needed it.  One resident, a woman with a colorful turban knotted around wet hair, was carrying a Barney’s shopping bag containing nothing but a large white bird.  She refused all aid for herself, but insisted the paramedics give oxygen to the bird.  The bird wanted no part of it.

 

Sam was wandering closer and closer to another group of men gathered around a pair of advanced life support ambulances.  They were waiting for any occupants who might not be coming out under their own steam.  Close by them were a pair of men in polyester sport jackets and jeans.  Their look and posture screamed ‘cop’, and Sam said they were fire marshals.  The two investigators were talking to some sort of commander in a white helmet.  I mumbled to Sam that if anyone got near those jackets with so much as a match they’d both go up like a torch and Sam told me to shut the hell up before they heard me.

 

Sam:  Oh, hell…

 

Sam shook his head and I looked away from the men in the clown suits to a line of firefighters emerging from the building carrying not hoses and axes but a line of stokes litters.  In the litters were burned and broken shapes that had been human at some time in the not so distant past.  The paramedics descended on each litter with stethoscope and medicine box, and within a minute or so pronounced the person dead.  Once they stepped back, the Fire Marshals landed on the bodies and it was then that Sam moved in to join them.  There would be only a short time before the coroner’s wagon arrived to transport the victims to the morgue and a preliminary exam had to happen while on the scene.  The fire was still burning merrily upstairs and it was the only reason the bodies had been moved before they could be looked over where they had been discovered.  The firemen who had recovered them were questioned by one of the marshals, while the other dragged on a pair of rubber gloves and got down to business.  Sam just horned on in and shoved his snout close enough to see.

 

I had no idea which one of them found the first bullet hole, but from that point onward I felt a drastic change. It became a homicide investigation.  I had inched as close as I could stand, so I could try to determine whether or not any of these messes had been Bill.  I didn’t really think any of them were.  I was queasy, but nervousness had nothing to do with it.

 

Deb:  Migod, they stink.

 

Sam:  Quiet, young woman.

 

I was right up there when the Marshal grabbed one of the victims to flip him over.  The head rolled obscenely and I heard the sound of bone and gristle crunching.  My stomach did one of those interesting slow rolls.

 

Marshal:  I’ll be a shit sonofabitch.  Looks like nonea these roasty-toasties died in the damn fire.

 

This character was either a master of understatement, or he thought he was some kind of comedian.  Quite calmly, I leaned over and what little I had managed to eat splashed all over Sam’s shoes and pants.

 

Sam:  He’s not here.  What the hell is this for??

 

Deb:  They…crackle..when you move them.  And they smell awful!

 

Sam’s eyes rolled like marbles in his big head and he looked to be formulating some sort of rude remark.  But I was the Stealth Barfer.  Before he could open his mouth I had deposited another layer on his shoes.

 

 

Gruber:  Don’t worry, Cowboy.  It won’t bite.

 

The German was referring to his car, a tanklike Maybach that gleamed mellowly in the waning daylight.  The only reason Bill knew this and could quote the vehicle’s specs chapter and verse was because it was all The Punk had been able to babble about for a solid week once Gaerity had shown her a write up in his latest Popular Science magazine.

 

The Maybach swallowed them both and Gruber guided the car through the rapidly developing chaos in the street.  Nobody spared them a second glance, even in a $400,000.00 car.

 

Bill opened his mouth, but Gruber was right there with an answer to the unspoken question.

 

Gruber:  It was a gift.

 

The man’s smile wasn’t there because he was happy.  Bill recognized it, as it was the one he, himself often wore right before he sent someone straight to Kingdom Come or the Devil Himself.  On Gruber it was very snake-like.

 

Bill:  Stop.

 

Gruber did so instantly.  Like his passenger, he was accustomed to immediate action as well as reaction.  Also, like his passenger, he had grown accustomed to listening to his companions.  It was a matter of instinct, and survival.  Strannix would not speak so imperatively without a reason.

 

Bill:  Wait here.

 

Gruber sat impassively, brakes on, big car idling softly.  Within a minute or two his patience was rewarded.  Strannix returned, only he was not alone.  With him was a white-faced and, from the look in her eye, nervous woman, and a man who was every bit as plank-faced as Strannix.  The man smelled redolently of vomit.  Gruber wrinkled his nose in distaste but kept his own counsel.  Where they were going, smelling of vomit was the least of their worries.

 

 

 

Bill made a small, savage motion meant to quiet us.  The Maybach had pulled away as soon as we had all climbed out.  Bill and the driver had exchanged one of those looks common to the ‘fraternity’ as I sometimes thought of his terrorist buddies.  It didn’t include Sam or me, and maybe that was a good thing.

 

We were standing in the middle of a tree-shaded side street.  At our feet was an open manhole.  It didn’t take a rocket scientist to see where this was going.

 

Deb:  I’ve never gone down a manhole before.

 

Nor had I ever had any particular desire to.  I could depend on sewers without acquainting myself with them.  Bill was lowering himself into the black opening.  He took a moment to glare at me.

 

Bill:  Don’t start this shit.  Dawg, send ‘er down.

 

His voice was a low, tight rumble.  He disappeared, and I heard his feet splash into some sort of thick sounding...stuff.

 

Deb:  But it stinks down there.

 

Nothing like an encore performance.  Sam danced slightly back, but only slightly and not for long.

 

Sam:  Get moving, young woman.

 

Deb:  Sammy…

 

Sam:  Don’t make me drop you down there.

 

A voice floated menacingly up to my ears.

 

Bill:  Punk….

 

Deb:  I’ll bust my face in these things!

 

I looked down at my shoes, and by relation my bare feet in my shoes.  My ten dollar Birkie knock-offs liked to come off at bad times as it was, and I couldn’t imagine a worse time for them to do it than someplace down there, starting with possibly going AWOL on the ladder.

 

Bill:  Wear some goddamned shoes one time.

 

Sam forced me closer to the opening.  I could see who was going to win this one.  Reluctantly I knelt and felt for the first of the ladder rungs.  Two or three rungs down I stopped and shook, frozen.  I had never done well on ladders.  I was too far up to jump, and not far enough down for Sam to start after me.  I felt a tug on the leg of my jeans.  I knew better than to continue the passive aggressive act, and managed to creep the rest of the way to the bottom.  Sam followed, finishing by yanking the manhole cover back into place by sheer upper body strength.

 

Bill loomed, something he hadn’t done in some time.  The sepulcheral atmosphere actually made him look sort of threatening.  But now that I had my feet flat on something and I was getting used to the colossal smell, I could stand serenely beneath the lowering eyebrows.  Whatever else happened, I could handle this much.  Sam loomed over my shoulder.

 

Bill:  What.  The fuck.  Are you two doing here?

 

For a minute I considered warning Bill to be careful about breaking his teeth, but there was a limit to how complacent I dared act.

 

Sam:  Looking for your ass.

 

Bill:  If I’d’a wanted ya t’know where I was…

 

Deb:  Is this an earthquake or just you two standing too close together?

 

The silence was eloquent.

 

Deb:  I only wanted to see for myself that you were okay.

 

Bill was not moved.

 

Deb:  On the other hand, reports of my sanity have been greatly exaggerated.  I’ll go home, no problem.  Don’t look at me like that.

 

Bill:  Quit talkin’ shit.  They’ll follow ya back.

 

Bill turned and began to walk.  Sam gave me a shove and I stumbled into motion.

 

Deb:  It’s dark down here.

 

Bill:  Shut up.

 

Deb:  It stinks?

 

Bill:  Bad habit, these fuckin’ sewers, always smellin’ like shit.  Shut the hell up.

 

Down in the main channel, where the turds and used condoms and the rest of the nameless crud flowed towards a treatment plant someplace, a large brown rat swam strongly past.  I’d had pet rats before, and this monster made my little hoodies look like imposters.  It appeared to be the size of a small horse and its coat gleamed with either vigorous good health or liquid shit.  There were drops of moisture in its stiff whiskers.  It looked jolly as hell.

 

Deb:  Eeeew, look at the size of that thing!

 

I shrank away, watching as the scaly pink tail floated on the surface behind the animal.

 

Deb:  Thing’s a rat Johnny Weismuller.

 

Bill:  Dawg, shut her ass.

 

Sam rammed solidly into my back, a Percheron whomping into a pony.  I stumbled yet again and nearly went sprawling.  He caught my wrist before I could do a swandive over the waist-high railing and join my friend the rat.

 

Bill:  This ain’t no nature hike.

 

With all the flopping around I had done, my shoes had performed true to type and sailed off merrily into the stream.  Sam yanked me back against his chest to keep me from overbalancing and going onto my backside, and one bare shit-smeared foot landed square in the center of Bill’s ass.  He staggered and caught himself, then turned on me.  There was murder in his eye.  As for me, King Laugh was pounding at the door and it was all I could do to keep him contained.  If I’d laughed at that point, even to relieve my own tension, it might have been fatal.

 

Bill:  Shut.  Up.

 

Deb:  I didn’t mean…

 

Bill grabbed my shoulders and gave me a hard shake.

 

Bill:  Shut y’ass and listen to me.  These people ain’t Andy Stochanski, they ain’t Ryback, they ain’t Cole.  They get shit done, one way or another.  They will kill your sons.

 

Deb:  Why - ?

 

Bill:  All four of ‘em.  Why?  It’ll bring you out, and then they’ll kill you…cause it’s the fastest way t’get t’me.

 

I squeezed my eyes shut, willing away the image of my four blockheads hurt, or worse.  I didn’t bother with thoughts of myself.

 

Deb:  Why haven’t they -?

 

The fucker kept cutting me off.

 

Bill:  They would’ve.  The reason they haven’t is the same as the reason I’m still alive.  They know their shit.  I know their shit and some they haven’t thought of.

 

Sam:  Shouldn’t we move on?

 

Bill responded to that quiet, logical voice.  He put his back to me, and led the way forward into the stink and the muck and the dark.

 

Bill:  The only thing goin’ for us us they don’t know where we live and there’s no way t’track us now unless you pop up and go happy assholing off.  All the people who did know…don’t anymore.

 

I thought of Ryback, the ‘suicide’.  I wondered how many others, not nearly so newsworthy, that Bill had gone to visit breifly.  Very briefly, probably.  I stared at the dim outline of his broad back.  The man was a machine, so much so that Tom had sent Benicio del Toro to him to learn the ways of the black-ops maverick.

 

Bill:  Don’t start that shit, Muttley.

 

I hadn’t realized I was snickering.  That had been a bizarre stretch, Bill taking the actor out on a winter hike, sleeping rough…calling him Fenster.

 

Bill continued moving ahead, into the stinking dripping fucking dark.  There was a set to his shoulders that I only saw once in a while – he thought he was in over his head. Sammy kept  a paw in the small of my back, making sure that I continued to follow the leader.

 

Deb:  Since when do you do what he tells you to do?

 

Sam:  Since I’m being followed by people who want to kill me.

 

Deb:  Bet he’s never been in a sewer before.

 

Sam:  Bet you’re wrong.

 

Deb:  You sound sure.

 

Sam:  I am sure.  How the hell you think we got where we were going when we were kids?

 

Deb:  Huh?

 

Bill:  Every damn cop in town knew us.  Most of the good shit went on after curfew.  Had t’get there somehow and he couldn’t always get the damn manhole covers up by himself.

 

Deb:  I forget these things.

 

Bill:  Sounds t’me like you forgot t’keep y’ass shut.

 

Deb:  Anybody else would hide in the bushes…not you two, no, you’ve gotta crawl through the sewer…

 

Bill:  Dawg?  Ya wanna plug that up?

 

Deb:  I’m gonna tear up my feet on this metal…

 

Bill whipped around and leaned in my face.

 

Bill:  Maybe ya wanna ride on my back?

 

Deb:  Maybe not.

 

Bill:  Then shut the hell up.

 

He put his back to me as quickly as he had turned around in the first place and began moving again.

 

Deb:  All I need is to tear the shit outa my feet and get a bunch of crap in the cuts…

 

I wasn’t even aware  that I was speaking aloud.  Bill stopped cold for the second time and when I had managed not to plow into him, Sam lifted me up so Bill could grab my legs and thread them through his bent arms.

 

Deb:  Put me the hell down!

 

Bill:  Shut up.

 

Deb:  I mean it, Bill, put me down, this is ridiculous.

 

Bill:  Shut up.

 

Deb:  I can walk for myself, ya big ape.

 

Bill:  Shut up.

 

Deb:  ‘S a buncha shit’s what it is.

 

Bill kept walking, though his pace had considerably slowed.  Once in a while he would stop at a junction and mutter  ‘left…right…left.’  After a minute or two he would helt me back up and start off in the direction he had chosen.

 

Sam:  We’re headed south.

 

Bill:  Damn, Dawg, you’re good.

 

I took that opportunity to slip off Bill’s shoulders.

 

Deb:  What’s on the south end of the island?

 

I forced a chirpy note into my voice.  I had been bothered by a steady stream of mildly pornographic thoughts during an extended quiet period during which Bill had convinced himself he wasn’t as lost as he thought he was, and given my rate of deterioration I thought it best to get myself back in the groove.

 

Bill:  Battery Park.

 

Deb:  Fifty yard line seats for collapsing real estate.  Damn.

 

Bill moved us away from a dusty shaft of light pouring through the hole in the center of a manhole cover.  To encourage me to move, Sam gave me a harder than necessary smack on the ass.  He didn’t like anyone making light of that event.  I jerked away from him, biting back an urge to whip out my Taliban Airlines line, since I could about guess what I would wind up swimming in if Gerard got hold of me.

 

I yanked myself back to bright and bouncy mode, forcing back the naughty thought, tripping along behind the truly fine nether regions of the man prompting them.  My eyes were glued to Bill’s fundament, and when he turned to make sure we were keeping up I had to drag them to meet his gaze.  Behind me there was a subdued but derisive snort.

 

Sam:  What’s in Battey Park?

 

Deb:  Bleachers?

 

Bill:  Grass.  Shut up.  Walk.

 

Deb:  Sammy…?

 

Sam:  No sympathy, young woman.  Do as he says.  You know how he gets.

 

Deb:  Since when do you follow orders from Bill?

 

Sam:  Since people want to kill me and he’s the only one who knows what they look like.  Walk.

 

I concentrated on putting my feet down carefully, aiming for the slighly less beshitted places Bill’s rundown bootheels had tracked through.  Battery Park seemed to be a familiar place name for reasons other than the ones I’s already been punished for mentioning.  It was very familiar, much more so than it should have been to a person who had never been to Manhattan before, even one who read history as much as I tried to.  I mulled this state of affaird over as I walked.  It seemed to be more calming than concentrating on Bill’s behind had proved to be.

 

The answer came to me in a tremendous burst, the way few things ever did.  Bill was taking us to MiB Headquarters…at least he was if circumstances hadn’t driven them to the tunnels under Grand Central or someplace like that.  Bill was trying to hide…according to Elmore, trying to die.  Not literally die, but trying to go into the Bill Strannix version of the Witness Protection Program.

 

Why not?  He’s tried to openly retire, he’d tried to stay low to the ground and avoid notice.  Neither had worked.  He had eliminated Ryback, but there were more where Ryback came from.  They had expunged all trace and memory of Eliot Gerard, so now he was trying to expunge all memory, if not trace, of Bill Strannix.  It was the only way he would ever live to see Rhino grow up.  And who better to render him a non-person than the Men in Black?