'Sorry, Pin—I'll quit. What's your name again?'
Stephie made an abrupt lane change that shot them around the left of the cargo hauler. They rocked out FORESTS OF THE NIGHT
147
in front of the truck to the blare of its horn. 'The name is Stephanie Weir. I would like it if you call me Stephie.'
'Sure, Stephie . . .'
The Antaeus pulled off the bridge and on to Detroit Avenue. In the space of one city block the glass monoliths gave over to old brick warehouses with dead windows. Even the few places that were in use were aged black. They passed the first Ohio City marker and they were in Manny's neighborhood.
Nohar pointed to the side of the road, next to a whitewashed building that held an unnamed bar that was just opening. 'Pull over.'
'What?'
'We pull over and wait for our shadows to catch up with us.'
'Kit, I told you they pulled—'
'Angel, the Zips aren't the only ones in on this.'
Stephie pulled over. 'Now what?'
'We hunch down, out of sight.'
'If you say so.' Stephie crouched in the foot well with Angel. Nohar eased back into a prone position.
Nohar looked back the way they had come. At the height of lunch hour, in this part of town, traffic was dead.
It only took half a minute for their shadow to show up. An unmarked industrial-green Dodge Electroline, programmed or remote-driven, was moving down Detroit. It paused, hazards on, directly across from them and stayed there for nearly a full minute. Then it accelerated and took the next right. Nohar figured it was about to perform some sort of search pattern.
Angel shook her head. 'What now? And where did that come from?'
'Now, we walk and avoid the pattern that remote is running.'
Stephie was pulling herself out of the foot well. 'What about your leg?' 'I'll manage—'
148
S. ANDREW SWANN
Nohar felt a little more warmth ooze down his leg. He pressed the bandage and tried to get adequate pressure on the wound. 'Van's from Midwest Lapidary Imports, I think. The company involved in this mess.'
He pulled the shirt tight and winced. 'Ditch the shotgun, let's go.'
He hobbled out and his leg nearly buckled. In the daylight, his leg was soaked from the hip down, and his denim pants were beginning to adhere to his fur. He could put weight on it, but the bloodstains could be seen from a block away. Nohar was getting the feeling any halfway decent search would turn them up. They were too damn conspicuous.
He just hoped nobody called the cops on them.
He led the way through a vacant lot across the street from the bar, down an alley between two warehouses, through someone's cracked-mud backyard, across a narrow brick dead-end street, through a gaping hole in a rusted chain link fence, over the rotting ties that were the only remains of the abandoned train tracks, and finally into an alley that led behind some residential garages. When he stopped, he had to look down to make sure his leg didn't end in a ragged stump. Angel spoke.
'Lady above, Kit. You know this place better than my runners knew Moreytown. And this place is solid pink —'
Nohar paused a second to catch his breath. 'Angel, the divisions aren't as clear as they seem to be when you're in Moreytown. I used to live up here.' Stephie asked, 'Open housing policy?'
Nohar snorted and rubbed his leg. 'Call it no housing policy and a relative absence of lethal anti-morey violence. By the way, we're here.'
Nohar hooked a thumb at the rear wall of the garage they had stopped behind. Carved in the wall, amid a host of childish doodles and vertical claw marks, was someblocky lettering. 'Nohar and Bobby, 2033.' The threes were carved in backward.
FORESTS Of THE NIGHT
149
Stephie was tracing the old carving. 'Who was Bobby?'
'First and only pink friend— Let's get inside.'
Nohar limped off around the garage. Manny's van was gone. Manny probably wouldn't be back until late afternoon or evening. When Nohar thought about it, he had probably contributed a lot to Manny's current caseload.
The side door was locked—in this neighborhood, predictable. Nohar rang the call button. He was right. Manny wasn't home. Angel and Stephie were round-ing the side of the house. He called out to them. 'This place has an old key lock, if you check the loose clapboard under the vehicle feed in the garage, you'll find a spare.'
Nohar didn't add the 'I hope' he felt. It had been nearly fifteen years since he'd had occasion to use the spare key. Luck was with them. Stephie came back with the key in hand.
Nohar let them in.
It was close to seven-thirty and they were all waiting for Manny in his living room. Nohar sat on his wind- breaker to avoid leaking blood on the furniture, while Stephie and Angel watched the news off the comm. News wasn't great. The attack on the coffeehouse resulted in three dead—all rodents—and the local news called it a morey gang war. Great.
Even better were the reports of similar, and more deadly, incidents on the fringes of morey communities in New York, Los Angeles, and Houston. All had the car bomb tie-in. All Honduran rats.
Reports were still coming in, they said, about unconfirmed attacks in San Francisco, Denver, and Miami. Everyone made connections back to the 'Dark August' of 2042. Eleven year anniversary of the first riots in Moreytown, also on a Monday, August 4. Nohar didn't need the reminder.
What really freaked the pinks was the obvious co-
ISO
S. ANDREW SWANN
ordination between all the incidents. Same gang name. Same M.O. The Zips could have done no damage whatsoever, and the pinks would still freak.
The mall in New York was the worst. AH four Zips there had automatic weapons, and the car bomb was a bit nastier than most. The vids had panned with loving attention to every body-bag.
Angel had overheard Terin complaining about her best people being dragged to the four corners of the country. While all the attacks were violent and bloody, the news never mentioned more than four rats involved in any one attack. Thirty rats, max. All heavily armed, supplied with explosives, and timed to the minute.
Terrorism staged to be a media event.
The whole situation made Nohar sick to his stomach. 'A decade out of the hole, and a bunch of psychopaths push us back in.'
Angel stared at the screen. For once, her wiseass attitude was gone. 'Kit, hell the Zips trying to do? Why?'
'Wish I knew.'
'Binder's moreau control bill is going to make it through the House.'
Angel turned toward Stephie. 'Huh?'
'The bill shuts down moreau immigration and starts mandatory sterilization.' Nohar shut off the bodies on the comm. 'We're on the wrong side of another anti-morey wave. The riots all over again.'
Angel let out a nervous laugh. 'Come on, Kit. You were there, this ain't nothing like the riots.'
Stephie responded for him. 'All you need is some media terror and Congress will jump on the bandwagon. It seems almost engineered to push Binder's legislation.'
The front door interrupted their conversation. A very tired-looking mongoose entered the living room. Manny glanced at Stephie, then Angel, and finally Nohar. He seemed beyond the ability to register surprise.
