assassins, deadly with knife and strangling cord, dropping on their victims from trees or roofs or climbing into seemingly inaccessible windows. They are also highly proficient with firearms, using a tiny revolver that shoots naillike projectiles and a rifle that shoots poison darts with a range of two hundred yards.
The subtlest assassins among them are the Dream Killers or Bangutot Boys. They have the ability to invade the REM sleep of the target, fashion themselves from the victim's erection, and grow from his sexual energy until they are solid enough to strangle him.
Audrey finds Toby in the locker room, sitting naked and pensive on a worn wooden bench. He looks up absently and pats the bench beside him. Audrey sits down and they both stare vacantly at the wall for several minutes.
Finally Audrey asks, 'Is Arn around?'
Toby looks at him blankly from an empty space. 'I never heard of it.'
'I uh thought ... I mean this morning ...'
'Well, my scent glands are so potent sometimes people hallucinate,' Toby tells him smugly. 'Perhaps you dreamed up the whole thing.'
'Well, maybe.' He puts his arms around Toby's shoulders hoping to excite him so he will give out the smell which is like exquisite perfumed poppers.
Toby's cock begins to stir and stiffen as he stretches his legs out in front of him and leans back, looking thoughtfully at his toes. Two little people come in rubbing against his legs like cats. They give off a delicate sand fox smell that floats on the heavier male scents of the locker room like a pousse-cafe.
A thirteen-year-old in the black suit and straw hat of an English public school 'fag' sticks his head in and calls to Audrey:
'The Shrink wants to see you.' He pushes his eyes up at the corners to make a Chinese face and adds in falsetto, 'Chop-chop!'
After a few general questions about space lag, the Doctor asks with elaborate casualness: 'Would you please tell me in your own words everything you remember about this uh Arn.' He glances down at a file in front of him.
Audrey tries to comply but he encounters blanks in his memory like trying to recall a dream that hovers just out of reach on the edge of perception, skittering away as you try to grasp it, erasing memory traces with a little broom that fades out, in turn wiping away footprints in distant sand.
The Doctor leans across the table and breaks an ampule under his nose. 'Just relax now and breathe in deeply.'
Audrey finds himself on a table looking up at masked faces.
'That's right now—count up to fifty....'
When Audrey wakes up he finds a shaved spot at the back of his head that is slightly sore to his touch.
'Well, Audrey,' the Doctor explains, 'we've installed a
The days seem to flash by like a speeded-up chase scene in a 1920s comedy ... patrols always behind them, bullets thudding into flesh, bombs in Middletown bars and theaters and restaurants. A wake of glass, blood and brains and the hot meaty smell of entrails remind Audrey of a rabbit he had once seen dissected in biology class. A girl had fainted. He could see her slump to the floor with a soft plop.
Shatter Day always closer ...
Moves and checks and slays
Like many riots, the Ba'dan riots began with a 'peaceful demonstration,' but neither side had any intention of letting it end that way.
The Anschluss with Yass-Waddah was to be put to a plebiscite. Those most directly concerned, namely the inhabitants of the Casbah, were disenfranchised. But they had obtained permission from the Town
