Dead Mans Hand

10:00 P.M.

The park was as hot and humid as a hooker's mouth. Fires burned everywhere, and shouts and snatches of song echoed through the trees as they wandered from tent to tent, from campfire to campfire, looking for Sascha.

In this hour, this night of triumph, even supposed nats like he and Blaise were welcome. Everywhere they went, jokers shook their hands and slapped them on the back. Drinks were being thrust at them every time they turned around; Hartmann buttons were pinned on their clothing at each stop. The night was heady with aroma; sausages sizzling on a hibachi, hobos stew simmering over a campfire, a pair of squirrels turning slowly on a spit. The sound of beer cans being popped surrounded them like a thousand aluminum crickets. People were drunk, stoned, excited, turned on, fucked up, and generally crazed, but it was a happy kind of insanity. Gregg Hartmann was going to be president; he was going to kiss it and make it better; for the jokers and all the other poor damned souls in the park, Camelot was just around the corner.

Jay wondered how they'd feel the morning they all woke up and realized that somehow Camelot had turned into Mordor.

"I want to go back to the hotel," Blaise whined yet again. "This is bor-ring."

"Hey," Jay told him, "this is history in the making. Look around. Taste it. Smell it."

Blaise sniffed the air suspiciously. "That's just beer," he said. "Beer and piss."

Jay had to laugh; that sounded like one of his lines. "Maybe you'll make a PI yet, kid."

"I'm tired of all these stupid jokers," Blaise said. "You should let me mind-control them. I bet they're just lying to you, I bet they all know Sascha. I could make them tell us."

"No," Jay said. "When we find Sascha, you can take him, make him tell me the truth. That's all."

They found Doughboy all alone in a field, playing with a manhole cover. He was throwing it like a Frisbee, flinging it twenty, thirty yards across the grass, then scrambling after it to throw it again. It didn't fly as well as a Frisbee, but Doughboy didn't seem to mind. There was nothing but innocent, childlike joy on his great round face. But when Jay called out, the joker stopped and looked guilty.

"We're looking for Sascha," Jay asked him. "He used to work at the Crystal Palace. Have you seen him anywhere?" Doughboy slowly shook his head from side to side. "I wath juth playing," he said.

Blaise laughed. "I know a good game he can play," he said. Doughboy's face went waxen, and he began to take off his clothes with thick, clumsy fingers.

Jay swung around. "Let him go," he snapped.

"Why should I? You can't make me." Jay slapped him.

Blaise stood there, his eyes hot with anger, his cheek as red as his hair, and for a second Jay was afraid of what he might do. Then, suddenly, he looked away. "Okay," he mumbled. "I'm sorry."

"All right," Jay said, after a long moment. "It's forgotten. C'mon. Sascha's still out there somewhere."

"How did you find me here?" Brennan asked Fadeout. "Wait, don't tell me," he added before the ace could say anything. "Lazy Dragon."

"Very astute," Fadeout said sarcastically. "He lost you when you were grabbed by the police, but. he picked you up again at the church by running down your usual haunts."

"And you followed me here."

"Quite right." Fadeout looked around. "You do know the most interesting people." He reached over and picked up Chrysalis's journal. "But this is what I've come for. This will give me more power than Chrysalis ever had-because I won't be reluctant to use the information."

Brennan couldn't believe that he'd come so close to finding what he needed, only to have it snatched away at the last moment. He made a move to reach for Fadeout, but the ace swung his gun up and pointed it at Brennan's midsection. "Uh-uh, wouldn't want me to have to shoot you?" he asked as the miniature Chrysalis moved.

She'd been standing on the desk next to Fadeout, and as he pointed his pistol at Brennan she leaped and grabbed it by the barrel. Fadeout looked at her in shock as her weight dragged the barrel toward the floor. He cursed and shook the gun, but she wouldn't let go.

As Brennan shouted, "No!" he pulled the trigger.

The shot echoed loudly in the confined chamber. The bullet ripped the miniature Chrysalis off the barrel and sent her flying through the air. She spattered against Mother like a broken rag doll. Mother made no sound, but extruded long, humanlike arms that cuddled the broken body against her mattress of flesh.

Brennan kicked the gun from Fadeout's hand, and with the same smooth motion backhanded him across the face and snatched the diary.

Fadeout went down, blood from his crushed lip dribbling on his chin. He put a hand to his mouth to wipe it away and mumbled, "You're dead now, you bastard," and threw something at Brennan. It hit his chest and bounced onto the desktop. It looked like a carved bit of potato.

Brennan backed away as the potato expanded, taking on black bands of fur, a large, chubby body, and a round, funny face with big black circles on its eyes.

The giant panda grinned at him. It was cute as hell with its fat, furry body and comical face. It was also twice Brennan's weight and had formidable talons and bright, sharp, shining teeth.

"Kill him, Dragon," Fadeout directed.

The panda made a whining, bleating noise and carefully climbed off the desk and advanced on Brennan as the homunculi ran screaming and skittering from the chamber.

There was no way Brennan could hope to defeat the thing, and it was between him and the door. The only factor he had on his side was superior speed. The damn, roly-poly panda couldn't be as fast as him. He hoped.

He backed up further into the chamber, and the panda padded after him, a stupid grin on its amiable, clownish features. When Brennan could go no further, it reared up on its hind legs and growled as if a buzz saw were rumbling deep in its throat.

Brennan moved. He tried to dodge around the creature, but the bastard was fast, damn fast. Brennan felt a surge of agony rip through his left arm as the panda swung a huge paw and caught him squarely on the forearm.

Brennan felt bones break and flesh tear, but he was by the panda and running. Fadeout had faded, but his eyes were still visible, so he could see. He tried to stop Brennan, but Brennan stiff-armed him and knocked him on his ass as he skidded by and went out into the tunnel. He looked to the left, where the sewer line lay, and then to the right, which led to a stepladder to the basement of the Crystal Palace.

Brennan didn't want to be trapped in the underground tunnel. He had to go up.

He caught his breath at the pain that lanced through his arm. Both bones in his forearm were broken. The radius had ripped through his flesh, and blood spurted in time with the pulses of agony surging up his arm.

Brennan breathed deeply and rhythmically to get the pain under control as he ran down the corridor and grabbed the ladder leading up to the basement. He glanced over his shoulder and saw the panda coming down the corridor a lot faster than he thought possible. He transferred the journal to the crook of his injured arm, groaning as the torn flesh and broken bones took its weight, and fumbled in his hip pocket.

He took the transmitter from his pocket, activated it. "Crystal Palace," he croaked. He dropped it as he pulled himself up the ladder with his good hand.

The trapdoor at the top of the ladder resisted his efforts at first, but opened when he banged his good shoulder against it, sending waves of agony pounding down his injured arm.

Brennan pulled himself into the storeroom and slammed the trapdoor back down. A flight of rickety wooden stairs went up to the first floor, and Brennan took them at a run, bursting into a corridor that led to the Palace's rest rooms.

A woman going down the corridor toward the bathrooms took one look at Brennan, bloody-faced and with the radius of his right arm sticking out of his flesh like a jagged spear stub, and screamed. Brennan bolted past her and burst into the taproom of the Crystal Palace.

Everyone stared at him. No one tried to stop him as he plowed into the taproom, but the press of customers formed a blockade that Brennan couldn't push through.

There came another piercing scream from the hallway, and Brennan knew that Lazy Dragon was still on his trail. And he didn't have the problem that Brennan did.

Lazy Dragon simply crashed through the crowd, scattering it like screaming tenpins. Brennan, knowing he wasn't going to outrun the panda, turned with his back against the bar, his right arm an agonizing hunk of dead meat hanging from his shoulder.

The smart customers were leaving. The slow, the curious, the drunk, and the stupefied stayed to watch as the panda closed on Brennan, its cute little face grinning a grin that exposed razor-sharp teeth capable of biting off an arm with a single chomp.

"Give me the book!" Fadeout commanded from behind the bear, but Brennan shook his head. "Take it," Fadeout ordered, and the panda advanced like slow, inescapable doom. Brennan gathered himself for a final attempt to escape as the panda shuffled forward on his hind feet. He feinted to his left, quickly shifted low and to the right, and almost scooted away.

Almost.

The ace slammed a paw down across Brennan's back and it felt like the ceiling had fallen on him. Brennan dropped to his knees with the breath squeezed from his lungs, rolled, and came to his feet right in front of the panda. The ace slapped the journal away from him, as easily as taking candy from a child, and Fadeout retrieved it.

"Finish the job," he told Dragon.

The remaining spectators crowded as best they could to the edges of the room.

"Leave him alone."

The unexpected voice sounded calm in the hushed silence, and oddly gentle. The panda turned slowly, one gigantic paw still raised and ready to smash Brennan to jelly.

A squat, hunchbacked figure had materialized in the open area between the onlookers and Brennan and the panda. Dragon, his eyes on Quasiman, swatted at Brennan, who took the blow on his shoulder and managed to roll with it a little. He smashed against the bar with a jolt that brought tears to his eyes. Somehow he managed to pull himself to his knees and say, "We need the journal," before collapsing in agony.

Quasiman advanced slowly, dragging his stiff left leg behind him. "Give me the book," he told Fadeout, and as he switched his attention to Fadeout, the panda charged.

It struck Quasiman like a runaway train smashing into a cliff face. The two hurtled backward into the screaming spectators. It was a miracle that no one was crushed as Dragon's momentum crashed them both through the wall. Wood shattered and pipes burst and a spray of water showered the room. Brennan pulled himself to his feet as they came crashing back through the hole they'd made in the wall, the panda first, Quasiman after him.

Quasiman lifted a heavy wooden table and battered his foe. His first blow crushed the panda flat on the floor, shattering the table to kindling. The panda got to its feet and charged at Quasiman, smashing him through the bar and into the large mirror and racks of bottles behind. Lupo deserted his post with a despairing yowl as mirror and bottles burst into a million scintillating shards.

Brennan swayed on his feet, undecided. He wanted to help Quasiman, but realized there was nothing he could do against Dragon. He wanted to follow Fadeout, but the ace had already managed to disappear in the dark room filled with running, screaming people. Dragon and Quasiman smashed through the bar again and rolled about the floor like angry behemoths, punching and kicking and clawing one another.

The panda had blood on its fur, Brennan wasn't sure whose, and Quasiman's shirt had been ripped off his back, exposing the mass of bone and flesh that was his hump.

Brennan's nose twitched at a sudden foul smell in the air. It was gas, natural gas. The battling aces had broken a gas line as well as a water line when they'd smashed through the wall. Brennan had a moment of calm, coherent thought, realizing that everyone had to get out before a spark ignited the gas that had seeped into the room. He turned to shout to everyone to leave, but it was too late.

There was a muted whooshing roar and flames blossomed near the shattered wall. Someone yelled "Fire!" and the pandemonium was complete.

There was a panicked flight toward the door. Some were trampled, but cooler heads somehow dampened the frenzy. Brennan realized that it would be impossible to force his way through the crowd, so he headed to the stairway that led to the exits on the upper floors. He paused at the foot of the stairs and watched Quasiman and Dragon waltz around the floor in a clumsy dance. The panda's paws were on Quasiman's shoulders and Quasiman had his hands locked around the animal's throat. Its snarling, spitting face was only inches from Quasiman's.

"Quasiman!" Brennan's voice cut through the panic like a bullhorn through fog. "Break it off! Quasiman!"

He never knew if the joker heard, whether he'd decided he'd had enough, or whether his brain slipped off, wandering God alone knew where. Quasiman suddenly vanished, teleporting away just as the panda snapped its jaws shut in a bite that would have taken Quasiman s face off. It groped around in bewilderment for its vanished foe and staggered into a pillar of flame that suddenly shot from the hole it had helped pound in the wall.

The air was suddenly speared by the scent of burned fur, and the panda tottered about, spreading the fire as it bumped into the shattered bar and the broken furniture that littered the floor. It finally stopped and plopped down on its rear. It let out a few whining bleats, then seemed to shrivel into itself, shrinking to its original negligible size.

Brennan started to go upstairs, then remembered Mother and the homunculi in the basement. He hesitated, cursing himself, then headed back for the corridor that led to the basement storage room and the chamber below.

The corridor was thick with smoke. Brennan ran, bending below the acrid fumes, found the open trapdoor, and went down the ladder. The air suddenly became searing hot, and Brennan knew that the fire had spread to the storeroom above. Manikins were scurrying from Chrysalis's secret chamber, wailing and crying like lost cats.

Brennan looked inside. Mother had pulled away from the wall and was flopping and squirming on the floor like a living mattress. Most of the homunculi had pulled away from her, but those attached with umbilical cords were as trapped as she was. Brennan hesitated, almost turning and leaving; then a vast telepathic wave of fear and desperation washed over him, so powerful that even his nonreceptive mind could sense it. Whatever she looked like, Brennan realized, however hideous and inhuman her shape, Mother was still a person.

He didn't know if he'd be able to drag her away with only one arm, but he knew that he had to try. He took a deep breath of the smoke-fouled air, gritted his teeth, and stepped into the secret chamber.

"I'm coming," he called.

He ran into the chamber and managed to tip up a corner of Mother's rectangular body. Her flesh was warm and rubbery and pulsating, and it had a pleasant, somehow soothing smell even in the smoky chamber. He got down on his knees and somehow managed to hoist her onto his back.

Sparks sprinkled from the ceiling and smoke rolled into the chamber like thick fog.

"It's all right," Brennan shouted. He caught his breath at the horrible pain in his broken arm. "We're going to make it." Then the ceiling fell in.