Ambient (25 page)

"Avalon!"

As I attempted to stand, my legs folded in on themselves, and
I collapsed back onto the futon. A great scabbed lump rose on
my head where I'd been struck. With much effort I got up again,
feeling as if I'd been crushed into pieces and then reglued by
someone unfamiliar with the human form. My arms would barely
rise above my head as I lifted them; it took several painful minutes to draw up my trousers.

"Avalon!" I shouted, in case-for whatever reason-she had
stepped into the hall. She hadn't. When I reached for my boots,
I spotted a small card lying atop the laces. The blank side, no
longer blank, was turned upward. On that side of the card were
two printed words. The hand was unrecognizable.

You're next.

I flipped the card over, seeing that it was one of Mister Dryden's personal business cards. Beneath his engraved name and
number someone had scrawled the notice, contact now. I read
those notes again and again. Looking back, I wonder why it took
so long for the message to take effect. After I tied my boots, I
pulled on my coat-slowly-checked the apartment once again,
and then left, moving down the stairs so quickly as I could.

Several possibilities flipped through my mind as I picked my
way along, skipping broken steps and wet heaps of litter. It had
to be Mister Dryden's people, I felt sure, and that assured me
that he was still alive. The Old Man's bunch obviously had been
the ones tracking us the day before; his gang were purest amateurs, I'd always felt, lacking in style and nuance. Mister Dryden
had a few working for him in various situations-Jake being their
overseer-who could have, with ease, come in, taken Avalon,
and left me none the wiser. That was a common gambit in readying business deals.

Why hadn't they taken us both? I wondered as I reached the
lobby. There was one explanation, as I saw it. The Old Man,
also surviving, undoubtedly, had suspected that we were behind
the blast-suspected his son as well, perhaps, but for the nonce
choosing not to dwell on it overlong. And so, to show his concern
so well as to send new word to me, Mister Dryden had involved
his boys. By taking Avalon they could lure me out.

You're next.

That disconcerted. If they wanted to contact us both, they would
have taken us both . . . unless they wished to take one of us in
the other way. If he suspected Avalon was behind the retiming
of the blast, as she'd been, in this way he could remove her while
getting word to me that I was needed, or in danger. But if he wanted to remove me for fouling the job, he'd know no better
bait could be used than Avalon.

Whatever was going on, she was in trouble. When that thought
entered, no other broached my head. Stepping outside, the cool
drizzle sprinkling over my face, I pushed through the scrub and
emerged onto the street. No one was in sight.

There was no choice. Hoping that at least she was yet alive, I
pulled my phone from my coat and punched in the code. The
phone-an owner's phone, and so always reliable-hooked directly into Mister Dryden's office.

The phone buzzed twice before anyone answered.

"Dryden," he said.

"It's me."

He was silent; I listened carefully, to hear if he whispered to
others in the room.

"O'Malley," he said. "Where?"

"Downtown."

"Safe?"

"AO. "

"Danger prowls. Careful yourself."

"Where's Avalon?"

Again, he paused. "Up yourself to Dryco. Now. Essent."

"AO."

"Move incog," he said. "To Bridge HQ. My word sends.
Use."

"Who?"

"Colonel Willis. He'll up you secondsfast."

"Is Avalon safe?" I asked. "Is she?"

"We'll see," he said. "I'll wait. Speed."

"AO."

He clicked off, leaving me even more afraid. Using my remaining shards of optimism, I concluded, by his final phrase, that
he'd wait until I'd reached his office before doing anything to
her. I'd decided, without hesitation, that were she to be blamed for what had occurred, she wouldn't be blamed alone; that, if
separated, now as we were, at the end we might at least be reunited. Walking, I could reach Bridge HQ in twenty minutes,
traveling Henry Street; so much as it hurt, I ran, pausing only to
retrieve my breath. As I drew closer to the old Manhattan bridge,
strung with searchlights left perpetually aglow as if for a holiday,
I saw copters buzzing in, transporting the living and the dead in
from Brooklyn, and Long Island, some whipping through the arch
of the nearest tower on approach.

Bridge HQ-situated on land cleared by government order in
the last year of the Ebb, in the Goblin Year-covered the terrain
between the Manhattan and Brooklyn bridges southeast of Park
Row and the Bowery below Canal; it was next to the Downtown
Control Zone, but not of it. The soldiers barracked in the old
Governor Smith Houses, old brick towers not in such bad shape
as the one in which we'd spent the night before. The HQ had an
airfield, a field hospital-located in the old city police headquarters, since transferred to Midtown-and the traditional facilities
common to Army HQs: stockades, addiction rehab clinics, disease treatment centers, and a crematorium.

To New York new arrivals, fresh and green from southern boot
camps, came each month, prepped to put in their year of domestic service before becoming eligible for transferral overseas. Upon
landing, each month's group was divided: one-fourth was placed
in the Manhattan Central Command unit; three-quarters found
themselves in the units parceled out into Long Island. Army sources
put the average casualty rate for Long Island units at 60 percent;
unofficial sources ran higher. The government's theory was that
those surviving a Long Island campaign should have no difficulty
on any foreign battlefield; that once Americans grew used to killing Americans, they'd qualm not over killing anyone else.

The northern entrance post was situated in the center of Henry
Street, beneath the bridge. Four Army boys there lifted their rifles as I strolled up, aiming at my head. Raising my hands so high as
I could, I slowly advanced, flashing my Drydencard.

"Halt!'' one screeched, after I'd halted. "State biz. Pronto."

"Dryco," I replied. A different one ambled over, snatching
the card from my hand. He was old for a private; seventeen or
so, and I was sure he'd awaited his draft notice rather than taking
the bull's horns sooner. Nowadays-it'd been looser in my younger
days-one was eligible for the draft upon turning fifteen; if one
wanted, surely, one could join the Army at age thirteen so long
as the necessary height and weight requirements were met.

"AO?" I asked; he'd held it for a long time, examining it
closely, as if it had been printed in Sanskrit.

"Shut up," said the Army boy. He held my card against such
sunlight as there was, and the Dryco corporate logogram visualized on the card. He grinned, recognizing it. Handing it back to
me deferentially, he affixed a visitor's pin to my lapel.

"Can I go?" I asked.

"Don't lose it, now," he drawled, sounding as if he hoped I
would.

An enormous stencilled sign, pocked and channeled by bullet
holes, rose high on the right, beyond the entrance post, just behind a truck that appeared to have been stripped for barterable
parts.

INFORMATION PERTANING TO BOMINGS/TERROR/
ANDOR/MURDER

RECIEVED HERE. CONFIDINTALLY ASURRRED. REWARDS
GIVEN

ONLY IN EVENT OF EXECUETION.

CALL: 6333512-797-3600 EXT.297753 DEPT.3131 CODE: 7BAKER

That the sign stood inside the base I found most intriguing.

You could pick the Manhattan guard from the Long Island guard at a second's viz. The Manhattan guard Army boys were rural,
starch-loaded whiteys with drug-wet eyes, and a stance suggesting that they'd sought trouble since first vaulting from the crib to
strangle the family dog. The Long Island units were, to a man,
black and Hispanic and Amerasian, urban, with eyes equally sodden, but containing a gaze found only in those who, at age six,
had hidden beneath the bed, watching silently as their families
were slaughtered by strangers. The Army thought it best that its
members should be introduced into situations most unfamiliar, so
as to sustain the most vehement and lasting reaction.

"Where's Command Central?" I asked a fellow reclining upon
a pile of what appeared at first a stack of Hefties-only after I
noticed that the crematorium stood behind him did I grasp that he
lounged upon bags stuffed with former members of his, or someone's, platoon.

"Who wants to know?" He lifted the pipe from his mouth to
speak, expelling gusts of heavy blue smoke. Once more I flashed
my Drydencard as he leaned forward, nearly falling off. "Third
building on the right," he said, refitting his pipe into the corner
of his mouth.

As I walked away, I slowly became aware of an increasing
roar and windrush nearby. Between the buildings I saw the tarmac; copters lifted and landed like pigeons in the street, refilling
and dumping. On their noses were emblazoned the group insignias of the Nurfs and the Surfs-the Nassau Unit Recon Forces
and the Suffolk Unit Recon Forces. Rotors spinning, motors
humming, they wafted out Army boys set to firestorm Ronkonkoma and Wantagh, swept out the victims of tactical regressions
suffered on the dunes of Wainscott and Amagansett. Each copter
carried its own music system, stereo or lasereo, drowning the
screams. Medivacs swarmed over the field, marking a purple A
on the foreheads of those deemed fit for triage.

I suspected the next building down as being the psyop headquarters, as there were no windows throughout the structure. The base's bulletin board stood out front, near the drive. A directive,
running along the top, read:

UNAUTHERIZED PICTURES FORBIDEN FOR DISPLAY PURPUSES.

Along the bottom of the board were pinned eight-inch glossies;
authorized or unauthorized, I wasn't sure. They showed, in all
colors, the debris of a recent operation near Riverhead-Army
boys propped up, for camera's benefit, mashed and mangled bur-
bies, which was what Long Islanders were generally pegged by
the Army. In the last picture, an Army boy, his mustache sparse
above his smile, stood between two cast-iron lawn gnomes, his
heel pressed against the chest of a naked woman. She lay on her
back, her legs splayed; most of his company, it appeared, had
inserted their rifle barrels into her. Below the picture was a note
attached, reading Clean your pece daily.

The next building I supposed to be Command Central; there
were lace curtains in the windows. Two MPs stepped up to me
as I entered, each putting the tip of their rifles at my jawline.
Waving my card once more, letting them viz it over, I relaxed.
So did they.

"Colonel Willis in'?" I asked.

"Yes, sir," one of them said. "He's officed. See the recep."

"AO," I said.

"Sorry," the other apologized, "can't be too careful, sir."

A dead body, primed, blasts so loud as a live one, but I saw
no need to teach the Army tricks, and walked over to the desk.
The receptionist, a young lieutenant, was watching TV in the
company of several noncoms and another lieutenant.

"Colonel Willis, please," I said, raising my voice over the
TV's vol. Why the entire Army wasn't deaf was beyond me.

"Sshh!!" one of them hissed. "Who's wanting?"

"Seamus O'Malley," I said, "For Thatcher Dryden."

The receptionist immediately buzzed the colonel's office.

"Dryco, sir."

It was hard to hear anything through the interom's static. The
receptionist hit it with the palm of her hand.

"Go right in, sir," she said to me. As I walked past, I glanced
to see what held their attention so intently. The news was on; the
screen was barely visible through the overlay of soot. Footage of
an execution ran-I didn't catch in which state. The guilty party,
said the reporter, was convicted of rape and murder one; a middle-aged man, he sat strapped into a chair atop a low platform.
The victim's husband approached, stepping onto the dais; he carried a blowtorch. Under the Retribution Act, the victim's family
was required to carry out the sentence as they wished. With his
tool he painted the fire on smooth. The reporter, bubbling, explained how, under prolonged application, the eyes would burst
within the head. I went inside the colonel's office, closing the
door behind me.

The colonel's inner office was no less busy than had been the
outer. A large map of Long Island was spread out across his desk;
hovering over it were the colonel and several aides of various
rank. With pointers and pens they marked the trails of insurgents
down Route 25 and the Sunrise Highway, circled supposed fortifications shielding Cutchogue and Massapequa.

"Excuse me," I said. They were talking among themselves.

"-patrol unit waved in at 0800 that they were interrogating a
party of insurgents picked up near Mineola-"

"Where the hell are they now?" asked the colonel.

"Surrounded. "

"How?"

"They'd engaged with said insurgents in reconstructive personnel selection-"

Meaning, they'd killed all but the younger women-

"-when under mortar fire they sustained a heavy loss ratio
refiguration."

"How many?"

"Fourteen."

"I'm to see Colonel Willis-''

"What'd they do then? Sit there? Yes? Who're you?" he asked
me, looking at me as if I were a troublesome child.

"Speaking. About what?" He shifted his attention once again
to one of his aides. "Air support readied?"

"Sent. "

"So where are they?"

"Forced to halt. Heavy ground to air interaction."

"Thatcher Dryden told me you'd be able to get me uptown
incog," I said. "To his offices."

All paused long enough to stare. After a second they returned
their look to the map, and to the reports and wires clutched in
their hands. I looked around his office as I waited for him to
respond. In one corner of the room an American flag drooped
low, limp against its pole. Behind his desk hung the president's
official portrait. The eyes were drawn so that their stare would
follow your progress across the room. The colonel's medals-
someone's medals-rested in a small display case atop his desk.
A doll rested to the right of his terminal, collapsed against it as
if resting following a long march. Filled with choice ingredients,
such dolls were on occasion left in appropriate Island areas by
recon units.