Orphan of Mythcorp (8 page)

Sweat dripped from my pits, slithered down my
torso. It took all my considerable self-control not to reach out
and shake that tiny finger she was pointing at me. “That’s what
they call me. I’m sorry for staring, Izzy, but this is my first
time seeing a real dw . . . little person.”

She turned back to the computer screen on the
table. “And how was your first time?”

“
I need to sit,” I quipped, earning a
snort. I pulled a chair from the table beside Izzy and sat. “Why
are you here so late?” I couldn’t stop goggling. She was so tiny I
wanted to eat her up; which was the wrong thought to entertain.
Good thing I was sitting down.

A real live dwarf. How lucky was I?

She was typing, moving her hands over the
keypad in her own special little person method. She had to joggle
her hands a lot to compensate for tiny digits. “Imagine thirty of
you here, and me trying to get work done. Bunch of navel-gazing
dickwads asking me nasty questions. Some people have no decency,
asking me about my . . .” she looked over at me. “Never mind. What
are you doing out at this hour anyway? I thought you had a curfew,
or was that just for your albino pals?”

“
I ah—”

‘
Why not tell her the truth? Who’s she
going to tell?’ Naked Charlie wondered. He’d popped up in the
Mystery section. I wondered how long he’d been
eavesdropping.

“
You ‘ah’ what?” Izzy asked. Apparently
when I listen to my spooks, time still goes on its merry way,
making me look the fool. Ava really should’ve informed me of
this.

“
I needed some time away from Camelot.
That’s what we’re calling the place where they used to scrounge
around inside dead people.”

“
The morgue?” she sounded
appalled.

“
Yeah, the place has been totally
corpsified, but at least AH!”

Marie had appeared between me and Izzy, and
the spook looked terrible: her face sported a bruise and her body
was all wavy, as if she were a heat ripple. I’d never seen even the
slightest change in any spook before. I mean, they’re dead, how
could they ever change? Marie looked on the verge of tears. I could
read fear in her bruise-rimmed peepers, usually so pale. For the
first time in at least fifteen years of after-life, Marie looked
dead.

“
What?” Izzy asked. “What was that
about?” She was facing me again, looking a smidge frightened by my
inexplicable outburst.

I stood. “I, ah . . . saw a spider. A
daddy-long leg. Why don’t you look for it while I go check the
Theorics section. I’m falling behind in class.” I’m sure my back
was a darn fine sight and all to Izzy, but I really doubted she
noticed, probably too busy trying to decipher my behavior.

A few ‘come-along-with-me’ gestures prompted
Marie to follow me to the Theorics section. The darkness here did
nothing to dispel the flickering light of her essence. Whatever
she’s composed of, the light and darkness of the living world have
no effect on her.

“
What happened?”

‘
They didn’t like me watching
him.’

It took me ten ticks to riddle this out.
“Sanson’s spooks did this to you?’ I asked. Marie nodded. “How is
that even possible? I didn’t know your kind could hurt each
other.”

‘
They were so angry. I thought they
were going to kill me.’

Moving on from that baffling statement, I
said, “But did you find anything out about Sanson?” Cruel to press
her for answers in this state, I know, but spooks don’t hang around
long and their focus evaporates even quicker. “Why is Ash
interested in him?”

She was starting to leave, her light
flickering, threatening to bleep out of existence.

“
Tell me what they’re doing, or I’ll
ignore you for a month. Don’t you dare wig out on me.”

“
Who are you talking to?” Izzy’s voice
reached me from beyond the stacks. “Are you alright? You sound
buggered.” Then, quieter, as if to herself: “He’s a kook, probably.
That would just be my luck—”

“
Marie,” I hissed. “Please.”

‘
The dead boy was researching,’ she
managed through wracking heaves. I hadn’t known spooks could cry.
Sanson’s haunters were a whole different breed from mine. Marie
looked up, met my eyes. ‘Researching about the city records
building. He wrote down a time: eleven tomorrow night.’ With that
she faded away.

Ah, at last, a lead. The game was afoot.

I would’ve smiled but for the recollection of
Marie’s face. A disturbing thought, this revelation that spooks
could hurt spooks. I couldn’t help but wonder if Sanson had ordered
the attack. He didn’t seem to be aware of his haunters, but then,
he could be acting for all I knew.

While trying to figure a way to sneak out to
intercept Sanson, I turned around.

And nearly bowled over Izzy. She’d snuck up
on me and got tangled in my legs. The tiny girl shoved against my
thighs (incidentally thrilling me) and backed up. The top of her
head only reached to the bottom of my sternum. Seeing her up close
and personal only added to her peculiar hotness: she was a
developed woman but in a smaller, cuter package than most
women.

I resisted the urge to pick her up and
squeeze her to my chest. If I’d been on my doojee, the urge
would’ve won and I’d have earned myself a punch in the stones and a
lifetime of enmity.

“
I’m sorry, Izzy,” I said, bending
down. “I didn’t see, or ah, I didn’t hear you come.”

“
No one does,” dusting her jeans and
pink t-shirt. I was suddenly curious where she found clothes to
fit—but not curious enough to ask. “When I come, I am very
quiet—usually,” a mischievous smile curling her lips.

It took about five ticks for my noodle
to catch up, but when it did, a laugh escaped from
my
lips. “Right.” Thoughts raged
between this alluring dwarf and my need to uncover Sanson’s
business. “Listen, I know we just met and all, but, I wonder if you
could help me.”

“
Yeah, your wardrobe could use a
woman’s touch,” she mocked. “Help you what?”

“
I need directions to the city records
building. But I don’t know jack about downloading them from the
computer.”

“
Well, downloading is my specialty.”
She turned and headed back toward the table. Every part of me
wanted to help her up into the chair as she struggled into it, but
presuming any such move on this feisty little-un was clearly
ill-advised. Eventually she made it up and plopped her rump down on
the cushioned seat. Her fingers (or rather, her arms) flew over the
keyboard, hands bouncing up and down in lieu of long
digits.

Fifty ticks later she tapped one final key
and the chitterlings of a printer sounded from the Admit Desk. Izzy
looked up at me. Red locks fell over her eyes, hiding freckles and
framing a miniscule nose. “Why do you need this? Are you up to no
good?”

“
If I was, would that bother you?” It
was weird, but bantering came easy with this girl.

Izzy sighed, reached up to close her laptop.
It was a stretch. “Only if it got me in trouble. Tell me one thing
before you run back to your Morai pals. Do you think Mythcorp was
evil?”

I scratched my nose: the DT’s setting in.
“No. I don’t think Mythcorp was inherently good or evil. It’s like,
it’s like any corporation or gun; it was only dangerous in the
wrong hands.”

Izzy climbed down. Looked up at me. “But
who’s to say who the wrong hands belong to? You?”

I shrugged and smirked. “I’m as good a judge
as anyone, I think.”

She grabbed her laptop and headed for
the door. “A social and political entity as powerful and
influential as Mythcorp, it’s only a matter of time before someone
reopens it. When that happens, it
will
be up to us to decide if the one who opens
it is the right man for the job.”

“
Or woman, you want to be PC about it,”
I quipped.

“
No,” Izzy said. “A woman would not be
dumb enough to open
that
Pandora’s Box. Happy hunting, Morgan.”

Sanson

Mom and Pop conked out at 9:00, Pop from his
meeting with Jack Daniels, Mom from her affair with Miss Cooking
Cherry. A night like any other.

Except I was heading out to break into a
public building, to steal classified documents.

Anything to get my curse
lifted
.

I’d Gated the weather channel on the Net:
Forty-two degrees this April evening. When your continued ability
to remain upright depends on manually regulating your body temp,
you pay attention to the ambient air. Before stepping outside I
chugged a whole bottle of nuked Nanex.

The heated supplement would raise my temp a
good six or seven degrees. Keep my body from seizing up for the
night.

The 407 bus runs till midnight, tracing
the circumference of Alpha Circle,
80
^th
Street to
151
^st
Street. My house on
89
^th
was a good two blocks
from the nearest bus stop. I checked the chrono on my left wrist.
“Quarter to eleven. Cutting it close, you yahoo,” I chastised
myself. I’d have to hump it down to the little glass depot on the
corner of 87
^th
and
Alpha.

Running when you’re dead is a real drag—it
could kill you.

I looked up at the black sky over Philicity.
Wondered what it would be like to live in the country, or the
suburbs, anywhere other than a metropolis. They say you can see
stars in the hills. I turned on my heels and started jogging down
the street.

At the end I turned right, jogged
passed Peter’s, the corner catchall store, continued on to
88
^th
. I did not gasp for air
(I don’t technically need to inhale; the nanites provide all the
oxygen I need) but I could see wisps of breath before me as I
jogged on. I crossed the street, reached
87
^th
, saw the depot about a
hundred yards ahead. The thermal on my right wrist read 64. I’d
gained six degrees from the Nanex, lost four already.

Hopefully the breaking and entering part of
my evening would prove less stressful.

I slowed as I neared the empty depot. On the
white plastic bench I checked my chrono. Two minutes to spare. Man
I was good. As I waited I began my visual inspection, checking my
body for signs of swelling, bruising, and, God forbid, busted
bones. Everything looked good.

But for all I knew I’d sprained an ankle or
pulled a muscle and would fall flat on my face later.

The 407 arrived, humming along down the
street right on schedule. A screech of brakes and a squeak of the
door and I was in. An elderly woman, pudgy with scraggly gray hair
eyed me as I boarded. She didn’t look away even when I returned her
stare.

I plopped down in the back seat, set my
backpack beside me. Halfway through the job. My thermo caught my
eye, it was blinking. “Sixty degrees,” I groaned. The hypospray gun
was in my pack, but taking it out in public never goes over well,
especially not with some goggling old bag watching my every move. I
should’ve checked the thermo back at the depot, darn it. The trip
to the records building would take eight minutes. I could tough it
out.

Maybe.

I let the electronic drone of the engine and
the whine of the wheels on the pavement wash over me. A few minutes
later my thermo started beeping. Warning me to take my injection
and quit caring what other people thought. Who cares if they know
I’m a zombie?

Most yahoos had probably read about me and
Dr. Wilmuts experimental treatment in the Philicity Times a couple
years back, anyway.

Pressing the little red button on the side of
the thermo may have shut off the alarm, but the digital readout—59
degrees—was still furiously blinking red.

Some guitar fluff fluttered down from
ceiling speakers. This trip was really starting to get on my
nerves. And the old bag was still staring. A few minutes lat the
bus driver pulled over to the depot on
98
^th
. I breathed a sigh of
relief. But when I tried to stand, I couldn’t. Not at first anyway.
My joints had stiffened up.

This was my body’s way of acclimating to the
temperature around it. I massaged my thighs, knees, calves and
arms—which was awkward with the old lady watching.

“
You getting off?” the bus driver
asked. “Ninety-Eighth Street, right?”

“
Yeah,” I called out. “I just . . .”
Another heave and I managed to stand. My movements were jerky. I
felt like the Frankenstein Monster, but at least I was upright. As
I shuffled past the old bag, I stuck my tongue out at her—and
thanked God it didn’t freeze that way.

Once the bus had vamoosed I sat down on the
bench and looked around. I was alone except for a young couple
getting their freak on in an alcove across the street. “Screw it.”
I pulled the hypospray gun case out of my pack, set it on the
bench. With joints so stiff they creaked when I used them, I
injected myself with nanites.

Two minutes later my body temp was back
up to a safe 63. That was close. Mom would kill me she knew I was
out alone. I packed up and headed down
98
^th
. Someone had a wood fire
going and I could hear a domestic argument brewing in the
apartments to my right. This was the so called County Land, where
the Genesee County Community Living apartments housed everything
but a community, and where the Courthouse and Records buildings are
situated.