THE ALL-PRO (57 page)

“Tears,” Quentin said. “I saw you cry when you talked about my mother. But that was just acting. Can you call up tears whenever you want?”

The man nodded. “Yeah. I always could. That’s how I got into acting, actually, ‘cause someone saw me fake-crying. They said it was a rare gift.”

“A blessing from the High One, right?”

The man nodded again. “Yeah. But these are real.”

“Go shuck yourself.”

“Look, I don’t want you to hurt me anymore, but I don’t want to hurt you either. I was already having second thoughts about all of this.”

“Easy for you to say now, isn’t it?”

“I was,” he said.

“Why?”

Sarge looked away. “You’re a good man, Quentin. That’s why. You’re better than all of the people around you. You’re better than me. I don’t have a kid. If I did, I’d want him to be just like you.”

Quentin leaned forward, just a little, just enough so that Sarge’s eyes shot back up to see what was coming next.

“If I were you,” Quentin said, “I’d never use that phrase again.”

Sarge nodded. “Okay, okay.”

Quentin leaned back. “So tell me how it went down. Tell me
why
.”

“I’m an actor,” he said. “Years ago, I was supposed to make a movie about George Starcher’s life, but it fell through. I would have gotten the part because I look a little like him and I’m big.”

“You’re a foot shorter than he is.”

Sarge nodded. “Sure, but with movie magic, I’d look big enough. The movie never got made. Gredok found some footage or something. I knew football. I really am from the Purist Nation. I left there when I was sixteen, so I knew your background. I was perfect to play the part of your dad.”

The man paused, seemed to expect another punch. Quentin stayed still, waited for more.

“My job was to make you believe,” he said. “Once that was done, I was supposed to remind you how much you liked playing in Ionath, that being happy was more important than a big paycheck.”

And how the actor had played that part. Quentin thought back to their conversations, how things usually came around to how much Quentin liked Ionath, how much he loved his teammates, his friends, the life he had built here. Of how blessed he was to play football for a living, to have escaped Micovi and the Nation. The actor had been manipulating him all along.

“Well,
Sarge
, do you have any idea how much money I lost because of you?”

Vinje shrugged. “You lost more than I’ll ever know in my life and you’re making far more than that.”

“Oh, please,” Quentin said. “I think daddy’s life lessons are over.”

The man’s bloody lip sneered. “Poor little rich boy.”

Quentin’s hands again balled up into fists. It was all he could do to stop from killing this man. And yet, Vinje wasn’t afraid. He wasn’t begging for his life. Vinje couldn’t do a thing to defend himself against Quentin, but he wasn’t going to cower, wasn’t going to whimper.

That much, at least, Quentin could respect.

“Your life is so hard,” the man said. “Your yacht, your rockstar girlfriend, your—”

“Shut up.”

“—huge contract, your friends that would do anything for you—”

“I said shut up!”

“—millions of adoring fans, that wide-eyed fullback girl who is dying for your every word, your—”

Quentin came off the bench and swung, a shoulder-twisting, hip-turning straight left that smashed into the actor’s nose. The fist hit so hard that blood splattered, sprayed across the floor.

Vinje sagged.

Quentin stood, stared. Waited.

Was the man breathing?

Oh High One, what have I done?

Then the man coughed, drew in a wet breath. He moaned, half-in, half-out.

Quentin turned to the door. “John?”

John rushed in, skidded to a halt. “Yeah?”

“Get a doctor,” Quentin said. “Or an ambulance. Or whatever. I don’t care. Just don’t let this guy die.”

“On it.” John shot out of the kitchen as quickly as he’d come.

Vinje reached up a weak hand. “Help ... me up.”

Quentin gently reached under the actor’s shoulders, lifted him, set him on the metal counter. Sure, the actor was a big Human, but beaten and weak like this it brought home the discrepancy in size. Quentin had used all of his strength on another sentient, a sentient who was not an athlete, a Human who was pushing fifty years old. No matter what this evil man had done, he didn’t deserve to be beaten to death.

“You ... can really punch. I don’t feel so good.”

“John’s finding you help. I’ll get you to a hospital, then I never want to see you again, you understand? If I see you again ... I’m not sure I’ll be able to control myself.”

“This is you under control?”

Quentin shrugged. “Yeah. Pretty much.”

Vinje gently touched his ruined nose. “I wonder if they can fix it. How bad does it look?”

The man’s nose was slanted to the left and already swelling at the bridge. Even Doc Patah would have a tough time repairing that.

“It’s okay,” Quentin said.

“I lied about something else,” Vinje said.

“What a surprise.”

“I am a sports fan. I know this is really messed up, what I did to you and all, but I was a fan before I was your dad.”

“
Pretended
to be my dad.”

“Right, pretended,” Vinje said. “Well, you’re fantastic. It’s great to watch you play. And getting to hang out with you was a real bonus.”

“If you ask me for my autograph, I’ll stomp on your throat and watch you die. Just sit there and shut up.”

Vinje nodded. He fell silent other than coughing every few seconds, splatting droplets of blood onto the floor.

Together, they waited for the ambulance.

• • •

THE ELEVATOR STOPPED
. Quentin stepped out into the musty hallway. Sagging smart-paper — paper that had long ago lost its ability to flash images — hung on the walls. Bits of trash lined the hallway’s stained carpet.

Quentin walked toward Suite 1510. From twenty feet way, he could see that the reinforced metal door was open.

Fred usually kept that door shut. Shut and locked.

Quentin walked into the office, his eyes glancing over the symbols on the door that spelled out gonzaga investigations in fifteen languages. Inside the long, thin office, Quentin found something he didn’t expect.

Choto the Bright.

Alone, sitting on the edge of a white desk, his right pedipalp arm in a sling.

There was no one else.

“Quentin,” Choto said. “I have been looking everywhere for you. I thought you might come here.”

Quentin looked up to the piñata, still hanging from the ceiling, then back to Choto. “What did you shuckers do with Fred?”

Choto’s baseball-sized eye swirled with green. “Nothing. I did nothing and I don’t think Gredok knows where Frederico went. The office was empty and open. Frederico is nowhere to be found. Neither is your sister.”

“Right. And I’m supposed to believe that?”

More green, a deeper shade. “I promise you, I had nothing to do with any of this. I didn’t know.”

Quentin shook his head. “Save it. You work for Gredok. I know where your loyalty is.”

Choto stared at the floor. “I don’t work for him anymore. I ... I have been ...”

“Fired?”

The Quyth Warrior looked up. “That is not the exact word for what happened. I have been kicked out, Quentin. Because I fought Virak at that dinner. Because I fought Virak to stop him from hurting you.”

Quentin glanced at the sling. Choto had been injured fighting Virak? Could it be true that Gredok had fired Choto, or was this just another trick?

“I don’t care,” Quentin said. “Outside of the practice field, the locker room and during games, I don’t want to see you.”

“But I must protect you!”

“No. You and I are done.”

A swirl of colors: blue, pink, black. “Quentin, please ... I fought for you. I did not think about it at the time. My life has become all about protecting you and now ... now I have nothing. I am Ronin.”

That word again. The same one Tara had used.

“Ronin. What does that mean?”

“It is a rough translation,” Choto said. “It means I have no leader. I have no master. In our culture ... it means I have nothing. I
am
nothing.”

Choto started to shake. Big, bad, mean Choto the Bright, gangland bodyguard, GFL linebacker — he was so afraid, he
shook
. Maybe Gredok could hide his emotions to manipulate Quentin, but Choto was not Gredok. This was genuine.

Quentin walked closer. “So, what do you do now?”

Choto again looked at the floor. “I do not know. I will finish the season, fulfill my obligation to the team. And then ... I will try to find a new leader. Or I will end my time.”

“Why don’t you just not have a leader at all? Be your own sentient?”

Choto’s good pedipalp quivered, then he winced. With the damaged one, it hurt to laugh. “That is not the Warrior way. I am not capable of that.”

“Tara is capable of it.”

Choto stared, then his eye swirled purple — sadness, pained confusion. “I am not Tara.”

Had Tara carried such a burden all this time? Tara the Freak. Outcast.
Ronin
. The sentient was far stronger than Quentin had thought. Stronger than Choto. The entire Quyth life cycle hinged on structure, on authority. A Warrior
had
to have someone to follow.

And then Quentin put the pieces together. “Choto, are you saying that you want me to be your leader?”

Swirls of yellow — excitement, nervousness — and pink. That was exactly what Choto wanted. The thought of it thrilled him, gave him hope. It also terrified him — if Quentin said no, Choto would have nothing.

“During the fight at Torba’s, I just reacted,” Choto said. “I did not think things through, but I knew what would happen. I knew the choice I was making. I chose you, Quentin. If you will have me, I will serve you faithfully. I will serve my
Shamakath
.”

Had they had spent so much time together that Choto had imprinted upon Quentin? If Quentin cast him away, what would happen to him? And if Choto hadn’t stepped in, could Quentin have beaten Virak? Vinje would have just escaped. Quentin might never have gotten answers.

He could not abandon Choto, not now.

And hell, he already had millions of sentients worshiping him, what was one more?

“Okay,” Quentin said. “I’m ... uh ... I’m your Shamakath, or whatever. Is there some kind of a ceremony or something?”

Choto’s eye flooded a light orange.
Total happiness
. “No, it is not like that. With your words, it is done. I am yours to command,
Shamakath
.”

“Okay, first thing, don’t call me that. Ever. I am Quentin, do you understand?”

Choto nodded, a humanesque gesture that required the Warriors to move their whole upper body.

“Good,” Quentin said. “And second, you tell no one of this. You don’t get to share the info. As far as the world knows, you are Ronin.”

“But, why? Being Ronin is a mark of shame.”

“Because you need to know what you’re getting into here. I’m not going to threaten you, or tell you I’ll kill you if you don’t obey or any of that crap. I wouldn’t do that. But you have to know, Choto, that I am going after Gredok the Splithead. Not this season and I don’t know when, but I
will
get revenge for what he did to me. If you’re following me, then you’re going to wind up going head-to-head with Gredok, probably head-to-head with your buddy Virak. I don’t want them to know I’m your leader. Do you understand?”

This time, Choto’s eye swirled with inky black. Anger. Rage. Not at Quentin, but at Gredok and Virak.

“I understand,” Choto said. “And I was hoping, very much, that was what you wanted.”

Maybe this was a mistake, but Quentin didn’t know what else to do. If Choto was for real, he would be a valuable ally in the fight to come.

“Shama ... Quentin,” Choto said. “It is almost time for practice. Shall we walk to the stadium?”

Quentin shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m not sure I’ll play for that betrayer.”

Choto’s pedipalps twitched and he winced again. “Please, stop joking,” he said. “It hurts when I laugh.”

“What are you laughing at?”

Another twitch, another wince. “The thought of you
not
playing against the To Pirates? As if you were even capable of that. You are very funny, Quentin.”

Quentin’s anger flared up, then it faded away. Choto was right. No matter what Gredok had done, Quentin Barnes wanted the ball. Needed it. He could stop playing no more than he could will his own heart to stop beating. He had to get his head back into the game.

“That’s me,” Quentin said. “A regular comedian. Let’s get to practice.”

• • •

QUENTIN LIMPED
into the training room.

A hovering Doc Patah spun in place, saw the Human and paused.

Quentin had waited until late after practice, until everyone had been patched up, showered, dressed and headed back to their apartments. Patah had lied about Cillian being Quentin’s genetic father. Quentin had trusted Doc Patah without question — a fact that Gredok had known, yet another element the crime lord had used to manipulate.

After the fight at Torba’s, Quentin had avoided Doc Patah. This was the first time they’d seen each other since the dinner.

Quentin still didn’t know much about Harrah emotions, but he knew fear when he saw it — and Doc Patah was afraid. Damn well he should be. The floating creature’s sensory pits widened and his mouth-flaps changed from light gray to a darker shade.

“Young Quentin,” Doc Patah said. “I know that you must be furious with me, but I—”

“Shove it,” Quentin said through clenched teeth. “Doc, it’s taking every bit of control I have not to rip you in half. I’m going to ask questions, you’re going to answer. Understand?”

Doc’s wide wings undulated slowly, keeping him in place. “Yes. I understand.”

Quentin stripped off his gear, limped to the rejuve tank. He slid in. This time, the pink fluid’s penetrating warmth did little to elevate his mood. Hate pumped through his veins — he didn’t want it to go away. That’s what he was now, a creature of anger, a creature of fury.