“Around these parts,” the youngster said, “I imagine it’s survival of the fittest, just like everywhere else.” He was still visually taking inventory of every one of them, as if committing all details to memory.
Then, just as if he’d deemed the lot of them safe, he switched gears, taking a step forward, sauntering toward Zel without a hint of menace, yet still as serious as could be, while he extended a hand toward her in greeting. Gabriel even thought that the kid was genuinely happy to find some fellow nonspastic humans of his own ilk out here.
“Johnson Stamp,” he said.
But Zel didn’t make a move to accept the strange gesture. Instead, she recoiled ever so slightly.
From where Gabriel was standing, there was nothing physically repulsive about Stamp, who seemed well kempt and proper. It was more of a curdle to the blood that the kid brought on, and Gabriel could understand her reluctance to engage him.
If Stamp’s employees were Text-blind to body language, the boss himself sure wasn’t. He read Zel’s message loud and clear but didn’t make issue of it, as he tn offered his hand to Sammy.
But the Mexican angled his body away from Stamp.
That seemed to do it, causing the kid’s gaze to darken even more as he drew back his hand, almost like it was a weapon about to be holstered.
“This is how it’ll be, then,” he said, his arms curved at his sides in stiff rejection.
The old man piped up from his corner of the room. “Maybe you’d have gotten a different version of hello if your men had seen fit to stay away in the first place.”
Stamp faced the oldster again, as if interested in his sparkiness. Meanwhile, the three employees loitered near the door, their arms crossed over their chests. They were assessing Gabriel and his head bandages, and he returned their stares with an outward composition that didn’t quite match the creeping heat of his vision.
Had one of them harassed Annie, just as Chompers had done to Mariah over the visz screen last night?
Had one of them chased Annie away?
In particular, Gabriel watched Chompers, whose trophy teeth clanked around his ankles as he shifted position. He was watching Gabriel right back with a strenuous curiosity. But Gabriel knew that the guy hadn’t gotten a good gander at him in the dark last night, so he wasn’t in the process of recognizing him. However, Gabriel
did
fear that the thug might be able to recall Gabriel’s whispered threats, which had suggested that Chompers leave before he got torn apart.
Shit. See what happened when he tried to sway somebody?
Still, scaring off Chompers last night had actually been worth it in the end, with the thug fleeing Mariah’s home.
“Sir,” Stamp finally said to the old man. “I don’t think you realize that I’m not after anything you own. Not unless you count company. I’ve found it isolating out here, and being a hub boy, I’m not used to it, even though I’m all too happy to get away from the masses.”
“Is that so?” the oldster said.
Stamp nodded. “Like you, I’m out here to just exist like nature meant us to, without all those abominations you find in the hubs.” His mouth curled up at one side—an unsaid, bitter reminiscence. But then he smoothed himself out again. “I’ll admit to you that my men need a firmer hand. I’m not used to employing anyone, seeing as I always made my way solo before now. I apologize for this tough start. But I’m also here to tell you that I don’t take kindly to the way the people around here have been dealing with the temporary waywardness of those on my payroll. If you give us the opportunity, we can be nice enough. I brought them out here to teach them better. I’m even gearing up to teach them polite language. I tell them that speaking Old American is the first step in becoming the entrepreneurs and successes we can all be.” He jerked his chin toward Whale Hide, as if the man’s smiliness provided all the example anyone might require of their intended goodwill.
The oldster glanced at Zel and Sammy, who were still keeping to themselves.
Then Stamp’s olive branch seemed to snap. “I should add that, unfortunately, one of my men was picked off the night before last. We found his remains under the circle of some carrion feeders, and I’m also here to see if there’s anything I need to do about it.”
It was as if someone had aimed a bullet at the ceiling, silent debris raining down as Zel, Sammy, and Chaplin went taut.
But not the old man. “Death is a risk of living out here in what remains of nature. By leaving the hubs, you’ve just bought yourself a stake in the ultimate craps game, so you might want to inform your boys that flitting round at night isn’t for the wise.
That’s
what you need to do about it.”
Stamp turned to all of them now, even Gabriel, who knew that just because the kid hadn’t singled him out didn’t mean he hadn’t been fully aware that Gabriel was there, waiting, nearly quaking with the effort of watching and wondering what any of this had to do with Annie . . . or Abby.
“If another one of my men ends up with his belly torn open,” the kid said, “I’ll be back here for better answers. But I think we can agree to live alongside one another well enough instead. Understand?”
Zel’s voice was low as she spoke. “We understand. But you won’t find any answers about what happened to your man in this room, Mr. Stamp, I promise you that. There really are wild things out there at night. Nature hasn’t been shy about providing them.”
Sammy was quick to support her. “If you’d just keep your men inside, you won’t find any of them attacked from now on.”
For a second, it seemed that Stamp and his men would leave without further ado.
Until the old man said his last piece.
“Hence, screw you and the horse you rode in on—”
Seemingly resigned, Stamp gestured toward Whale Hide, who yanked a contraption out of a long pocket of his heat suit and zap-flicked it toward the oldster.
Too late, Gabriel saw that it was a taserwhip, the length of it sizzling through the air toward the old man’s neck.
Gabriel felt himself going into a crouch, automatically preparing to spring and intercept the lash by wrapping it around his hand, reeling the culprit toward him for a preemptory reckoning. The electricity would give him a charge, yet he’d heal quicker than the oldster.
But, near his feet, Chaplin pressed hard against Gabriel’s legs, the dog opening his mind, pushing in images of what would occur if Stamp’s men realized that they had a monster in the room:
More whips, zap-flicking toward Gabriel, lashing around his neck and arms, capturing him. . . .
The images caused Gabriel a second of hesitation—one in which the taserwhip sang out to curl around the oldster’s neck.
The smell of burning skin hit the air.
As the man gurgled out a whimper under the grip of the lash, Gabriel could just about feel it, too. And when the old guy’s hands came up to pull the wire from around his neck before the thug could fully energize it, Gabriel couldn’t help but start forward, consequences or not, thinking that his own capture would be nothing compared to the pain of knowing something could’ve been done to avoid the old man’s anguish.
But Chaplin disagreed, fixing his teeth to his master’s trousers, urging him back and connecting to his mind with ferocious strength.
Mariah,
the dog thought.
All of us. Don’t make it worse.
That brought Gabriel to his senses.
If they saw how he withstood the electricity, they’d know, and he’d be no good to anyone right now if he exposed ha c, bringing this sanctuary into the sights of the authorities for harboring a monster.
So he hung back, digging his nails into his palms as he fisted his hands by his side, as helpless as he’d felt that night when he’d seen Abby wasting away.
The other two employees already had their whips out, eyeing Zel and Sammy, and the tips of Gabriel’s fangs pierced him.
But he pressed his lips together, narrowing his eyes.
“Don’t even think about it,” Stamp said to Gabriel. “Not unless you want the electricity turned on high and your old friend to really dance.”
Chaplin tore his teeth away from Gabriel’s trousers, barking at Stamp.
The kid’s gaze slid down to the dog.
Gabriel bent to wrap an arm around the canine’s neck, holding
him
from jumping in to defend Mariah’s friends now.
Outplayed,
Gabriel thought to his familiar.
Too much to lose, boy. You should know that.
But the notion abraded him, anyway. They’d
all
been retreating for a long time, and look where it’d gotten them—underground, hiding, always on the defensive.
Yet he carried on, knowing that Chaplin had been right when he’d reminded him that now wasn’t the time for his vampire to come out. Not if he wanted to finesse his way into answers about Annie or find what he was looking for and then somehow move on. Not if he wanted to keep these people from further trouble.
But he could still help.
“Why’re you really here?” Gabriel asked, his lips barely moving so that he could hide his teeth.
As the oldster let out another, weaker trembling sound of discomfort in the background, Stamp glanced toward it, as if it might answer Gabriel’s question.
He’d come here to show he was serious about keeping his men secure.
Gabriel’s hands tightened in Chaplin’s fur, and the dog stirred beneath him.
Obviously content with the upper hand, the kid took a handheld black unit out of his suit pocket. It looked like a gun with a flip-up monitor as he turned it on and aimed it at Gabriel.
At first, Gabriel thought to cloud the device, just as he had done with Mariah’s visz monitor, but Stamp adjusted a knob, and the machine proved too powerful to interrupt.
So, Gabriel withstood it, realizing that the kid was only using a scanner with a built-in facial recognition database to determine who his neighbors were. Really, there’d be no big harm since Gabriel had never been identified as a monster, so it wouldn’t give Stamp much to go on. Also, he was only a couple years older than his vampire appearance let on.
The bottom line was that Gabriel, like many other society dropouts, had destroyed his identity long ago, and the history stored in the database would end just before it got interesting. Thank-all for that.
Stamp touched the screen, no doubt accessing more information. Then he flicked a glance at Gabriel, his features never changing, never revealing what might be on that monitor.
All the same, Gabriel put on a show of breathing quicker, just as he’d done with Mariah. He just hoped that the machine didn’t have anything that could register his vital signs, because he’d be in trouble.
But when Stamp turned away from him, Gabriel supposed the scanner wasn’t equipped with such accoutrements, and he laid his hand flat against Chaplin, patting the dog, telling him that things would be okay if they could just endure another few moments.
Stamp went on to scan Zel, who had her hands pressed flat on the crate table again, a muscle working in her wrinkled cheek, as if she were drawing on every ounce of restraint she had. All of them seemed to be doing that, especially the old man, who shook under the pull of the lash.
“All of this,” the kid continued as he accessed the screen, “could’ve been done in a friendly enough manner. ‘Hello,’ you could’ve said. ‘Pleased to meet you. I’m Zelda Hopkins, ex-lieutenant of police forces in the Northlink. I went off the Nets a while ago, but I’d be pleased to show some kindness to someone else who could enjoy a fresh start.’”
When the oldster yelped from his corner, Stamp glanced at Whale Hide, who seemed to be getting more and more impatient to mess around with his prey.
“Lay off him,” the kid said.
His command was so even and forceful that Chaplin shrank back. As for Whale Hide, he held up his free hand, murmuring something like a Text apology.
Stamp turned the scanner on Sammy, looking just as blank-faced as he had with Zel and Gabriel. “All of your ID chips went dead a while ago,” he said. “If I didn’t intend to show you what a good neighbor I can be, I’d report that.”
“But you won’t,” Zel said. “Not if you want to get along.”
Stamp lowered the device, sending her a glance that could’ve been either detached or threatening.
Zel shut up, then seemed angry at herself for backing down.
The kid wandered over to scan the oldster next, and Stamp adjusted the machine as a high squealing sound made Gabriel and Chaplin cringe. Gabriel tried not to show it, but when he saw that the pitch had caused Zel, Sammy, and the oldster to react, too, he relaxed. The response wouldn’t set him apart.
Stamp finally lowered the device. “You’re not even in the database, sir.”
“Intrusive technology came after my time,” the oldster said, the lie a mocking last punch to show he still had some fight left in him.
By now, he was on his hands and knees, breathing hard and unsteadily, the whip still looped around his neck. Gabriel knew that Whale Hide hadn’t even turned up the electricity to high, either. He would’ve smelled the crisp of it.