"Like we did
before?" said Karen. "When you and your boyfriend tried to use
us as guinea pigs?" Her eyes lost their dullness for a moment.
They sparked. Rage. Then the spark disappeared and that same
muffled expression draped itself over her visage again.
"Look,"
said Olik. "We didn't know what we were going to see."
"We still
don't," said Adolfa. "So you going to push us first into the
next dangerous place?"
Olik looked almost
embarrassed. "I probably would," he said at last.
"But…." He lifted out his mangled hand. "Hard to
push anything with one hand, yes?"
"Maybe I
should just push
you
," said Karen.
Olik's attempt at
good-natured appearance disappeared instantly. "Try," he said.
"Wait,"
said Jim. He stood. Loathe as he was to get between people who had
the clear will and apparent skill to kill each other – and everyone else in the
car – a dozen times over, he also didn't want to take a chance at being caught
in their crossfire. "Let's ease up. Take a breath."
He looked at Olik. "What did you want to propose?"
Olik seemed to find
that question amusing. "I should call you Nathaniel, yes?"
Jim frowned.
"I don't…."
"You are like
the man in Bible. Nathaniel of old, who Jesus said, 'Behold an Israelite
indeed, in whom is no guile.'" Olik grinned. "You have no
guile, little man. Like Nathaniel. You just ask your question, straight
and forward."
Jim's head was
spinning again. A subway going who-knew-where, with a rapidly diminishing
number of strangers… and now one of them turned out to be some sort of macho
thug who was a closet biblical scholar?
"What do you
want?" he finally said.
Olik looked at the
group. "I want to live," he answered. He pointed at
Adolfa. "Like you, yes?" She nodded. "And
you?" he added, pointing now at Jim. Jim felt his own head bob up
and down, feeling almost as though someone else was controlling his
actions. "And you?" Olik asked Karen. She didn't
answer. Just stared at him. He nodded as though she had responded
clearly in the affirmative. "Of course. So we need to work
together. Talk. Survive."
"Why do you
want to work together now?" asked Adolfa.
Olik smiled that predatory
grin of his again. "When I was boy, I worked part of every year as
shepherd. Deep in woods, with my brothers." He wiped a hand
across his forehead, looking at the perspiration on his palm for a moment
before flinging it away. It disappeared into the darkness.
"All day long they teased me. Pushed me, punched me. I stayed
away from them. But at night… at night I slept between them. And
why?" Olik looked around. No one spoke. He wiped his
forehead again, his eyes far away for a moment as he relived old
memories. "Because at night the wolves came. They howl in the
night, and I was afraid. So I sleep between my brothers. Not
because they would protect me, but so when the wolves come, they will eat my
brothers and I will be able to escape." His eyes refocused.
His grin now looked like that of one of the wolves he spoke of.
"I don't think any of you will care for me, yes? But I will stay
with you, because perhaps you protect me from the wolves."
"Or maybe
you'll be the one who gets eaten first," said Karen, her eyes still
shrouded by a mist of non-emotion.
Olik's grin didn't
falter one iota. If anything it grew wider. "Is what you call
a win-win, yes?"
Karen smiled
back. But Jim noted that the smile didn't reach her eyes.
Olik turned back to
the others. "So we band together, yes?" He put his hand
forward. "We fight together. Survive."
Jim stared at the
outstretched hand. It was palm down, fingers rigidly forward. He
didn't know what to do with it. But a moment later Karen put her hand on
top of Olik's.
Good
golly
, he thinks we're in a football
practice
.
It was absurd.
But then, was it
any more incredible than the events that had already transpired?
Adolfa put her hand
on top of Karen's.
A moment later, Jim
added his own hand to the group. And when he did he was surprised to find
that he didn't feel silly at all. Rather, he felt like he was making a
choice that would have fateful consequences. He was choosing his
team.
And like it or not,
it was the team he was going to play on until this deadly serious game was
over.
================
================
"First is
first," said Olik.
He pulled his beefy hand away and sat down. Slumped almost, his body going
loose at the last second as he let himself fall into one of the seats.
"Who are you?"
Jim looked at
Adolfa. She was looking back at him with a quizzical expression, and he
sensed that she expected him to take the lead in the conversation. He
swiveled back to Olik. "What do you mean?" he said.
Karen sat
down. Rigid. A tightly-coiled spring that might burst into movement
at any moment. Jim suspected he didn't want to be around if that
happened. "He wants to know details about you," she said.
"Is right,"
said Olik with a nod.
"Like, our
favorite colors?" asked Jim. "Our turn-ons and
turn-offs?" He could hear the acidity in his voice, and didn't
care. When Olik had pulled his hand away the sense of foolishness had
returned. They had no chance. They were children playing in a
minefield, and the only question was which one of them would be blown to hell
first.
Jim sat down as
well and wondered if he wouldn't be better off just staying in a seat until the
train stopped or some new monstrosity came for him. Resistance was an
exercise in pride sometimes. And sometimes it was worse: an exercise in
stupidity. Sometimes it was better to let fate come, to let death take
you.
No. Think
of the girls
.
"Not
turn-offs," said Olik. He laughed loud and long. The laughter
was harder than the situation merited, but his mirth seemed genuine.
"I mean what you are good at, what skills you have. Things that may
keep us alive," said Olik. He didn't seem to take offense at Jim's tone,
and Jim had to remind himself that he was talking to a very dangerous
man. "For example: I am businessman. Who is very good
shot." He patted his coat where Jim presumed his remaining gun was
holstered. "I also am good fighter, but with one hand, not so
much." Olik looked at Jim. "I hear you talking about
being shrink. Is doctor, yes?"
Jim nodded.
"A shrink is a psychiatrist. A doctor of the mind."
"But with
medical training of the body?"
"Some."
Olik nodded
approval. "Good. Helpful. What happened to the little
man, and to Xavier… you ever see things like that before?"
Jim shook his
head. "I've never even heard of anything close to that."
"And of people
who followed us into car?" said Olik. "They were dead?"
Jim paused.
"I… don't know." Then he shook his head. "No, they
couldn't have been. They had to be alive."
"But they kept
coming when they were shot," said Adolfa. Her eyes were wide, fear
settling into the shadows on her face. Jim worried she might shut down if
she followed that line of reasoning too far.
He
shrugged. "Maybe they were on something. Some
drug. Like some super-powerful methamphetamine or some other drug I've
never heard of. But dead?" Another shake of the head.
"That I can't accept." He noticed Olik looking at him with
narrowed eyes. "What?" he said.
"Super-powerful
methamphetamine?" said Olik, repeating Jim's words, rolling them around
for a moment as though sampling their taste. He paused, looking like he
was going to say something further, then shook his head and switched his gaze
to Adolfa. "And you?"
Adolfa actually
grinned, that same wide-open smile that she had flashed on Jim before all this
had started. She suddenly looked as though she hadn't a care in the
world; as though she was having a conversation with friends on her veranda, and
not a strategy session in a bullet train to nowhere. "I'm just an
abuelita
,
she said." The pride in her voice was clear.
"Yes, a
grandmother," said Olik. "I heard this, too. But even a
grandmother must do more." He leaned toward her. To Jim's
astonishment the huge man actually looked friendly now, concerned and
interested. No hint of threat about him. "What did you do,
abuelita
?"
Adolfa looked
around as though uncomfortable being the center of attention. "I… I
helped my husband run our family business."
"Which
was?" Olik still spoke softly, gently coaxing the information out of
her.
"Just a little
store," she said. "Little things to the neighborhood
children."
Olik nodded
somberly, as though she had just told him she was researching cures for
cancer. "Where is your husband now?"
Adolfa laughed, a
rasping titter that sawed through the darkness of the subway car.
"Oh, he died years ago." Tears glittered in her eyes. She
wiped them away and sat up straight, a proud woman pushing on with what tools
she had. "I took over. I grew the business without him."
Olik nodded.
Jim saw him, saw what he was doing. Saw him assuming the role of the
father of this strange mixed family. Saw him forging a bond between
Adolfa and him. Cheap, basic psychology, but the man was doing it well.
Whatever he is,
he's more than a "businessman."
Olik reached out a
hand and placed it on Adolfa's shoulder. He squeezed it. "What
you do for the store?" he asked.
"Bookkeeping,
mostly," she said, dabbing at her eyes with the ends of a sleeve.
"Some hiring and firing. Inventory."
Another squeeze by
Olik, and Jim saw gratitude bloom in Adolfa's eyes.
He's got her,
thought Jim, and couldn't help admire the man's deft touch. She'll die
for him now.
"We will find
a way for you to help us,
abuelita
," said Olik. "And we
will protect you until that time comes."
He turned to
Karen. And as he did, Jim noted something. A flash in Adolfa's
eyes. It was fast: so fast he couldn't be sure it really happened.
Maybe he imagined it, maybe it was just the flare of one of the streaking
lights outside.
But he didn't think
so. At least in that instant he thought it was something real. In
that instant he thought he saw
amusement
. Like
Adolfa
had
been the one playing
Olik
.
Then the look was
gone and she dabbed at her eyes, just looking grateful for the attention and
the promise of protection.
Olik lifted his
chin when he looked at Karen. Again, Jim noted the posture change.
To Jim he had presented an overbearing attitude, a menace. A subtle
threat if he didn't get his way. To Adolfa the man had seemed the
patriarch and protector. Now to Karen he was holding himself forth as a
fellow-soldier. As an equal – and equally dangerous – peer.
"And
you?" Olik said. Admiration crept into his voice. "I've
never seen someone move the way you did against our good friend Xavier."
Karen didn't answer
for a long time. Then in a near monotone: "I take karate."
Olik snorted.
"So you are just lawyer?"
Karen looked at him
evenly. "I'm in acquisitions."
"And you take
karate, what, after work and on weekends?"
"A girl needs
her exercise."
Olik looked like he
was trying to decide how much to challenge her on that. He sighed and
leaned back. "So we have the brain doctor, the
abuelita
, the
ass-kicking lawyer, and me."
"What kind of
business
do
you run?" said Jim.
Olik's wolf-grin
returned. "Internet commodities."
"Like gold and
silver trading?"
"Something
like that."
"But not
that."
Olik shook his
head. "No."
"Then what,
exactly?" Jim looked around. "Since we're all in this
together
,
like you said."
For a moment he
wondered if he had gone too far, if he had pushed Olik's charade of familiarity
beyond what the man was prepared to accept. Olik suddenly seemed to swell
in his seat, as though he had miraculously pulled substance from the air itself
to add to his mass.
This is
it. I'm dead. Good-bye, girls.
Then the fight
dissipated as fast as it came. The big man relaxed. He leaned back
in his seat and kicked out a foot, his posture suddenly that of a man with
nothing more to worry about than when to get the next beer out of the fridge.
"My
commodities are a bit more… perishable… than gold and silver," he said.
"What does
that mean?" Jim said.
Olik
chuckled. Amused by Jim's inability to divine his meaning.
"You are doctor. Smart man. You tell me."
Jim thought.
Internet commodities, the man had said. Like gold and silver, but
"more perishable." He had no idea.
Olik chuckled
again, a deep rumble that turned into a painful cough. He curled around
his mangled hand, still jammed into his coat. Jim wondered how long it
would be before the guy needed a hospital.
"Cotton?"
said Jim. It was the wrong answer, he knew that. No way was an
internet cotton mogul wandering around the subway with a pair of
silencer-equipped guns tucked into his jacket, ready to make mince-meat of
anyone who got in his way. No, whatever Olik was into was something
considerably uglier. Illegal. "Drugs?"
Olik was still
coughing a bit, but he shook his head. He was smiling. The smile
was starting to piss Jim off. Maybe he wasn't some super-criminal like
this guy, but he wasn't a
moron
.
"Sex."
The word seemed to
come out of nowhere. It slithered like a serpent out of the darkness, a
single syllable that said so much with so little. Jim knew Karen had said
it, but only because
he
hadn't, and it didn't seem like the kind of
thing Adolfa would say to a bunch of strangers.
Olik looked at the
woman with an admiring nod. "You are one bright kick-ass
lawyer."
"You sell
sex?" said Jim. "On the internet? Like call girls?
An escort service?" His voice must have sounded his confusion to
Olik. Another of those irritating seismic chuckles bounced out of the big
man's chest.
"No, not
escort service." Olik leaned toward Jim. In the darkness the
big man's fevered eyes seemed to glint. Jim was reminded of the saying
that the eyes are the windows to the soul. He wondered if he was
glimpsing a very bright avenue in a particularly hot suburb of Hell. Probably.
"I trade in
people
. Women. Girls. Boys. You
have money to pay, I will ship you the goods. Willing and compliant, with
all necessary," he coughed delicately, "pharmacological means to
maintain compliance." His grin was beyond wolf-like now. It
was rapacious. The smile of someone who profits off suffering, off broken
families and loss of innocence… and who sleeps like a baby each night.
Jim felt sick to
his stomach. "You call that being a businessman?"
"I call it
being very rich businessman," said Olik. "Sex trade powers
internet. No people looking at porn, no people like me. No people
like me, no more of your precious emails and Googles."
Jim shook his
head. "That's not how it works."
"Is exactly
how it works." Olik looked relaxed. An expert in his domain.
"Average person looking at internet is also looking at porn. Who
supplies porn? People like me. And then when they are tired of
porn, where do they turn? Also, people like me. Because supply
always leads to more demand. I am merely filling a need."
Jim glanced at
Adolfa. She looked disgusted, but he sensed she wasn't going to say
anything. She was too fragile, too vulnerable. And she had pinned
her hopes for the future on the strongest person in the car. At least for
now.
He looked at
Karen. "Doesn't this bother you?"
Karen looked at him
like he was something she would hire someone to scrape off the back of her
toilet. She didn't say anything.
Jim looked back at
Olik. The big man was smirking. "You see? No one
likes
me. But most people…" and he motioned at Karen and Adolfa, "…
they will recognize me as necessary evil, yes?"
"No,"
said Jim. But he said it without conviction. Like he only
half-believed himself. Like maybe Olik was right. Maybe there was
necessary evil in the world.
No. That was
ridiculous. Jim had always tried to be a good guy. Maybe he wasn't
perfect – who was? – but he didn't accept the idea of
necessary evil
.
Olik put a hand on
Jim's knee. "You will come around," he said.
"Everyone does eventually, yes?"
Jim didn't say
anything. There was nothing he could say.
Olik stood.
"Okay then: let us look for way out of this place. Before more
monsters come for us, yes?"
Adolfa nodded and
sprung – all-too-eagerly – to her feet. She didn't want the monsters to
get her, that was clear. She wanted to get back to her grandchildren.
Jim stood,
too. But slowly. And couldn't help thinking that by signing on to
Olik's team he might actually be joining
with
the monsters.