The Good Doctor's Tales Folio Four Read online

  The police officer smiled. “A fair question, Beast Hoskins. Jackson, Tennessee, which lies not many miles east of Memphis.”

  “For west, for us, this is the most,” Hoskins said. “Much land lies in between. Perhaps we can make a deal.”

  “A deal?”

  “Don’t trust his words,” Occum said, a low whisper. “He’s playing with your mind.”

  Hoskins shook his head. “You said my thick skull protects me. I will protect you.”

  Hoskins hadn’t fallen over when the police officer did his trick, Sir Sellers realized. Well, Hoskins did have a thick head. It went along with his stiff neck.

  “I haven’t shown a tenth of what I might do, if provoked,” the police officer said. “Still, I would rather negotiate than fight. Your Master Occum is someone I would like to remember as a friend.”

  Sir Sellers bristled at the weasel-words and dug his toes into the rocky ground for a charge, but waited to see if Hoskins could make the deal he wanted.

  “I propose we split the booty; one Beast for you, one for us,” Hoskins said.

  Oh, I get it, Sir Sellers thought. We can’t transport both of these Beasts back. Hoskins is offering up something not ours. Well, not counting the fact Master Occum made both Beasts into family. That’s what had Master Occum upset.

  “Mark this line on the map,” Hoskins said, drawing a pencil line from north to south at their current position. You don’t recruit over here” he said, pointing to the east “we don’t recruit over there.” Pointing to the west.

  “That’s actually…equitable. Reasonable. Something unexpected from a Beast,” the police officer said. Sir Sellers thought their enemy got the better part of the deal, a larger piece of the map, leaving them with more of the actual Transforms who lived in the United States. That couldn’t be a good thing. Could it? “I agree.”

  Sir Sellers recalled telling himself to quit trying to bargain with Hoskins, as he lost every time. Perhaps Hoskins had a special skill, as Master Occum termed things.

  “Go, then,” Occum said, unhappy.

  “But which of these Beasts should I take? Shall we flip a coin?”

  “Do you prefer either, sir?” Sir Sellers asked, the words slipping out into a conversation he possibly shouldn’t be sticking his snout into. He had a preference, the same way he knew which way to go to hunt down Beasts and Monsters, the same way he knew Shere Khan was flawed. The bear-Beast had been a Beast Man for too long, and being a Beast for too long had irrevocably scrambled his mind. Sir Sellers feared the bear-Beast would never be more than an automaton, unable to meet his responsibilities with any creative thought.

  “I prefer the armored bear, as should any right-thinking Master,” the police officer said. “Far more tractable, older and more powerful.”

  “I suggest we keep the flame-broiled demon for our family,” Sir Sellers said. Master Occum turned to him and mouthed the word ‘why?’ without speaking. He shared Master Wandering Shade’s sentiments about the Beasts. “I say this as Farsight. His name is Horace Knox. He is one of us.”

  Master Occum smiled, catching the code word and the nuances. “I think I’ll agree with my charge’s assessment.”

  “It is done, then,” the police officer said. “May we never again meet in person.” The police officer turned to the bear-Beast. “Come along…” pause “Horace.” The bear-Beast walked off with the police officer, no longer feeling like family. Soon their adversary’s entourage vanished into the distance.

  To Sir Sellers’ surprise, Hoskins still glowed in Sellers’ metasense. Not a standard metasense glow, but a family glow.

  “Hoskins, go see to Sadie,” Occum said. “Sir Sellers, what’s going on in that fool canine skull of yours right now?”

  He didn’t remember the word ‘canine’, so he shrugged. He would rather be waking up Sadie. He thought this would be an excellent time to prove to her that she was, indeed, a woman. “The other Beast was bad.”

  “Shere Khan bad?” Occum asked. “He didn’t feel that way to me.”

  “Different bad. A book without letters. Teaching him human would make you very grumpy for a long time.”

  Master Occum shook his head, not understanding. “Well, you sensed something, so that’s good enough for me. So, what are you sensing about our friend Hoskins?”

  “Good things. Brother Hoskins, do you feel odd?” Sir Sellers asked.

  “I do,” Hoskins said. “Stronger. More a part of the family.” He paused. “But I didn’t do a quest. How can this count?”

  “I would say a great deed of valor on the field of battle – and your deed was great, as I believe your diplomacy may have saved our small family from extinction – makes a Beast into a Noble as much as a completed quest does,” Master Occum said. “When we get back home, I think I’m going to have to knight you, Hoskins.”

  Hoskins, soon to be Sir Hoskins, smiled.

  Sir Sellers turned to Sadie, who rested in Hoskins’ arms. “Are you ready for a game?” Sir Sellers asked her. “I want to play ‘prove to Sadie she’s a woman’ with you.” Of all the wooing words he had stated so far, he thought these were the best, his most inventive of the bunch.

  Sadie, alas, did not. “Occum!” she said, with a loud enough shout to make Master Occum twitch. “Fix this, please!”

  Sir Sellers frowned. He would need another long talk with the household women. This just wasn’t working the way he wanted.

  Carol Flees Enkidu

  [Carol Hancock POV]

  The world swam as I drove and I struggled to remember my last five minutes. Not good. Enkidu’s rape I remembered. He wasn’t here, though, implying an escape or a rescue. My still excessive wounds meant I had rescued myself. I needed to get away from the Quad Cities. Enkidu would be able to track me with a schnozzle like his. Would he heal faster than I did? Was he as low on juice, or whatever served as his equivalent to juice, as myself?

  Why did the road wiggle so damned much as I drove?

  I blinked, and shook my head. I didn’t move anymore. In fact, my car sat in a ditch, steam rising from under the hood. I must have blacked out and crashed. I must not have been driving very fast – I didn’t seem any more injured than before.

  I remembered Enkidu raping me. I must have escaped, but what should I do now? I didn’t know where I was; one Illinois corn field looks like any other around the end of September. If I was in Illinois. I might have crossed over to Iowa. The corn fields over there looked just the same.

  Call Bobby? Right. He was sweet, I loved him, he knew how to box, but for a situation like this he was nothing more than a bed toy. Finding me out in some random part of Illinois would be beyond his capabilities. My other recruits? I barely trusted them when I stood over them. No way would I let them near me, injured.

  Hmm. My recruit style had problems, didn’t it? I promised myself to deal with that issue soon. First, I had to survive. Get juice. Get back to Chicago.

  Time for me to walk.

  I blinked and woke up. I lay in the mud, cold, down in some corn stubble. I remembered Enkidu raping me. I must have escaped…but to here? What had I been thinking? I lifted my head from the ground and glanced around. Less than two hundred feet away police and wreckers surrounded a car, guns out, and two uniformed officers attempted to open the trunk.

  That must be how I escaped. The police knew the car was mine.

  Soon the bloodhounds would come out.

  I was cold. Wait a second. I couldn’t be cold. Arms are immune to the cold. I held out my right hand in front of my eyes. My hand shook. I glanced again at the bright police lights. Bright, painful.

  Cold grue flooded my stomach. I neared withdrawal.

  So this was how death came to an Arm: lying in cold corn stubble, the frosty night above, watching the stars, near withdrawal, memory failing, waiting for the hounds to track me down. The hounds wouldn’t have much of a problem. I couldn’t move.

  I felt my body with my hands, attempting to find out the probl
em or problems. Pat pat pat. Bandages everywhere. My left arm barely moved. My breasts were gone completely. Blood seeped from an impressive throat wound, which threatened to gape open at any second. I was crazy thirsty and I knew why: the last time someone cut my throat (Keaton, the bitch) I had needed gallons of liquid to replace my lost blood. I won’t even describe my hunger, for juice or for food.

  If I lived, I would learn whether I regrew breasts as well as I regrew earlobes.

  My abdomen remained my worst damage, damage I remembered well from the rape. I didn’t know exactly what went on in there, but my lower abdomen hurt like hell. I only hoped that my natural healing would suffice. I still bled from those wounds. As I lay in the corn stubble, I endured sudden stabbing agony whenever I twitched.

  I had gone from high on juice to the edge of withdrawal, and I still wasn’t fully healed. The remnants of my black rage at Enkidu still lingered inside of me. I still had his hand. His hand still twitched.

  I tried to think things through while I watched the stars and waited for the hounds, or for my body to be able to move again. I had gotten the kill. Enkidu came in immediately afterwards.

  No coincidence there.

  I hadn’t picked him up with my metasense until after the fight, because of the diffuseness of the Chimera metapresence. I would be on the lookout for it next time.

  If I remembered.

  He didn’t have any problems picking me out, though. He had come in when he sensed me kill the Transform. He came in thinking he would kill me, but I seduced him instead. Fine, he was vulnerable to Arm seduction tricks. Unfortunately, all the fruits of my labors got me was the prick. He had tried to snuff me anyway.

  Once he injured me, he started stealing my juice, which made him horny. Just like an Arm. Also, just like an Arm, he started enjoying himself too much and forgot to finish killing me, a mistake on his part.

  I suspected he wasn’t much older than me, as a Transform. However, he hadn’t been trained, and I had. That’s why I walked away from this debacle and he had crawled.

  More police vehicles approached, and as I suspected, out came the barking dogs.

  I decided to try a trick the FBI inadvertently taught me, back in the Detention Center. Could I cow bloodhounds the same way I cowed other animals? I remembered cowing some German shepherds the FBI had set up to test me once, guarding my Transform prey.

  That was a good memory. I focused on the feeling, how I cowed McIntyre’s damned dogs. Stared through the corn stubble. Buried myself deeper in the muck.

  At least the police didn’t have the choppers out. Yet.

  I’m over that-a-way. Far away. Go!

  Downwind of me, the dogs shouldn’t have had any problems sniffing out my presence. I think they did find me, but decided they didn’t want any part of me. Instead, the bloodhounds made a bee-line across the road and across the next field, making the high ‘hot on the scent’ yelp.

  I started to crawl back toward my car. The police had my duffel, my supplies, my keys, my money, my weapons, everything. They had everything but me.

  I slurped muddy water and chewed discarded field corn as I crawled, rested, and waited. Fifteen minutes later, I saw my chance. I stood and started forward.

  I would give them me.

  Despite my bulk, I stealthed like a sonofabitch when I needed to, and I needed. I risked burning a tiny bit of juice to get my zombie shuffle up to a run. I ran down the bank and flipped myself into the open trunk of my car. The blinding pain nearly did me in. The five policemen still at the scene, waiting for the dogs to chase me down, didn’t notice a thing.

  I remained woozy. Craving juice. Nearing withdrawal. Actually in withdrawal? Hell if I knew. I had no idea how fast I might heal in this condition, but heal I did, at least a little.

  The wrecker driver finished towing my car out of the ditch and paused to chat for a moment with one of the police officers and scratch out a signature on the official documentation. Thankfully, not too much later, the wrecker driver drove off, presumably to take the car to the police impoundment lot. In the distance, say three or four miles away, I heard the rumble of the Interstate. Somewhere out there close was I-80. East, down I-80, was Chicago. Home.

  I had screwed up horribly with this kill. I hadn’t disposed of the body, leaving it behind for the police to find. I had left blood everywhere, and, unless Enkidu took souvenirs, the remains of two breasts.

  I clutched my own souvenir in my useless left hand. A choice between easy juice or keeping Enkidu’s hand? Well, I would take the juice but at least think about keeping the hand instead.

  I hadn’t wiped prints. They had my car and my duffel. If I lived in the Quad Cities, I would have to move.

  The tow truck stopped at the Interstate, but didn’t turn. I rolled out of the trunk and skittered behind a trash bin at the inevitable corner ESSO. The friggen middle of nowhere, and I needed juice. I couldn’t drive, either, not in this condition. I oriented myself by the road signs. Perfect. The eastbound side of I-80.

  I needed a ride to Chicago, but in my condition, I wouldn’t be able to bluster my way there. I waited. Eventually, I found a likely target: tourists. Tourists towing a camper. In this case, a small camper, one of the ‘fold up’ types, all folded up. There would be almost no room inside. Perfect. If I could get in. I stealthed over, found the unlocked door at the back of the camper, and opened it to find folded down canvas and other vacation crap. I wiggled in like a sardine and got the door shut behind me.

  Amid the folded down mess I found one cabinet filled with food. I ripped a hole in the door to get at the food, and found staples. Sugar, flour, oil, crackers. Heaven tastes like a fresh unopened bottle of catsup, I discovered.

  The rhythm of the road soon led me to sleepy slumber and healing land.

  I should have looked at the plates on the damned camper.

  Between Rumor and Rizzari

  [Carol Hancock POV]

  Rumor proved to be cold blooded about the whole ‘feed the Arm the Transform’ thing, but once I metasensed the Transform, I realized that no matter how goody-two-shoes he thought he might be (if he did, which I doubted), bringing this Transform to me wouldn’t disturb him.

  The Transform was alive, and human, but the Transform’s mind was long gone. Years, I think. He was little more than a juice-directed robot. I sneered. Focus Patterson knew nothing about Arms. If she knew anything, she wouldn’t have bothered with this charade, since no Arm fit to hunt would have fallen for a trap with bait like this. Even I, messed up as I was, could sense the remains of the two Focus tags on the male Transform.

  On some subjects, such as Focus tags on Transforms, I think Arms had a better metasense than Focuses and Crows. It was nice to see us Arms weren’t on the bottom of the barrel, despite what the world kept trying to tell us the rest of the time.

  After I took possession of the Transform from Rumor, I bagged a car and drove north on I–79 as fast as I dared risk, to get out of Pittsburgh. My plan was to spend the night in Erie, calling Bobby in Chicago and Zielinski in Boston. I had some serious Network ass to kiss, and some big questions for Zielinski about the safety of interacting with the Network.

  For once, the world mostly cooperated. I got myself a room at a rural motel along I-90 just outside of Erie, ate four dinners in four different Erie dives, got some takeout burgers and fries, went back to my room and finally drew the mindless Transform. Gaah. I buried the Transform in some rural geezer’s half dug up back yard, suffused by the stench of an overflowing septic system drain field, apparently under repair by a bad contractor for the last two years. Nobody would be able to smell the body over the reek of sewage.

  Before I headed out to dispose of the body, I made calls. I found Bobby at home, petrified for my safety, and I barely talked him out of doing something stupid. I wouldn’t tell him my location, or my situation, or how long I would be gone. I did give him some explicit phone sex; my kill had restored me sufficiently so I felt somewhat amorous. I told hi
m that if I didn’t come back in a week, consider me dead, and move on with his life. He didn’t appreciate my realism.

  I had my worries. I still bled down below. My muscles ached from lack of exercise, I couldn’t do a full workout in my condition, and I couldn’t contact Zielinski.

  I tried all the phone numbers from his list, and not a one of them connected to a phone.

  That left me with one number, a scary number, saved for last, with the code word “Armageddon” attached to it. The phone number of Dr. Lorraine Rizzari, Focus. Without the code word, I would never get through – apparently Focuses got a lot of crank calls. Because of my dealings with Officer Canon, and the danger of Focus Patterson, I didn’t want anything to do with any Focuses.

  Unfortunately, I was fresh out of options.

  I called, and talked, and after a half hour of chatting with several paranoid and far too intelligent functionaries, I finally got the Focus on the line.

  “I’m Carol Hancock, an Arm, and I’ve got a problem, ma’am,” I said.

  “Hmm?” the Focus said. From the clackity clack noises, she typed as she talked to me. “What sort?” She spoke with a highfalutin’ Boston accent, same as the late President Kennedy once used.

  “I killed a tagged Transform. By accident. What do I need to do to make this right?”

  The clackity clack noises stopped.

  “You did what?” the Focus said, in an accent best described as Boston fishwife.

  The conversation went downhill from there. Rapidly. Downhill.

  Tonya Prepares to Meet Lori

  Tonya woke early and puttered around her office, starting her preparations for the day. She was a tall woman, with the native good looks that came with a Focus transformation. She was forty-nine, but she appeared to be nineteen. Her olive complexion was flawless and unlined, framed by a cascade of black curls. She stood lean and tall, with the smooth curves and glowing energy that came from a strong body and excellent health. Her household’s early morning quiet wouldn’t last long. She had demanded Focus Rizzari visit her in person to talk about her meeting with the new Arm. She predicted a difficult confrontation.