Emergence (4 page)

His answer was terse and pretty much what I expected. Cheap bastards all the way up.

“Five grand? Hmm. Yeah, okay. Transfer the money to the account I text you, and I'll see to it you find the guy in a ditch somewhere.” I paused for his response. It was also what I expected. “And a kind fuck you to you, too.”

Well, at least I'd got something out of this.

Then I turned to the window and grimaced.

Not much, though.

Especially after Mihailo collected his fee.

#

“You should not work for thugs. Then I would not have to kill so many of your employers,” Mihailo said.

The two of us were having lunch in the back of a greasy inner-city diner. Mihailo was chomping on a BBQ sandwich, his third. He was a man with thin dark hair, Serbian features, and a thin frame, which hid the fact he was built like Bruce Lee.

Mihailo looked to be in his early-thirties. That was a lie since I was thirty-two and my father had introduced us when I was ten. I had only a vague idea of his true age; Whatever his powers were, he'd probably outlive me.

“It's the economy,” I said, poking my salad with a fork. “I used to get much better jobs from people who knew what they were doing. The Powers Crash affected everyone. Even the Angels are getting chintzy.”

My father narrowed his eyes. “You should not work for DNAdvanced either.”

“You want to be judgmental, stop being a hitman.”

“Mercenary, not hitman.”

“Whatever.”

Mihailo laughed. “Says the man known as the Freelancer.”

I grimaced. Despite having superpowers and being a criminal, I wasn't one of those theatrical types who considered it an invitation to put on an opera cape like Hero. I was a smuggler who occasionally did a little work.

Unfortunately, that had all changed when I'd been picked up by The Chimeric Agency, the TCA, after transporting Snow Bunny's crew to a job out west to La Futura. National pundit Aisha Cordell had nicknamed me on her show, and I'd been left with the unfortunate situation of being a famous criminal called the Freelancer. Not something you wanted to be…if you wanted to stay out of prison, that is.

“God, don’t remind me,” I muttered. “Now clients seek me out, and both the cops and the DCD watch me like a hawk.”

“Perhaps you should consider retiring. Find a real job.”

I snorted. “Being a psychic means I can outwit the local idiots. I just have to keep up with the bribes.”

“Which requires money. Which you don’t have.”

I grimaced, again. “Okay, you have a point.”

“Have you considered planning jobs, rather than simply helping other criminals with theirs?”

“I don't have a head for that kind of thing.” I also had an arrangement with an agent of the Motor Hills TCA branch to look the other way as long as I was just helping rather than actively participating. I wasn't about to announce I was a snitch to a hitman, though, even if I considered him a friend and off-limits to the people I passed on information for.

All was fair in love and war, after all.

Also crime.

“You could be a big time famous criminal with a fancy car and powers, or an anonymous small-timer no one notices or gives a shit about. You can’t be both.”

“Watch me.”

“Fine.” Mihailo took a huge bite out of his sandwich. “Why do you need so much money, anyway?”

It was the kind of question only a man born in the Soviet Union could ask. “This is America, Dad. You can never have too much sex or too much money.”

“If you ask me, your wife is the reason why you don't have enough of either.”

I glared at him. “
Don't
bring up my wife.”

“I am simply saying you could have married someone other than a princess.”

“No, I couldn't have.” I took a bite of my cheap-ass salad.

My marriage to Lisa had been chosen purely as a pragmatic measure. When you could read people's minds, you knew exactly what they wanted and what they needed to be happy. I'd chosen her from about a thousand other women because I wanted a relationship purely based on sex, money, and no emotional commitments. I wanted someone who was hot, wouldn't care where the money came from, and wasn't interested in kids. So, of course, I fell in love with her and we were discussing kids. Lisa was still hot, yet even that was starting to matter less and less. I’d even stopped scanning her mind.

“I won't bring it up again.” Mihailo sighed. “I'm going to need four thousand for the job.”

I stared at him. “Four thousand? I'm already making nothing off this because of the repairs.”

“A reasonable price for a man's life,” Mihailo said.

“For ten minutes’ work?” I said, instantly regretting it.

“I meant yours.” Mihailo narrowed his gaze.

I sighed. “Fine.”

“You're always bragging about how much money you make,” Mihailo said, holding out his coffee to be filled by a blue-skinned waitress with a clubbed tail named Grace. “What happened? Don't tell me the Powers Crash either, you don't invest.”

I sighed. “No, but I spend. I made six figures last year, and the year before that, but all of that's gone now. Tied up in the house, the flat screen, the game-systems, gifts for Lisa, the cars—”

“A proper criminal then. What do you give your mistress?”

I stared at him. “I'm not like that.”

“No judgements from the mercenary,” Mihailo said, frowning. “But pay the tab, give me the money, and say hello to the Mechanic for me. I'm sure you'll be able to work something out.”

I stared at him, then sighed. It seemed everyone knew about that little tidbit. Lisa had found out only last month, and she hadn’t been taking it well. I’d need to get something really nice for her to make it up.

“Yeah, sure.”

#

Eastside Motor Hills was a collection of strip clubs, liquor stores, pawn shops, drug dens, vacant lots, abandoned strip malls, shuttered business, boarded homes, and porn distributors. Its residents were folks too poor to move out, hoodlums, hookers, homeless, and, of course, chimerics who didn’t fit into normal society. Case in point, a chick with four arms in a faux-leather mini-skirt, torn fishnets, and tiger-striped bikini top stood on the corner. She tossed her cigarette on the sidewalk and gave me an inquiring look through heavy-lidded eyes clumped with a literal handful of mascara.

I shook my head. “No, thanks. Uh, not tonight.” I kept walking, hands in my jacket pockets.

“Suit yourself,” she scoffed as I walked on.

I crossed Warren Harding Avenue, looking up at a billboard advertising some vague product featuring a glamorous pop star. I had to wonder about the beauty standards imposed by norms. I mean, the hooker had extra limbs, sure, but she was still not bad looking, considering the life she led. Probably could make a fortune at sci-fi conventions. I started to wonder what it would feel like with a woman with four hands when my attention was called back by a homeless drunk ahead of me. The tattered mess staggered out of a vacant lot and commenced vomiting on the corner of a building.

Ah, home.

I'd actually grown up in Northtown, an even worse district of the city at one time. It reached its natural conclusion when the populace was forced into Eastside and Southpointe before they bulldozed practically everything to the ground. I was about thirteen then. The spot where I'd grown up was an office building now, specializing in chimeric-based body alteration; one that promised to trim a few hundred pounds off your body in a day in exchange for the cost of three middle-class houses.

The promise of a better tomorrow, according to DNAdvanced.

“Hey, Freelancer!” A greasy-looking, obese white man accosted me from the opposite corner, outside of a strip club. “Why don't you come in and check out the goods! We have a special for local heroes.”

Yeah, just yell my name out on the street, jackass.

I forced down the gut response of ‘Sorry, man. I'm not really in the mood for an STD.’ Given my current circumstances, I decided to try to not piss off any more people today than I already had. I’d taken a big risk taking the Mayhemers to rob Argyle Thompson, as he had plenty of friends around town, especially those who hated chimerics.

I just waved the greasy guy off and kept walking.

“Suit yourself!”

Okay, must be Eastside’s new mantra.

Moments later, I navigated a litter-strewn alley and strode up to the Mechanic’s garage. A beefy, tatted-up pair of gun-toting fellas straddled motorcycles just outside of it.

“Hey, Gary,” I said to one of them. He stood a head taller than me, had a cigarette hanging from beneath his mustache.

He nodded. “What’s up, man?”

“Oh, the usual. Trying to stay out of trouble and doing a shit job of it.”

“I hear ya.”

“How’s Jen and the kids?”

“Doing great. Steph just got accepted into UCLF’s neurosciences graduate program.”

“Wow, man. That’s great. You’re raising some brilliant girls. I can’t believe Steph’s already in college…”

I peered past Gary, saw the battered remains of the Ferraris I'd trashed earlier. They were being worked on by her crew.

“Oh, man,” I said with a sigh.

Gary glanced back over his shoulder, looked back at me. “Yeah. I heard you were involved in that.”

“Lies, Gary. All lies.” I clapped him on the shoulder, then gave a fist bump to Jimmy, the other beefy guard, as I strolled inside past a machine that looked conspicuously like a certain flying rodent's from the 1989 Michael Keaton movie.

The Mechanic produced vehicles for superheroes, supervillains, vigilantes, and enthusiasts for the above. I had no idea why the DCD hadn't come down on her, but I suspected it was for the same reason they hadn't come for me. Either way, she hadn't betrayed me yet.

And I knew why.

“Hey, sexy!” A feminine voice spoke from behind me.

I turned to look at the five-foot-three form of the Mechanic a.k.a Elaine Stephens. We'd grown up together in Northtown and both developed powers around the same time. Elaine kept her red hair in a simple ponytail and was wearing a pair of grease-covered overalls, which were more form-fitting than usual. She was a trifle rugged, short, and buxom; that said, being around her always had a way of making me feel a little uncomfortable, since I’d always thought of her kind of like a kid sister, yet she’d never made it a secret she was attracted to me. I mean, conflicted, right?

“Elaine,” I said, picking up her thoughts. They were the usual mix of mercenary, biological, and psycho-sexual urges. There were a few traces of worry, too, which made me think things were even more troubled than I imagined. “How's business?”

“Booming,” she said, smiling. “Everyone wants wheels with enhancements.”

Elaine's chimeric power was like mine, in that it didn't really make much sense by current understandings of physics. She could create any number of additions to cars which could violate the laws of physics, so she made a shit-ton making fully-functional replicas of iconic models for James Bond and Knight Rider fan boys. As much money as I made from crime, Elaine had the right of things. She’d probably retire with more money than the next six supervillains combined.

I looked over at the Headhunter's vehicles. “Selling to the bad guys, still, I see.”

“I sell to you, don't I?” Elaine hooked her arm inside mine. “Your car is out back. We heard about your little debacle earlier.”

“Debacle? Moi?”

“That’s the downside of a signature car, my friend.”

“Yeah,” I muttered. “Guess I’m not very smart.”

“I can work around that, making it so no one remembers the details.”

“Oh?” I said, knowing I couldn't afford it. “Sounds interesting.”

“You know the Headhunters are looking for you.”

“Yeah. I figured they might be.”

“They’re throwing serious bank to get people to cough up your location. You’re not exactly hard to find with that big mansion under your real name.”

Crap
.

“Why tell me this?” I asked, already knowing she thought I'd get out of it. A fact I wasn't so sure of.

“We’re friends. Plus, you have the kind of…
potential
I’d like to cultivate.”

The two of us came to a smaller storage building behind the workshop with an installed garage door. Opening it, I saw the Supra had already been repaired and equipped with new modifications, which made it look more like the Delorean from
Back to the Future
than the vehicle I'd used on a hundred runs.

“Oh, sure, this is
way
less conspicuous.”

“No one will see any of this,” Elaine said. “Of course, you'd never be able to pay this off in a million years.”

“Uh, okay. Then how?”

“It's time you stopped with this penny ante stuff,” Elaine said. “There are big jobs out there just waiting to be done. Snow Bunny loved you, really loved you, and we both know why. There are other people who could use a seasoned planner and operative.”

“You mean go full-supervillain. Wear a costume. Become the Freelancer full time. Ditch the house and wife.” I tried not to hide my terror about the fact she knew I was snitching.

“Would that be so bad?”

There was no answer I could give other than the one she wanted. I took her hand and gave her a soft kiss on the lips. “It's an interesting offer.”

“Why don't you take it for a spin?”

I’m not above admitting I'd used sexual attraction in negotiations before, usually to keep the receptive ones from betraying me to take their part of the score. Less need for Mihailo that way. I felt guilty about it with Elaine, but I needed to get the hell out of Motor Hills. The car was a necessity now.

“Sure,” I said, pressing her against the side.

She smiled, opened the door, and pulled me in.

#

In the movies, 007 sleeps with countless women, and the men in the audience are supposed to feel envy. In truth, when you use sex as a weapon you end up feeling kind of like an asshole.

Or maybe it was just me.

Still. I had the car. That’s what mattered.

Driving to the suburbs, I contemplated my next move. The future was curiously opaque, as if there was a signal missing from my psychic satellite network. This wasn't the first time this had happened. It usually meant the involvement of something powerful.