Flex (31 page)

P
aul hadn’t even known
the key to the city was a real thing.

THREE FOR THREE, the headlines read, showcasing a mundane man’s triumph over a terrorist ’mancer. Editorials asked whether the government should fund SMASH when a pair of insurance agents could do the job. The banquet the mayor threw in his honor was so full of well-wishers, Paul couldn’t keep track.

He wished he could give Aliyah the credit. And he wished his foot didn’t hurt. He’d learned a new word:
orthotics
. A special shoe to make up for the toes Anathema had lopped off. Walking was a special kind of memory; his titanium right foot held the regret of the ’mancer he’d killed by mistake, and his lopsided left held the regret of the ’mancer he hadn’t killed soon enough.

A couple of good brandies helped dull the pain. And the mayor had hovered by his side, eager for photo ops, his hand resting possessively on Paul’s shoulder. It was a nice wrap-up. Paul stayed long after most people had gone home, until the busboys had started to remove the tablecloths from the tables, because why not?

So, he was in a grand mood when his ex-wife Imani and her scheming politician lover David arrived.

“
Paul
,” David said, giving Paul a solid, two-handed pump. “Can you hear that? That’s New York City, breathing a sigh of relief.”

Paul ignored the blatant back-patting to check Imani, who clutched her purse in both hands. Which made him feel sad; they’d been close, once, and now there was that stiff barrier of
ex-husband and -wife
between them. Or, at least, Imani interposed it between them.

But he was feeling good, so he figured he’d get it over with.

“Great to see you, David,” Paul said, relishing the look on David’s face as he realized he was being dismissed. “Mind if I talk to my ex-wife?”

David stammered a bit, then skedaddled. Paul was relieved to see Imani could still share one mischievous smile as she watched her boyfriend retreat.

“…So.” She looked around at the banners, the empty champagne glasses, the brass key in Paul’s lap. “You must be swimming in job offers.”

“A few.” The mayor had sniffed around, asking if Paul was willing to head up a local ’mancer squad – nothing to compete with SMASH, you know, but the SMASH teams were federal. And, in light of the Long Island Broach, maybe the Feds were a little bit too cowboyish for the mayor’s liking. “But more importantly, Aliyah’s taken care of.”

“You got Samaritan to cave?”

Paul frowned. He was still afraid to use his ’mancy on Samaritan papers – as Kit said, “You don’t shit where you eat.” And the flux on that might rebound in ways that hurt other patients.

“No,” he admitted. “They’re tough nuts. But the mayor said there’s both federal and state funding to help Anathema’s victims – and Aliyah is first in line. She’ll get her plastic surgery.”

“You believe him?”

“It’ll make headlines if she doesn’t. So yes.”

“That’s good.” She squeezed her purse. “Listen. I don’t want you to think you’ve done a bad job. Aliyah loves you. But… I’m pressing for exclusive custody.”

Paul dropped his brandy, thinking:
She knows.
“What? Why would you…”

“If you’ll be chasing ’mancers, then Aliyah will always be at risk. She got burned; she almost got murdered. Twice. So I’m going to take Aliyah somewhere far away. Where she won’t be in your splash zone.”

Paul felt his stomach unclench. She didn’t know about Aliyah. That made it harder.

“I can’t let her go,” Paul said, wishing he could tell her why:
she’s a ’mancer now, Imani. She needs my guidance.

“I know. So you’ll get your lawyers, and I’ll get mine, and we’ll play tug-of-war. With Aliyah in the middle. Are you sure that’s what you want?”

She’d delivered a buried compliment, Paul noted: she didn’t ask whether it was what was best
for Aliyah
. She knew, and acknowledged, that what Paul wanted was always what he thought was best for his daughter. And she had come here to tell him face-to-face rather than sneaking it in through a lawyer’s summons.

He hugged her. She hugged back, feeling the loss of everything they could have shared; the love could never be recovered, but for one moment they could close their eyes and pretend.

“I have to keep her,” Paul said. “I hope you understand.”

And he limped away, feeling all the scars of Anathema.

A
s he walked
to his car, a small man in a white suit paced alongside, tapping the floor with a cane, matching Paul’s awkward gait. Paul thought it was mockery, until he noticed the man’s ankle was in a cast.

“…Oscar?” Paul asked, coming to a befuddled stop. Though he should have expected this meeting, he’d been too caught up in his victory to contemplate hanging threads. He looked around for Oscar’s bodyguards, half expecting to see men charging at him, but no one else was in the parking lot, just him and the head of a criminal organization.

“Mister Tsabo,” Oscar said politely, removing his hat in a grand sweep. “I congratulate you on your accomplishment. Terrorist ’mancers are never good for business.”

“What do you want?”

“The dropping of pretense,” Oscar said. “The continued flow of product. We both know what you really are, Mister Tsabo. I’m still owed my three pounds. And then, perhaps, we can work out some very profitable arrangements for future product. Same guidelines, of course – I wouldn’t do anything to upset you. Now that I’ve seen what you’re capable of, I’ll sign contracts. Because signing contracts – that means something to you, does it not?”

“Your brother tried this,” Paul said through gritted teeth. “He too made a nice offer. I declined. He showed me the iron fist inside the velvet glove.”

Oscar flexed his hand, revealing manicured nails. “Then don’t make me remove my glove. You and I both know there are parties who’d be interested in hearing what you can do. You and I both know it’d be difficult to stop me if I chose to tell.” He spread his hands. “So, why force me? Your medical expenses will pile up. As will your costly flux damage. So, why make an enemy, Mister Tsabo, when you could have a perfectly pleasant arrangement?”

Paul felt, once again, that strange synchronicity that hovered between them. They were both reasonable men in unreasonable situations. And though Oscar Gargunza Ruiz had Paul over a barrel, he wasn’t rubbing it in.

“Anything I forbid will shut down my Flex,” Paul said. “You know what kind of man I am.”

“That leaves a good number of lucky breaks available to me,” Oscar agreed.

I’m going to regret this
, Paul thought – but then he thought of SMASH hauling him away, then hauling Aliyah away, and had no choice but to extend the hand.

H
e met
Kit by the burn ward’s coffee machine.

“Did you clean it all?” Paul asked.

Kit looked caught between “resentful” and “resigned”, mopping his bald pate with a handkerchief. “As much as I could. You got lucky. The muscleman? Was flying high. All he remembers are flying gas-mask albinos and some lawyer making him sign a paper. They’ve got him in the Refactor, but I doubt he remembers anything worthwhile.”

Paul sighed. That was the only real loose end. “That’s good.”

“Better for you: when that muscleman collapsed the roof, it crushed your Flex-making equipment. And unactivated Flex looks like a lot of other rubble. They let me onto the lot to look over the evidence, and I gathered as much as I could find.”

“You find everything?”

“I wish I hadn’t.” He pushed a sack into Paul’s hands. Paul felt his own ’mancy thrumming to life at his touch.

“Thanks.”

“Don’t you thank me. You’re lucky. You should be in the Refactor – except they’re running scared because of what you told them. Was that true? Are we… are we in for a flood of new ’mancers?”

“Aliyah, she… she’s one point of data. Maybe Anathema was wrong. But given how smart Anathema was… I’m pretty sure we’re going to see an uptick in activity. Maybe not the apocalypse but a lot more than we’re used to.”

Kit crossed himself. “My God.”

“What’s with the cross? You’re Jewish.”

“You never heard of insurance?” He hunched over the table. “Look, my friend, I didn’t sign up with Samaritan to be your mop-up man. I wanted to put ’mancers away, not cover their tracks. But SMASH is stretched thin, and they’re not subtle. So, I’ve been wrestling: is fostering a little evil all right to prevent a larger one? It’s one thing to look the other way – but you’re asking me to
help
you lie.”

Paul nodded, not interrupting his friend’s train of thought. Kit had to make up his own mind on this one.

“I don’t know,” Kit continued. “You have a little girl to raise, younger than any ’mancer I’ve ever known–”

“You found nothing on adolescent ’mancers?”

“Europe had records, but that’s lost in the broach. The government certainly does. But independent studies? Forbidden. God forbid some unscrupulous country unlocks the secret of ’mancer gestation, creates a ’mancer farm. It’s all black-books stuff. So I can’t say how your daughter would fare. But…”

“You think SMASH would help?”

He looked troubled. “You, you get sent to SMASH, well… you made the choice to lose yourself in paperwork. Maybe you didn’t decide all the way, I see that now, that nobody set out to do this, but… it’s still a choice. Enough to make the punishment deserved. But you’re not six years old. I can’t see them sending her to boot camp, do you?”

“No.” Paul warmed his hands by his coffee.

“But more than that. Anathema was just one woman, and she almost took down a whole city. God knows what her progeny will be like – good? Bad? I think they’ll all be evil, but that’s me, thinking ’mancy corrodes the soul. Maybe they’re misguided. Yet I know from experience, Paul – even a misguided ’mancer can do a lot of damage.”

Paul couldn’t deny that.

“I think, based on the evidence I see before me…” He swallowed. “God help me, I think we’ll need a ’mancer to fight a ’mancer.”

“
If
we need to fight them,” Paul countered. “Maybe some can be trained.”

Kit turned around to glance nervously towards Aliyah’s room. “That,” Kit said, “remains to be seen.”

“The training?”

He gave Paul a dour look. “The all-bad.”

Paul reached under the table to unlock his briefcase. Dramatically, he pulled out…

…a tray of donuts.

“Would someone out for blood,” he asked, “offer you an assortment of your favorite treats?”

Kit pushed himself back to take in the full twenty-four count presented before him. Finally, he chuckled. “…Depends. Let’s see which one you go for
this
time, bubeleh.”

Paul chose a Boston Kreme – a new taste, far different from his usual cruller. He looked to Kit for approval.

Kit’s reluctant smile was like the sun creeping out from behind a storm cloud.

A
nd
, finally, Valentine and Aliyah.

One of the good things about all the commotion was that Aliyah now had a private room with a guard stationed by the door to keep out reporters. Not to mention every nurse was all too willing to give Aliyah extra helpings of ice cream.

Valentine hadn’t left Aliyah’s bedside since Aliyah’s readmittance. She slept in a chair next to her bed, never leaving despite Imani’s occasional hints for her to go.

Paul knew Valentine’s vigil was a sign of love, because Aliyah didn’t want the Nintendo DS near her. So Valentine had gone without videogames for days – an act akin to starvation for any normal person.

Aliyah was awake, watching Dora on television. “Hey, sweetie.”

“Sssh,” Aliyah said, riveted to the screen.

Paul locked the door behind him. He knew things had returned to normal, for his daughter felt free to ignore him. Yet there was something frantic in the way Aliyah watched Dora – a show that was a little young for her. She shouted all the answers at Dora as if she hoped Dora might respond, waved her arms as if she thought she might control Dora’s movements by force of will alone…

…and then, as Paul felt a flicker of ’mancy swelling up from his daughter, Aliyah pinched her arms.

“Kill me,” Valentine sighed, slumping into the chair. “Dora’s all she watches.”

Paul pulled up a seat, letting Aliyah yell at the television. He was glad to see that Valentine, tired as she was, had swapped her black eye patch for a glittery rhinestone-encrusted version; she was acclimating herself to her new existence.

“You don’t have to stay here. We have a home, Valentine. With a bed. That you’ve – well, you’ve mostly assembled it. And you don’t seem to mind using your laundry as a pillow…”

She rubbed her forehead. “I know. I just… you know.”

“You feel responsible. For her ’mancy.”

Valentine gave Paul a hangdog look. “Yeah.”

Paul didn’t want to ask. “
Are
you?”

Valentine blew a lock of hair out of her eye. “…not consciously. But, you know, miserable girl over there, lack of parenting skills over here… I taught her the way I got through my bad times. And I probably – I probably rubbed off on her.”

“Anathema accelerated that.”

“She did. But… I catalyzed her.” Valentine nibbled a nail guiltily. “I’m sorry, Paul. I didn’t mean to… you know. Curse her.”

“This isn’t a curse.”

Valentine glanced over at Aliyah. “
She
thinks it is.”

“Yeah, well.” He got out the Nintendo DS he’d purchased to replace the one lost in the fire. It was smeared with chocolate from the donuts, but Paul found that fitting.

He slid the Nintendo over to Aliyah.

“No.” She pushed it off the bed.

Paul spoke in his best let’s-be-reasonable Daddy voice. “You have to learn to control this.”

“I’m not a ’mancer,” she whispered, and Paul was grateful for that whisper – if she threw a tantrum now, they’d all get Refactored. But Aliyah had always kept her cards close to her chest, and Paul doubted that even her own mother suspected the depths roiling inside her daughter. Some days, he wondered how much
he
knew.