All Tomorrow's Parties

Carson tried for her, past that stranger's upraised hand, and her protector yelped as one of his fingers got bent back. It deflected the blow, though, and gave Chevette time to twist out of that grip.

She backed off two steps and shook her head, trying to clear it. Something was wrong with her eyes.

Carson came after her, that same look on his face, and in that instant she knew that she knew neither who he was nor what it was that was wrong with him.

'You just didn't get it, did you? he said, or that was what she thought she heard him say, feeling a tear run down from her swelling eye, her head still ringing.

She took a step back. He came on.

'You just didn't get it.

And then a hand came down on his shoulder and he spun around. And went down, the man behind him having done something that Chevette hadn't seen.

And she saw that it was Rydell.

It wasn't.

It was.

Rydell in a rent-a-cop's black nylon jacket, looking at her with an expression of utter and baffled amazement.

And Chevette got it, right then and absolutely, that she was dreaming, and felt the most enormous sense of relief, because now she would wake up, surely, into a world that would make sense.

On the floor, Carson, rolling over, got to his knees, stood up, shook himself, brushed a squashed cigarette-filter from the sleeve of his jacket, and suckerpunched Rydell, who saw it coming and tried to move aside, so that Carson's fist slammed into his ribs, rather than his stomach, as intended.

And Rydell screamed, in shrill animal pain, doubled over. And that was when the guy with the black leather car-coat, the fresh-looking black buzzcut, black scarf knotted up high around his neck, this guy Chevette had never seen before, stepped up to Carson. 'Mistake, she thought she heard him say. He took something from the pocket of his black coat. Then: 'You're not on the menu.

And he shot Carson, right up close, without looking down at the gun in his hand.

And it was not a loud sound, not loud at all, more like the sound of a large pneumatic nail-gun, but it was final and definitive and accompanied by a yellow-blue flash, and Chevette could never remember, exactly, seeing this, though she knew she had: Carson blown back by however many thousand foot-pounds of energy trying to find their way to kinetic rest at just that one instant in his body.

But it didn't take, in memory; it did not stick, and she would be grateful.

And grateful too, though for other reasons, that this was when Tessa, in the sound booth overhead, killed the lights.

53. (You Know I Can't Let You) SLIDE THROUGH MY HANDS

RYDELL knew that sound: a subsonic projectile through a silencer that slowed it even more, draining off the expanding gases of the ignited charge, and still the muzzle velocity would be right up there, and the impact, where it was localized.

He knew this through the pain in his side, which felt like a white-hot ax blade between his ribs; he knew it through his shock (he was literally in shock in a number of ways) at discovering Chevette (this version of Chevette, with really different hair, more the way he'd always wished she'd wear it). He knew it in the dark that followed the report, the dark that followed the death (he was pretty sure) of whoever the man was who'd gone after Chevette, the man he'd decked, the man who'd gotten up and, it felt like, driven Rydell's broken rib halfway through his diaphragm. He knew it, and he held on to it, for the very specific reason that it meant the scarf was a trained professional, and not just some espontaneo in a bar.

Rydell knew, in those first instants of darkness, that he had a chance: as long as the scarf was a pro, he had a chance. A drunk, a crazy, any ordinary perp, in a pitch-dark bar, that was a crapshoot. A pro would move to minimize the random factor.

Which was considerable, by the sound of it, the remaining crowd, and maybe Chevette as well, screaming and heaving and struggling to get out the door. That was bad, Rydell knew, and easily fatal; he'd been a squarebadge at concerts, and had seen bodies peeled off crowd barriers.

He stood his ground, nursing the pain in his side as best he could, and waited for the scarf to make a move.

Where was Rei Toei? She should've shown up in the dark like a movie marquee, but no.

And zooming past Rydell's shoulder, toward where he'd last seen the scarf, there she was, more comet than pixie, and casting serious light.

She circled the scarf's head twice, fast, and Rydell saw him bat at her with the gun. Just a ball of silver light, moving fast enough to leave trails on Rydell's retina. The scarf ducked, as she shot straight in at his eyes; he spun and ran to the left. Rydell watched as the light expanded slightly, to whiz like cold, pale ball lightning around the perimeter of the dark bar, people moaning and gasping, screaming as she shot past. Past the struggling knot at the door, where several lay unconscious on the floor, and still no sign of Chevette.

But then the Rei-sphere swung in and down, and Rydell spotted Chevette on her hands and knees, crawling in the direction of the door. He ran over to her as best he could, his side feeling like it was about to split; bent, grabbed her, pulled her up. She started to struggle.

'It's me, he said, feeling the complete unreality of seeing her again, here, this way, 'Rydell.

'What the fuck are you doing here, Rydell?

'Getting out.

The blue flash and the nail-gun f-wut were simultaneous, but it seemed to Rydell that the flick of the slug, past his head, preceded it. In immediate reply, one tight white ball of light after another was hurled past him from behind. From the projector, he realized, and likely straight into the scarf's eyes.

He grabbed Chevette under the arm and hustled her across the floor, adrenaline flooding the pain in his side. The stream of projected light, behind him, was just enough to show him the wall to the right of the door. He hoped it was plywood, and none too thick, as he pulled the switchblade from his pocket, popped it, and drove the blade in overhand, just at eye level. It punched through, up to the handle, and he yanked it sideways and down, hearing an odd little sizzle of parting wood fiber. He made it down to waist height, twisted it, back to the left, and three-quarters of the way up the other side before he heard the glasslike tink of the ceramic snapping.

'Kick. Here, he said, striking the center of his cutout with the stub of the blade. 'Brace up against me. Kick!

And she did. She could kick like a mule, Chevette. The section gave way with her second try, and he was boosting her up and through, trying not to scream at the pain. He was never sure how he made it through himself, but he did, expecting any second one of those subsonics would find him.

There were people unconscious, outside the door, and other people kneeling, trying to help them.

'This way, he said, starting to limp in the direction of the ramp and the Lucky Dragon. But she wasn't with him. He swung around, saw her headed in the opposite direction. 'Chevette!

He went after her but she didn't slow down. 'Chevette!

She turned. Her right eye swelling, bruised, swimming with tears; the left wide and gray and crazy now. As if she saw him but didn't register who it was she saw. 'Rydell?

And all this time he'd thought about her, remembered her, having her there in front of him was something completely different: her long straight nose, the line of her jaw, the way he knew her lips looked in profile.

'It's okay, he said, which was absolutely all he could think of to say.

'It's not a dream?

'No, he said.

'They shot Carson. Somebody shot him. I saw somebody shoot him.