Wildcards

– Xavier Desmond

"Let them say what they will. I can still fly."

– Earl Sanderson, Jr.

"Is it my fault that everyone likes me, and no one likes you?"

– David Harstein (to Richard Nixon)

"I like the taste of joker blood."

– graffiti, NYC subway

"I don't care what they look like, they bleed red just like anybody else… most of them, anyway."

– Lt. Col. John Garrick, Joker Brigade

"If I'm an ace, I'd hate to see a deuce."

– Timothy Wiggins

"You want to know if I'm an ace or a joker? The answer is yes."

– The Turtle

I'm a joker, I'm insane,

And you ca

Coiled in the streets

Waiting only for night

I am the serpent who gnaws the roots of the world

– 'Serpent Time,' Thomas Marion Douglas

"I'm delighted to have Baby returned to me, but I have no intention of leaving earth. This planet is my home now, and those touched by the wild card are my children."

– Dr. Tachyon, on the occasion of the return of his spaceship

"They are the demon children of the Great Satan, America."

– Ayatollah Khomeini

"In hindsight, the decision to use aces to secure the safe return of the hostages was probably a mistake, and I take full responsibility for the failure of the mission." -President Jimmy Carter "Think like an ace, and you can win like an ace. Think like a joker, and the joke's on you."

– Think Like An Ace! (Ballantine, 1981)

"The parents of America are deeply concerned about the excessive coverage of aces and their exploits in the media. They are bad role models for our children, and thousands are injured or killed each year while attempting to imitate their freak powers."

– Naomi Weathers, American Parents League

"Even their kids want to be like us. These are the '80s. A new decade, man, and we're the new people. We can fly, and we don't need no bogus airplane like that nat Jetboy The nats don't know it yet, but they're obsolete. This is a time for aces."

– anonymous letter in Jokertown Cry, January 1, 1981

COMES A HUNTER

by John J. Miller

I.

"If you wish to find the unclouded truth, do not concern yourself with right and wrong."

– -Seng-ts'an: Hsin-hsin Ming.

Bre

He disembarked at the Port Authority with the other passengers. They scattered to their myriad destinations, their eyes averted in the habitual ma

He was tall, but not excessively so. His build was more lithe than bulky. His hands were large. Sunta

Forty-second Street outside the Port Authority building was crowded. He merged into the flow of the foot traffic, allowing it to take him into an area of Manhattan that was only slightly less seedy than some of the more polite parts of Jokertown. He extricated himself from the swarm of pedestrians after a few blocks and went up the decaying stone steps of the Ipswhich Arms, a blowsy hotel that apparently catered to the local hooker trade. It looked as if business was bad. People were apparently going to Jokertown for their kicks. They were cheaper there and, even if only a fraction of what he had read was true, a lot kickier.

The desk clerk looked dubious when he came in alone and with luggage, but took his money and gave him directions to a room that was as small and dirty as he had thought it would be.

He closed the door, put his bag on the floor, and carefully set his leather case on the sagging bed.

The room was sweltering, but Bre

"Captain Bre

There was no signature, but he recognized Minh's elegant, precise hand. There was no address, but he didn't need one. Minh had hidden him in his restaurant for several days when he had surreptitiously returned to the States three years before. And Bre

He closed his eyes and saw a face: masculine, lean, predatory. He tried to make it vanish. He tried to blank it from his mind by conjuring-from the depths of his consciousness the sound of one hand clapping. He tried, but failed. The face smiled, mocking him. It began to laugh.

He sat on the bed, waiting for the darkness and what it would bring.

II.

The air was flat and unmoving and clogged Bre

It was early evening and the street was still crowded with potential customers, but the restaurant was closed. That was strange.

The vestibule, the only part of the restaurant's interior visible from the street, was dark. The sign hanging on the inside of the outer glass door said "Closed. Please call again." in English and Vietnamese. Three men, city punks, lounged on the street in front of the building, joking among themselves.

Bre

Kien was still alive. Of that he never had a doubt. Kien was a cu

He turned the corner and, u

He set his case down and flicked open its latches. He could barely see in the gloom, but he needed no light at all to assemble what lay inside. He snapped on and dogged down the limbs, upper and lower, to the central grip, and with sure, practiced strength slipped the string over the lower tip, stepped through, set the tip of the lower limb against his foot, bent the upper limb against the back of his thigh, and slipped the string over its tip. He brushed the taut string with his fingers and smiled at the low thrumming sound it produced.