Jokertown Shuffle

Wyrm stood in the doorway. But that couldn't be. Wyrm was dead. He looked dead, Kien suddenly realized-and pissed.

"I wasss your loyal ssservant," the scaleless reptiloid joker hissed, "and I died becausssse of your ssschemes."

"It wasn't my fault," Kien protested. He still half refused to believe that Wyrm was standing before him, but the evidence was hard to ignore. It looked like Wyrm, talked like Wyrm, and even had a big ugly wound in its throat where Fadeout had stuck it with the same letter opener that had killed the watchdog joker. "Fadeout killed you," Kien added. Wyrm approached, still looking angry, and Kien drew back behind his desk. Wyrm was inhumanly strong, and his bite was highly poisonous. Kien knew that he was no match for the joker.

"I died," Wyrm hissed furiously, "becaussse you wouldn't give me the loyalty I alwayssss gave you." He loomed over Kien like an avatar of death, and the general cringed. Kien pictured Wyrm's great gaping maw crunching down ruthlessly on his throat.

"Don't," he managed to get out. "Don't," he repeated, shielding his face with his arms.

Wyrm drew back with a sneer. "You're not to meet your dessstiny at my handsss," he said, clenching and unclenching powerful fists. "But out there." The joker pointed out the window facing Central Park.

Kien came around from behind his desk cautiously and peered out. Central Park was gone. In its place was a dense, thick jungle.

Just like home, Kien thought. Just like Vietnam.

6.

Bre

Scar was toying with him, Bre

Even without Scar, there were too many corpses to handle. He needed help, and he needed weapons, preferably both. But the run-down streets were deserted, the decaying buildings dark and empty.

Bre

A familiar building caught his eye as he surged up the street, gasping in the killing heat, throat dry, heart starting to pound. It was the Famous Bowery Wild Card Dime Museum. Inside it would be cool, and dark, with plenty of hiding places.

He pounded up the stairs, twenty yards ahead of his nearest pursuer, and slammed hard against the front door. It swung wide open, and the cool, dark interior of the museum beckoned him. He dashed inside and put his back against the wall, catching his breath before moving into the interior.

He looked around at the familiar exhibits, the wall of monstrous joker babies floating in jars, the diorama of the Four Aces, Earth verses the Swarm, Kien's assassins attacking him and A

He wandered on to the next exhibit. It was the Fall of Saigon recreated in all its casual brutality. Bre

He wandered on in a daze. The last exhibit took him full circle in time and history, and he found himself looking at a diorama that was similar, so similar, to the first one he'd seen. Kien's assassins were breaking into his house, but it was Je

Am I doomed, Bre

Scar stood at the head of the pack of dead men, gri

"You think you're so smart," Scar said, mockingly. "We knew this was the first place you'd go." He looked over and pointed at a diorama that Bre

It was a scene of Bre

Bre

Scar gri

Something that appeared from the shadows at Bre

It was a man, a young man in his midteens. He was shorter than Bre

Scar looked from the newcomer to Bre

A murmur rose from the ranks of the dead men as the newcomer spoke. "You know who I am," he said in a soft youthful voice. "You know that I stand with this man. As do," he said, gesturing with his staff, "these others."

The dead men looked around the dark chamber, as did Bre

The dead men still outnumbered them, but punks and bullies that they were, they no longer seemed to have guts for a fight. Bre

His young ally said nothing but turned slowly to face Bre

"Are you real?" Bre

"As real as I would have been if things had worked out differently." He leaned on his staff, still smiling. "Come," he said, "it's time to go to the center of things. Everyone is waiting."