Lowball

Those About to Die …
Part Seven

Marcus had to drag his eyes away from Father Squid. They seemed heavy as stones. He lifted them and found Baba Yaga. She stood with her arms crossed, her lips pursed and her cheeks sucked in against the bones of her face.

You bitch, Marcus thought. At first it was a whisper. You bitch. But then, as he watched the smug satisfaction that lifted the corners of her lips, it became a scream. Biittttcccchhhh! All the rage and anger and confusion and determination to kill that he had overcome with Father Squid surged back into him with a vengeance. Poison-laden saliva flooded his mouth. He didn’t think about what he did next. He just rose and did it.

He propelled himself upwards and crashed against the mesh that trapped the fighters in the ring. He pressed it up, his tail flexing beneath him. When the strained tension of the mesh pushed him back he fell with it. Gripping the mesh in his fists, he yanked down savagely, using the weight of his long body.

Dangling from it and looking through the lacework, he saw Baba Yaga turn to one of her guards. She jabbed her finger, indicating Olena. The burly, black-suited man stepped up behind her. He pinched Olena’s shoulder in one hand. Using his other, he caressed her chin with the barrel of a handgun, lifting up on it to make her rise. She looked terrified.

Marcus shot upwards again, and then yanked down again. Up and down again, more frantic, failing with each attempt. The guard was leading Olena away. The announcer was saying something. It sounded like he was ridiculing Marcus. The crowd, watching him thrash, began to relax again. A man decked out in African garb pointed at him, smiling. A red-haired woman in a tight black dress stood and thrashed in imitation of Marcus. Another man followed Marcus with his upheld cell phone, his freckled face tight in concentration as he tried to take a photo.

Hating them all, Marcus roared up into the mesh with renewed fury. He clenched it in his fists and wrenched his body around, his snake portion twisting him with all the force of his long, trembling muscles. He felt one section of the mesh give, just a single ringlet cord where it looped through one of the thick glass panels. He sensed it like a spider in its web. He let go and dove for the weak spot. He slammed his head and one arm through. Straining and cursing, he squeezed the other shoulder through, and then he wriggled like mad.

Marcus landed on the African man, driving his shoulder hard into the man’s chest. The audience panicked. No laughter now. Shocked faces, people crawling backwards, shouting out, running for the exits. As much as he wanted to rage at them, Marcus had a different target. He squirmed toward Baba Yaga’s box. He punched the man with the cell phone as he passed him and elbowed others out of the way.

Reaching up and grabbing the low railing of the box with both hands, he came up and over, face-to-face with a cadre of armed guards. Baba Yaga stood beside the wretched old man. Her face was wrinkled in concentration. Her lips puckered and her cheeks sucked in as if she were trying hard to gather enough saliva to spit.

For a terrible moment Marcus thought she was going to do to him what she’d done to Father Squid. The horror of it-even though he’d rushed to it-froze him in place. He watched her lips move.

She didn’t spit, though. She was trying, and the guards were waiting for it. That was clear enough. Marcus realized she couldn’t do it again! Her power had limits. There was exhaustion in her eyes. She clutched at a chair along the wall with one hand, needing its support just to stand. She gave up trying to summon her power and, said, flatly, disdainfully, “Shoot him, you idiots.”

Marcus ducked under the box as the barrels of several Uzis fixed on him. He skimmed beneath it and shot up from the rear. Curling and coming up fast, he grabbed Baba Yaga by the shoulder. He spun her, and launched his tongue at her stunned face. It hit with a wet venom thwack. The impact snapped her head back and flung her arms out. She fell into her guards, who scrambled awkwardly to support her, encumbered by their weapons.

Having poisoned her good, he didn’t wait around for the spray of bullets he knew would be coming his way. He slipped back over the railing and dropped down into the stands. He landed hard. He glanced through the glass at the prayer bench that was the still-living Father Squid. He hated leaving him, but there was no choice. The father would want him to escape and live. So he was going to.

Gritting his teeth, he squirmed, whip fast, through the aisles and over seats. Olena. She was his last bit of business here. Get her, and get out. That’s what mattered.

Many were heading, like him, for the exit doors. It was chaos. When bullets started to fly from Baba Yaga’s box it only got worse. They tore up the seats and ricocheted off railings. Marcus weaved wildly, all curves, the point of his tail snapping behind him. He slithered over a row of cowering Japanese businessmen. He shoved a fat white man in a pinstriped suit out of his way, and bowled right through the blond, slinky, barely clad harem of women following an Arab-looking man in a long, shimmering robe. Someone behind him screamed, a high, piercing screech of agony that cut through all the other noises. Then the screamer died, battered down by the barrage of gunfire.

Marcus kept going, telling himself that nobody in here was innocent. They had come here to see people die. They may have gotten more than they bargained for, but who was to say they didn’t deserve it?

When a man and woman, holding hands as they ran, went down right in front of him, Marcus realized the shots had come from the other side of them, from the mouth of the tunnel. The woman’s long, auburn hair floated above her as she fell. Through the trailing screen of it, Marcus saw the shooter. The guard took aim with one hand, while his other clamped down on Olena’s wrist. She twisted and yanked, making it hard for him to set his shot.

Marcus arched his body over the fallen couple. He reared high as he climbed the steps up to the guard. His tail cut a sinuous weave beneath him, a sidewinder motion that clearly unnerved the guard. He fired at Marcus’s torso several times, only managing to graze his shoulder. And then, just before Marcus reached him, he lowered the gun and shot at his tail. Two bullets punched through his scales. The pain was instant, molten, as if red-hot iron prods had been slammed deep inside him. Roaring at the pain of it, the tip of his tail lashed at the shooter, catching his legs and flipping him. Marcus squirmed over him, pressing down as hard as he could. He bent and poison tagged him.

That done, he looked up at Olena. He stopped, unsure-now that he’d reached her-what to do. He stared at the perfection of features that was her face. She was too beautiful. Too beautiful for him, at least. He with venom on his tongue, blood on his fists, with the guilt of a murderer a searing brand on his flesh.

Suddenly, it felt impossible that someone like him had any claim on someone like her. He was speechless.

Olena stepped toward him, a hand held to her lips as her wide blue eyes took in the blood glistening on his scales. The concern on her face was exquisite, almost too generous to be believed. “Marcus, you are shot.”

Marcus managed to say, “I’m okay.” He wasn’t sure it was true. His tail hurt with each pulse of blood through it. It took effort to keep the rhythmic surges of pain from showing on his face. “Olena, will you…” He hesitated. She watched him. “Can we get out of here? Will you come with me?”

The crowd had begun to squeeze around them, pressed against the wall, nervous but still frantic to escape down the tunnel. Olena scowled at them. “Yes. Get me away from these ones.” She bent and retrieved the guard’s handgun. With a few quick motions, she popped it open, checked something, and then slammed it closed again. Marcus didn’t know what she’d just done, but clearly she knew a thing or two about handguns. Weapon raised in one hand, she beckoned him with her other. “Come. We go.”

He didn’t need to be told twice.