Myth-Taken Identity

FIFTEEN

"Everybody was kung fu fighting—hyah!"

The skinny figure under the spotlights executed a few side kicks as he pranced about the small round platform over the heads of the crowd.

"Retuuuuuurrrrn to me, and always be my meeee-lody of looooovve!"

I winced. I had always suspected the Imps of inventing karaoke: It had a way of taking innocuous music and rendering it so tasteless and painful that it induced hopelessness, even suicidal tendencies, in its listeners.

The gadget could be set to hover almost anywhere, providing a slate showing lyrics, backup music, and, naturally, a mirror ball for atmosphere. Not surprisingly, Klahds were another big market for the gadgets, so no one thought twice about the fact one was making a fool of himself by singing in public there at The Mall.

"At the Copa! Copacabana!"

Chloridia's face wore a more aghast expression than mine. "Is that your friend?" she asked. "I'd advise him not to quit his day job."

"He did," I retorted, "but not to sing."

The impostor on the stage hit a sour note.

"I can't stand that anymore," Chloridia insisted.

She raised her hand, and a lightning bolt exploded from her joined fingertips. The mirror ball over the phony's head exploded in a burst of shards. The music halted, and the lights died away.

"Thanks," I growled.

I appreciated it, but time was when I didn't need that kind of help. At least Chloridia wasn't inclined to rub it in.

"Glad to oblige."

The security force mustered from several sides, pikes at the ready. Parvattani was among the group to my left. He looked tired. He must have been chasing Skeeve sightings since morning, same as we had.

To my surprise, the impostor didn't flee when his magikal music box blew up.

"Any requests?" he shouted.

The crowd, as usual, loved a spectacle. They didn't want the show to end either, and began to yell out the names of songs. The impostor got them clapping in rhythm and burst into song again.

"Oh, I wish I was in Dixie! Hooray! Hooray! In Dixie Land I'll take my stand—Come on, everybody sing!"

I understood what he was doing. If the crowd dispersed, he had no cover. I had to raise my assessment of the intelligence of Rattila's shapeshifters, or at least this one up one notch.

Massha, now confident that her gadgets were going to behave normally, launched a burst of blue light toward the figure on the stage. It enveloped him in a beam of light that pierced right to the back of one's eyeballs. Whether they wanted the show to go on or not, the audience had to stop looking at him. I thought it was a pretty clever move on Massha's part. The people started to drift away, leaving only a few standing and staring. "Wait, everyone!" the impostor cried. "Look!" He held up his hands, and began to make fire-shapes on the ceiling. "Look! A duck! A horse! A rabbit!"

Chloridia threw a whammy of her own, and the phony froze in place, his hands making a birdie.

I grinned ferally. He had nowhere to go and no way to get there.

Now we had him. All around us were Parvattani's guards, halberds at the ready. I gestured to them to follow me in case the impostor suddenly figured out he didn't need a voice or hand gestures to defend himself magikally, using Skeeve's talent. We couldn't be too cautious.

We closed in on the fake. I took the time to decide what I was going to do to him first. Punch him out? Pull out his fingernails? Make him invoke each of his cards one at a time and snap them while he was still wearing the faces? For a change I didn't have the visceral reaction, thanks to Massha's blue fire spell hiding Skeeve's stolen face.

The nearby bards had stopped playing. It was so eerily quiet that I could hear the sound of my own breath, that of my companions, and the sound of exhalations coming from just behind my shoulder.

I spun.

Hundreds of faces surrounded us, all with red-rimmed eyes, pale complexions, and gaping mouths.

"Who are you?" I asked.

The zombie faces didn't respond. I shrugged, headed for the burning figure on the platform. The closer I got, the closer they got. The nearest one was a Troll with long, pale gray-blue fur that smelled like an old sofa.

"Bathe much?" I inquired. It didn't answer.

Massha waved a hand in front of their faces. "Aahz, I don't like this. They're not conscious."

"So what?" I asked. "Describes most talk-show audiences. What matters is what they do."

The impostor was still burning like a Roman candle. I kind of hoped that the spell hurt. I reached for him. Before my hands could touch the sparkling flames, two big, hairy hands reached around and grabbed me.

A Troll in good condition is no match for a Pervect, in the sense that a dragon is no match for a Zippo lighter. I was lucky. This one was under autopilot, or at least remote control. I shook him off. A couple of Imps jumped on me from behind. I hauled one of them over my shoulder and beat the Troll over the head with him. When I was done with those two, I launched the other Imp into the crowd. A female Deveel, a slimy, yellow slug with two heads and six arms and a werewolf, all with half-lidded eyes, launched themselves in my direction. Their eyes looked bored, while their fists, feet, and even teeth attacked me.

"Yow!" I howled, as the werewolf latched onto my ankle with his fangs. I kicked out. "Back off, Lassie! Hey, Chumley!" I called, no longer able to see my friends in the throng. "Massha! Anybody!"

A loud roar sounded from my left. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a squidlike creature flying in a low parabola, followed by a red lizard, an adolescent Gargoyle (you could tell by the punk patterns chiseled on its skull), and a batwinged beast with bright red fur.

The guards were outclassed and outnumbered, but they fought pretty well. Though they might not have been used to weapons of Mall destruction, they were used to working in teams. Two or three would stun a shuffling shopper unconscious, then an officer with bamboo finger traps would leap on the body and immobilize the arms. In short order, they put away three Deveels, four Klahds, and a flying shark-creature.

Massha kept trying to get close to the dais, but she was in a dogfight with another of the red-winged bat-birds. Eskina galloped by, clinging to the ear of a howling Bugbear whose ear she was biting. I looked around for Chloridia. She had to make this capture. Each of us had agreed on the priorities during the briefing: get the impostor. I flipped a Klahd over onto three Kobolds. They col- lapsed under his weight. I fought my way one more step. Then another.

"Aiyeee!"

A body dropped on top of me. I came up fighting, grabbing my new opponent around a furry middle.

"Aagh!" a familiar voice cried.

I halted just in time to keep from throwing Eskina into the face of an oncoming Dragonet.

"They are too many," she panted.

"Naw," I insisted. "We'll get through. Stay with me." I knocked out another Imp, and she accounted for a crazed Gnome.

Where was Chloridia?

At last I spotted her. She rose straight up out of the crowd, her bright green dress gleaming.

"How dare you?" she shrieked, pausing to slap a zombie Flibberite in the face.

I watched her float toward the pseudo-Skeeve. A fold of her long dress swished over my head, covering my eyes, but I didn't have a hand free to brush it away. It whisked off, and I glanced over where she had the impostor in a headlock.

But she didn't. She was gone. And the spell she had put on the shapechanger was wearing off. There wasn't time to wonder what the hell had happened to the Kallian. I threw myself toward the Skeeve-clone. The zombies surged in on me, their blank eyes rolling as if they were auditioning for Night of the Living Dead. I pushed one after another out of my way, but the sheer numbers overwhelmed even my strength. The weight pushed me to the floor, pinioned my arms and legs.

"Can't breathe," Eskina gasped, her tiny figure almost invisible under the Klahd who had tackled her.

I could keep breathing, but I really couldn't move. The zombies seemed to have fallen over on me like so much cordwood. I looked up into the blank eyes.

"Coffee," I choked out. "What?" Eskina asked in disbelief.

"They're in a trance. They need coffee. We need Sibone."

"She cannot hear you here!" she squeaked.

"She can," I insisted. "She's a seer. She's watching out for us. Sibone!"

I felt my back flatten farther and farther into the floor. My physique was more resistant to crushing than the diminutive Ratislavan, but I was reaching my limit. Suddenly I smelled that unmistakable, delectable aroma.

"Oooo-oooooh!"

The zombies were entranced beings of few words, but their meaning was obvious. Little by little the weight started to lift off my body. As soon as I could, I flipped over and crawled to Eskina's motionless body. I listened to her chest. She was only unconscious. I hoisted her over my shoulder and stood up.

Bubbles tumbled out of the sky like spherical snow. The zombies ignored us now, pursuing the iridescent bronze spheres. As the cups of life-giving brew materialized in their palms, the zombies gulped them down, then held out their hands for more. I never saw anyone who wasn't pulling an all-nighter before an engineering final drink so much coffee at one time.

Soon, consciousness returned to the diverse faces. Most of them looked confused, others angry, and the rest embarrassed for their current behavior. One large Whelf female actually had the grace to apologize for having her foot in my face.

"I am so sorry! I don't usually step on people I don't know!"

"No problem," I assured her. "Go back to your shopping."

"Oh, yes!" she exclaimed, as if the opportunity had just occurred to her. "I was looking for a new wand for my husband's birthday!"

"Pay cash," I warned her, as she minced away.

All but one of the former zombies departed. Of course, the Skeeve was long gone. I found Massha sitting on the stairs of the dais wrapping herself around a mocha lattecino with double whipped cream. Chumley was lying on the floor with an ice pack clutched to one big eye.

"What happened back there?" Massha asked.

"We were ambushed," I stated grimly. "Chloridia poofed out, so we don't even have the phony under wraps."

"Where'd she go?

"I don't know," I replied. "But we're still at a net profit, magicianwise."

I dragged the last zombie survivor, a half-conscious Walroid, away from his extra large cappucino. He goggled at me, his wiry mustache puffing out indignantly.

"We found Cire."

"They almost got me," Strewth panted, tearing back toward the Rat Hole.

In the cover of the riot he had switched identities, assuming that of a bicycle messenger he had once encountered in a bar. He jingled his handlebar bell. Shoppers jumped out of the way of his front wheel, diving into fountains or behind bards if they had to. He pedaled grimly.

"But they didn't get you," Rattila's voice echoed in his mind. "Hurry back! I need the power you gathered."

Strewth slithered into the hidden entrance and divested himself of the bicycle messenger's form. He scrabbled on all fours into Rattila's presence and lay panting at the huge rat's feet.

"They got all the raiders," Strewth gasped. "They're no longer out of it. They're back to normal."

He expected Rattila to be furious. Instead, the Big Cheese looked jubilant.

"Why aren't you mad?" he asked.

"They're rejuvenated," the Ratislavan gloated, his red eyes gleaming. "Don't you see the benefit? We can milk them all over again. The magicians! The technicians! The artists! The inventors! Everyone! Their special talents will be mine. And when we've drained them again, we can restore them, and start the process all over. I shall have more power than any magician has ever dreamed of!"

"Oh, I dunno," Wassup put in, speculatively. "I bet when you get right down to it they all want the same thing. Yeowww!"

Rattila blew out his smoking finger as the brown mall-rat hopped around trying to put out his burning foot.

"There is nothing I hate more," he hissed, "than a minion who doesn't understand hyperbole."