The Green And The Gray

22

"—siv thuysen mecidu-noens fyl errea!" eleven-year-old Phyllida called, standing tall and proud in a posture that reminded Roger of Melantha after she'd won her first game of Crazy Eights. The girl lifted her arms toward the ceiling, gave a flourish of hands and fingers that was too complicated for him to follow, then let her arms drop to her sides again.

"—and in peace they lived there all," her younger brother Yannis said with equal drama. "The Song of Tros-partia," the two children said in unison, and bowed low toward the five adults seated on the chairs and couches in front of them.

"Very nice," Caroline said approvingly, her tone finally carrying some genuine warmth. But of course, Caroline had always been a sucker for a good performance, especially one involving earnest amateurs. The children's impromptu recital had been just the thing to bring her around.

"Definitely," Roger seconded, wondering if he should point out that it had been far more interesting than that psychological drivel they'd suffered through three nights ago at the Miller Theater.

Probably not. "Did they do the translation themselves?"

"Oh, no," Iolanthe said. "The Song of Tros-partia is a landmark saga of our earliest recorded history.

We wouldn't trust it to any but the most Gifted of our Pastsingers."

"That was actually the third English translation of the Song," Aleksander added. "As we've grown more knowledgeable about your language's nuances over the years, the Pastsingers have tried to render it ever more accurately while still maintaining the classic form and sentence structure. This version was completed only two years ago."

"The children did a wonderful job," Caroline said. "Do you suppose one of them might grow up to be a Pastsinger?"

"We've wondered that ourselves," Vasilis acknowledged. "But then, every parent wants his or her child to be blessed with one of the Higher Gifts. We'll just have to wait and see."

"How exactly do these Gifts work?" Roger asked. "Is it genetic, or something else?"

"It's basically genetic," Vasilis said. "A pair of Laborers will tend to have Laborer children, a pair of Farseers will tend to have more Farseers, and so on."

"The whole dominant/recessive thing is more complicated than with Humans, though," Aleksander added. "Take Vasilis and Iolanthe, for example. As a Manipulator, Iolanthe has a small bit of the Groundshaker Gift, so if there was to be a true Groundshaker born among us, you might reasonably guess he or she would come out of this homestead. But their eldest daughter, Xylia, has already tested out as a Laborer, and there's no particular reason to assume Phyllida and Yannis will have any of the Mind Gifts."

"How about Melantha's parents?" Roger asked.

"Another good example," Aleksander said, nodding. "Zenas and Laurel are both Laborers, who by all rights should only have Laborer children. It just shows you can never predict where the lightning will strike."

"At any rate, we very much appreciate you sharing that with us," Roger said, looking back at the children.

"Children?" Iolanthe prompted.

"You're welcome," the two children said, again in unison.

"And now it's time for bed," Vasilis said. "Go get your night things on."

Yannis made a face, but apparently knew better than to argue. Nodding acknowledgment of their instructions, they left the living room.

"They do a very effective dramatic reading," Roger commented. "Though that unison thing is a little unnerving. Do they practice that, or does it come naturally?"

"It's mostly a side effect of our close-range empathic communication," Vasilis said. "And siblings often have clearer communication among themselves than usual."

"But I think they do practice, as well," Iolanthe added. "They've always been fascinated by coordinated movement, whether in dance routines or Olympic synchronized swimming."

"Any word yet from the searchers?" Caroline asked.

"Only that Melantha hasn't answered any of their calls," Aleksander said. If he was startled by the sudden change in subject, he didn't show it. "Trust me: the minute she does, you'll be among the first to know."

"Can't you just sense her presence or something?" Roger asked.

"Unfortunately, it's not that easy," Aleksander said. "If it was, we'd have found her at your apartment that very first night. No, if Melantha chooses not to answer a call, the searchers could walk right past her without knowing it."

"What about you?" Caroline asked. "Couldn't you order her to respond?"

"I think you're under the impression that Persuaders have considerably more power than we actually do," Aleksander said. "We don't order people to do anything. It really is just persuasion: the pushing of our particular point of view while still allowing the other person to make up his or her own mind."

"And thanks to you, Melantha has had a chance to rethink her earlier decision to allow this insane sacrifice," Vasilis added. "As long as that hasn't happened, there's still a chance for Aleksander to persuade enough of the Greens to our side."

"What happens if you do?" Roger asked. "Nikolos said Melantha isn't at her full strength yet."

"No, but merely the threat she poses might be enough," Aleksander said. "If we can convince the Grays that we would be willing to create a wholesale slaughter—which, of course, we aren't—

perhaps we can make them leave New York of their own accord."

"Why don't you just leave?" Caroline asked. "There's a huge country out there just waiting for you."

"Because this is our home," Iolanthe said. "How do you just pick up and leave your home?"

"You did it once before," Caroline reminded her.

"It's not that simple."

"Why not?" Caroline persisted, starting to sound a little cross. "I'm still waiting to hear a good reason."

"No offense, Caroline, but it's really none of your business," Vasilis said, sounding a little cross himself. "If we choose to stay here—"

"It's all right, Vasilis," Aleksander interrupted him quietly. "We've told them this much. We might as well tell them the rest."

He looked back at Roger. "It has to do with our transport, the one buried under Ellis Island," he said.

"We still use it to grow some of the herbs and spices we knew back on our own world."

"Yes, Velovsky mentioned that," Roger said. "Is there a problem with it?"

Aleksander sighed. "Just the rather awkward fact that we can't move it."

"Its propulsion systems don't work anymore?"

"They work just fine," Aleksander said dryly. "Unfortunately, so does Human sonar."

Roger grimaced, suddenly understanding. "Oh."

" 'Oh,' indeed," Aleksander agreed heavily. "It was probably risky enough bringing it into New York harbor through all the traffic back in 1928. Now, with modern underwater detection, we couldn't move it a hundred yards without triggering an early-warning system somewhere."

"Especially after 9/11," Roger said.

"Indeed," Aleksander said. "So now you know the truth. We can't move the transport, and we also can't abandon it to the risk of being found by the Humans or, worse, by the Grays."

"Which leaves us only one choice," Iolanthe said. "We have to stand and fight."

"And the only way to do that is with Melantha," Aleksander concluded. "I'm convinced that if I can talk to her, I can bring her onto our side—" He broke off. "Ah—I see we're ready for bed."

Roger turned. Vasilis and Iolanthe's son and daughter had returned, along with the four other children who had been at dinner that evening. All were clothed in leotard-like outfits of various shades of green, with dark brown half-boots of a soft-looking material on their feet. "Nice pajamas," he commented.

"Has everyone cleaned their teeth?" Iolanthe asked, standing up. Six heads nodded silently. She nodded back, then turned to Roger and Caroline. "Would you like to come, too?" she invited. "You, especially, Roger, said you wanted to know more about the tree thing."

"Definitely," Roger said, getting to his feet. "Come on, Caroline. This should be interesting."

At first, Fierenzo's legs wouldn't work at all. He sagged in the middle of the sidewalk, muscles trembling uncontrollably as his attackers held him up by his arms like a puppet with broken strings.

"You can do it," Nose said encouragingly. "You want to be here all night?"

"Go to hell," Fierenzo gritted out, fighting to get his feet under him. This time his knees held as he cautiously put a little of his weight on them. He tried taking a step, and collapsed again into his captors' grip as he let the joints buckle again.

Curly swore in an unfamiliar language. "Come on, Fierenzo—we didn't hit you that hard."

"Maybe you've never hit a diabetic before," Fierenzo snarled back. "Give me a chance, will you?"

"We're wasting time," Curly growled. "I say we go in and get them ourselves."

"Patience is a virtue," Nose said. "He can have one more minute."

Fierenzo smiled tightly to himself. In actual fact, despite the lingering pain, his muscles were recovering quite nicely. Already, he judged, he ought to be able to at least hobble if he had to.

But his captors didn't know that, and the throwaway fib about diabetes should have muddied the waters that much more. If his helpless act could buy him a little more time, he should be able to run or fight if and when a suitable opportunity presented itself.

He spent Nose's extra minute in a great show of agony and unsteadiness. All too soon, though, it was over. "That's long enough," Curly declared, balling his hand into a fist and giving Fierenzo's kidney a none-too-gentle prod. "Move, or we leave you here."

"You'll never get in there alone," Fierenzo ground out, the warning buying him another couple of seconds. He was definitely coming out of this now, and should be back to a reasonable level of strength by the time they reached the station house. Remembering to keep his movements shaky, letting the two men take as much of his weight as they were willing to, he started walking.

They had taken five steps, and were passing beneath one of the streetlights, when a section of sidewalk two yards in front of them exploded.

Fierenzo twitched reflexively as a thundercrack and a cloud of concrete dust washed over him. An instant later he lost his balance completely as his captors yanked him backward and twisted him around the other direction, hustling him back the way they'd come. They hadn't taken more than two steps when a second sledgehammer blow shattered another section of sidewalk, again a couple of yards ahead of them.

The two men got the message. They brought Fierenzo to a halt; and then, even as Nose hauled the detective out of his sag, Curly let go entirely and took off at a dead run down the sidewalk, zigzagging like a soldier crossing an enemy field of fire. Nose swiveled Fierenzo around again, this time to face the street, and shifted to a one-armed hold beneath his rib cage. His other hand snaked around to join it, and for a moment he seemed to be fiddling with something just beneath Fierenzo's sternum. His hands separated; and Fierenzo winced as a gleaming, short-bladed knife flashed into view, clutched in Nose's right hand. It waved in front of his eyes a moment, a silent warning to behave himself, then came to rest against his throat. "Show yourself or the cop dies!" he shouted past Fierenzo's ear.

The only answer was another crack of exploding sidewalk, this one a yard to their right, followed by another the same distance to their left. Fierenzo strained his eyes against the glare of the streetlight and the headlights of the oblivious drivers zooming past, trying to spot the shooter.

But there were no figures moving around in the shadows of the buildings across the street, and no obvious silhouettes in any of the windows. Another chunk of pavement disintegrated to their right without even a hint of a muzzle flash that he could see.

Nose apparently couldn't find the shooter, either. He snarled something under his breath and again shifted grip, this time grabbing a handful of Fierenzo's hair and yanking his head up and back to expose his throat more conveniently to the knife. "Last chance!" he shouted. He hauled Fierenzo backward, and there was a metallic rustle as he brushed up against the playground fence. "Show yourself!"

Fierenzo stiffened. With his face pointed upward at this new angle he couldn't see what, if anything, was going on with the shooter across the street.

But he was in perfect position to see the shadowy figure that glided silently across the night sky above the glare of the streetlights to his right, dropping toward the playground behind him.

He barely had time to wonder whether he had imagined it when a voice came suddenly from across the street. "All right!" it called. "I'm here! Don't hurt him!"

"There you are," Nose muttered. Taking a deep breath, he screamed.

The earlier screams, aimed at Fierenzo from six feet away, had been bad enough. This one, bellowed practically in his ear, was a hundred times worse. His whole body stiffened and then turned to jelly, sagging him toward the ground in spite of the grip on his hair. Whereas before the world had seemed to twist around him, now it was as if he no longer had any direction at all. His chest and gut were a whirlpool of agony as his internal organs seemed to grate violently against each other. He wanted desperately to be sick but his stomach muscles couldn't even organize themselves enough to vomit.

The scream cut off into a fainter echo. At first he thought it was just a trick of his ears or mind as they vibrated with an afterimage of the sound. But then the fainter scream came again, and he realized that it was coming from Curly, somewhere down the street. He hadn't run off in panic, as Fierenzo had thought, but had merely moved away to deprive their attacker of the advantages of a bunched target.

Curly screamed again, too far away for Fierenzo to feel any fresh effects from the noise; and as some of the other agony began to subside he became aware of a duller secondary pain coming from the top of his head. Nose was still holding him mostly upright by his hair, the knife still resting against his neck, using him as a human shield against the silent gun across the street.

And as Curly's screams continued and Fierenzo's brain started sluggishly working again, he realized that the attacker's gun had indeed gone completely silent. Twisting his neck, he got one eye turned far enough to look toward the street.

There, on one of the twenty-story buildings on the far side of the pavement, was a sight that a week ago would have made his jaw drop all the way to the ground. Halfway up the side, midway between two of the darkened windows, a human figure was pressed against the sheer wall, arms and legs spread-eagled as if he'd been shot out of a cannon and slammed bodily into the brickwork. There was no sign of ropes or a platform, no indication even of any climbing hooks.

The scream came again; and as the sound echoed off the building, he saw the figure's right foot twitch loose from the wall as if his magic glue had suddenly evaporated. He scrabbled frantically for a grip, sliding a couple of feet down the side before he could catch himself again. Clearly, the screams were having the same debilitating effect on him that they'd had on Fierenzo.

Just as clearly, he was hanging on for dear life. Curly gave another scream, a short one this time, and the human fly slid another foot downward.

Fierenzo felt his jaw tighten as he finally caught on to the strategy. By moderating the length of their scream attacks, his captors were trying to bring the attacker down in a controlled fashion; not hard enough to drop him ten stories to his death, but also not giving him a chance to fight back.

Only they didn't know about the other man, the one who had glided over their heads during the noisy attack on the sidewalk an eternity of pain ago. The man who might at this very moment be moving stealthily up behind him and his captor.

The only problem was, the way things stood right now there was precious little he or anyone else could do from back there without putting Fierenzo's life at risk. The chain-link fence effectively blocked any way of getting to Nose's knife hand, and Nose himself showed no sign of letting down his guard any time soon.

Of course, for all he knew the stalker might be focused exclusively on rescuing the figure being forced down the building across the street. He might not care at all whether or not a police detective ended the evening with his throat still intact.

It was Fierenzo's job to make sure he had that option.

"Let me go," he gasped, putting all the agony and fear into his voice that he could. It didn't take much effort. "Please. You've got him—he can't do anything to you anymore. Please—my stomach—

I'm going to be sick—"

"Oh, for—" Lifting the knife away from Fierenzo's throat, Nose let go of his hair and disgustedly shoved him away to sprawl onto the sidewalk. Fierenzo tried to catch himself, but his disobedient muscles weren't up to the task, and a chorus line of stars flashed across his vision as the side of his head slammed into the cold concrete. Stifling a groan, he flopped over onto his back to look up at Nose. The other looked back for a moment, his face expressionless, then shifted his attention back to the building across the street. From down the sidewalk, Curly gave another of his short screams, rattling Fierenzo's ears still further.

And as the two of them concentrated on bringing down their opponent, they completely missed the giant Lincoln Log that came swinging up out of the darkness of the school ground to land across the top of the chain-link fence.

The figure who ran up the makeshift ramp was nearly to the top when the rattle of the metal rings finally woke Nose to his danger. He spun around, searching for the source of the noise, his knife arcing up into guard position. But he was too late. Even as he spotted the log and looked up, the newcomer had reached the top and taken off upward in a high, arching leap. Nose spun around to follow his motion, knife held high, his mouth opening for another scream.

He never got it out. As the newcomer reached the top of his arc there was a sound like a guitar string being plucked, and something gripped in his left hand sent a slender line of white shooting into Nose's chest.

The shot staggered him backward, the intended scream coming out as an agonized cough instead.

The gunman got off a second shot, this time bouncing Nose off the fence, before he landed on the edge of the street. His knees bent to absorb his momentum; and as he crouched in place for a second, Fierenzo finally got a clear look at him in the streetlight. Short and squat, he was dressed in dark clothing with a ski cap pulled down to his eyes and a patterned scarf covering his nose and mouth.

A scarf that looked suspiciously familiar.

A long, ululating scream erupted from down the block. Clenching his teeth against the renewed surge of pain, Fierenzo twisted his head around to look. Curly, of course; but to Fierenzo's surprise, the other wasn't running for cover, but was instead charging full-tilt toward the crouching gunman.

For a heart-stopping pair of seconds Fierenzo thought that the tactic was going to succeed as the gunman staggered under the sonic assault. But then he regained his balance and leveled his weapon at his attacker. Bracing his left hand with his right in a traditional marksman's stance, he fired.

Curly didn't just stagger the way Nose had. The white line that ran into his chest not only stopped him dead in his tracks, but delivered enough impact to throw him backward off his feet. He hit the sidewalk with a sickening thud and lay still.

Beside Fierenzo, Nose was trying to get to his feet. Shifting aim, the gunman fired again into his chest. Nose went down again, and this time stayed there. For a moment the gunman peered at him, as if trying to decide whether he needed an insurance shot, apparently decided against it, and turned to Fierenzo. "You okay?" he grunted.

"Oh, just dandy," Fierenzo wheezed back. The scarf was familiar, all right. So was the voice coming from behind it. "You have a good nap?"

Jonah shook his head. "You came that close, Detective," he said darkly. "You play games with these people, you're going to be burned."

"Tell me about it," Fierenzo said, wincing as he rolled onto his back and tried to work his trembling hand into his coat pocket. "Your fingers working any better than mine right now?"

"What do you need?" Jonah asked, squatting a little unsteadily beside him.

"My phone," Fierenzo said, his fingers finally closing on the device. "I have to call an ambulance."

"You'll be all right," Jonah assured him. "There's nothing a hospital could do for you anyway."

"It's not for me," Fierenzo said, easing out the phone. "And while I appreciate you coming to my assistance, I'm going to have to ask you to surrender your weapon."

"What, you mean the ambulance is for them?" Jonah asked scornfully. Reaching down, he plucked the phone from Fierenzo's fingers. "Sorry."

"Damn it," Fierenzo snarled, making a useless attempt to grab it away. "Give that back."

"They don't need or want an ambulance," Jonah said, turning the phone off and dropping it into his own pocket. "Trust me. Anyway, what are you feeling so charitable for? They attacked you, remember?"

"Doesn't matter," Fierenzo bit back. "I still can't just leave them bleeding on the sidewalk."

"This isn't like the guns you're used to," Jonah said patiently, hefting the flattened mallet Fierenzo had seen him holding earlier that afternoon on the alley fire escape. "Though I'll admit the one down the block will probably hurt a lot longer than you will. Anyway, you're the only one who's bleeding."

Frowning, Fierenzo reached up and touched his cheek. There was blood there, all right, a thin trail rolling down into his collar from the bottom of his ear. "I still need that weapon," he said, wondering what kind of permanent hearing damage he'd managed to sustain tonight.

"Sure," Jonah said, holding the gun out in front of him. "Now you see it—"

He opened his hand; and right in front of Fierenzo's eyes, the gun seemed to come apart into a set of slender, silvery snakes. For an instant they stretched out along the insides of Jonah's fingers and then vanished up his sleeve.

"—now you don't," Jonah finished, and Fierenzo could imagine a grin behind the concealing scarf.

"It's all in the wrist."

"Look—"

"Later," Jonah cut him off, taking his upper arm and starting to pull him upright. "We've got to get out of here before their friends arrive."

"You mean there are more—aaah," Fierenzo interrupted himself as his whole body seemed to explode in new pain. "Easy—easy!"

"Sorry, but we can't wait," Jonah said, continuing to pull. "The only reason they're not on top of us already is that they're scattered all over Manhattan looking for Melantha."

"For Melantha?" Fierenzo asked. "What do they—aaah!"

"Yeah, I know," Jonah said sympathetically. "Try not to groan too loudly, will you? It attracts attention."

He worked Fierenzo to his feet, then ducked over and grabbed his leg. A second later, Fierenzo found himself hanging over the other's shoulder in a fireman's carry. Before he could protest, they were heading down the sidewalk at a fast trot, each step adding an extra jolt to his pain.

He was clenching his teeth against the agony, staring at the swaying sidewalk flowing beneath Jonah's feet, when the blackness finally took him.