The Never War

FIRST EARTH

You’re going to what?” shouted Gunny with horror.

“We’re going to deliver a message from Max Rose to Winn Farrow,” I said.

Spader added, “And that’s going to get us in good with Rose so we can find out about the natty-do he’s cooking up with the Nazi wogglies. It’s perfect.”

“It’snotperfect,” Gunny said nervously as he paced the floor of our hotel room. “First off, you’re not delivering a message, you’re delivering a warning. Winn Farrow doesn’t take kindly to warnings.”

“But we’re just the messengers,” I said.

“That’s even worse, shorty,” Gunny shot back. “He tried to kill Max Rose. Do you think he’d bat an eye over bumping off two messenger kids? No, sir. You boys can’t do this.”

“I hear what you’re saying, Gunny,” I said. “But May sixth is tomorrow! We’re running out of time.”

“This is what we do,” Spader added. “It’s what being a Traveler is all about.”

Gunny stopped pacing and looked at the two of us. Like it or not, what Spader said was true. This was what we were there for. To chicken out and hide wasn’t an option. I wished itwerean option, but it wasn’t.

“Then I’m going with you,” Gunny announced.

“You can’t,” I said. “If something happens to us, you’re the only one who knows what’s going on.”

“He’s right, mate,” Spader said. “You’d have to push on without us.”

This was the last thing Gunny wanted to hear.

“That doesn’t make me feel any better,” Gunny said softly.

It didn’t do much for me, either, but it was the truth. “It’s not going to come to that,” I said with more confidence than I actually felt. “We’re going to go down there, give him the message, and get out.”

“And what happens if you run into Saint Dane?” Gunny asked.

“I’m counting on it,” said Spader with conviction.

I didn’t like the way Spader said that. The simple mention of Saint Dane’s name always cast a dark shadow over his normally bright personality. Our best hope of pulling this off was to keep our heads on straight and be smart. If Spader lost it and went after Saint Dane, well, then Gunny would probably end up being onhis own after all. I couldn’t let that happen, mostly because I didn’t want to end up on the front page of the newspaper under the headline:

TWO BELLBOYSRUBBED OUT INGRISLY MOB SLAYING.

“I’m not going to argue with you anymore,” Gunny finally said, sounding tired. “You boys have had more experience with this Travelerbusiness than I have. But I know about Winn Farrow and how he operates. I promise you, the man isn’t right.”

“We know,” I said. “We’ll be careful.”

I really, really hoped that “careful” was going to cut it. Twenty minutes later we were in a taxicab, headed downtown to meet the infamous Winn Farrow.

I have to admit, I was having second thoughts. What if Winn Farrow was as nutzoid-vicious as everybody said? He might start shooting before we even got in the door. The more I thought about it, the more I worried that we had gotten a little bit too cocky.

Spader must have sensed my tension because he gave me a friendly shove.

“It’s gonna be fine, mate,” he said, actually sounding oddly cheery. “We’re the good guys. We can’t lose.”

I wished that were true.

“Besides,” he added, “nothing’s gonna happen to you so long as I’m around.”

“How do you figure that?” I asked.

Spader didn’t answer right away. I think he was trying to find the right words. When he next spoke, it was with a serious tone I hadn’t often heard from him. I’d seen him blind with rage at Saint Dane. I’d also seen him devastated by the death of his father and the disappearance of his mother. But this was different. This was a thoughtful, sincere side of Spader that I hadn’t known existed.

“I may not know much about being a Traveler,” he said. “But from what I’ve seen, the key to this whole thing is you, Pendragon.”

That took me by surprise. “We’re all in this together,” I said quickly.

“True, but you’re the one keeping us together. I think we’re all playing our parts, but I’ve got no doubt, the most important piece to this natty puzzle is you, mate. If anything happens to you, I’m afraid the show would be over. I won’t let that happen.” I didn’t know how to react. Though I was slowly starting to accept the fact that I was a Traveler, I wasn’t ready to take on the responsibility of being some kind of ringleader. It was tough enough just trying to figure out why I was chosen to be a Traveler in the first place. I didn’t want to be in charge, no way. The thought of it actually made me a little nauseous.

“I appreciate it, Spader,” I said to him. “And I’ll be watching your back too.”

“I know that, mate,” he said.

I wanted this conversation to end. It was freaking me out more than I was freaked out already. Anyhow, the time for talk was over because the cab had screeched to a stop. I looked out the window and saw we were two blocks away from where we told the cab driver to take us.

“We’re not there yet,” I said to him. “We need to go another two blocks west.”

The cabbie turned around and said, “Maybeyougotta go two more blocks, but I sure don’t. Ain’t safe for cabs to go over there. They see us comin’, they think it’s Christmas. I been robbed too many times to go in there again. So whether you like it or not, this is as far as I go.”

He meant it too. I didn’t bother trying to talk him out of it. We got out of the car and paid him. The cabbie then hit the gas and did a quick U-turn with his wheels squealing. He gunned it out of there like he didn’t even like beingcloseto Winn Farrow territory. We watched him for a second as he made his escape, driving right through a red light.

It didn’t help our confidence any.

“Maybe we should rethink this,” Spader said.

“I’m tired of thinking,” I said. “C’mon.”

We started walking west. As I’m sure you’ve figured out by now, this was a bad section of town. Gunny told us it was the meat-packing district. Historically this was an area of Manhattan where all the slaughterhouses were. It was made up of big, rambling brick buildings where livestock were killed, cleaned, packed, and shipped. A grisly business by anybody’s standards. Luckily for us, they didn’t do the slaughtering here anymore. The main business was processing and shipping meat. It was a place most people avoided. Can you blame them? It wasn’t exactly a fun spot for a Sunday picnic. I guess that’s why so many criminals made their homes down here. It was the kind of place that even the cops avoided.

Yet here we were, Spader and I, walking right down the street like we belonged there. Believe me, we didn’t. The further west we walked, the more I felt the hot stares of people’s eyes on us. This was the kind of neighborhood where everybody knew everybody else. A stranger stood out like a brilliant light bulb in a dark cave. People watched us from doorways and windows and from passing cars. A few people even whistled. It was their way of taunting us, knowing that we were headed for deep trouble.

“I feel like we just arrived at a party we weren’t invited to,” Spader said nervously.

“Or like it’s feeding time at the zoo…and we’re a couple of pork chops.”

Our destination was an old packing plant that was built onto a pier over the Hudson River. Max Rose told us exactly where it was. It was the place where Winn Farrow and his gang spent most of their time, when they weren’t out slitting people’s throats, that is.

After walking for a very tense five minutes, we found ourselves in front of a big brick building with the wordsWILD BOAR MEATSpainted in two-foot-high faded white letters over the green, garage-style door. ”This is it,” said Spader. “What do we do, knock?”

The answer came quickly. Somebody had walked up behind us. I turned to see that it was more than one somebody. There were five guys, all wearing greasy clothes and worn caps. Their sleeves were rolled up to reveal huge, Johnny Bravo-style arms. I also saw that their hands and arms were stained with dark-brown blotches. I’m guessing these guys worked in the meat-packing plant, which meant those brown stains were actually, gross me out, dried blood.

None of them looked happy to see us. They all had scowls that told me they didn’t like strangers and would probably make us pay for invading their turf. Looking at their hands again, I really hoped that those blood stains came from working in the packing plant and not from pummeling bozos like us who wandered into their neighborhood.

“Do you guys work here?” I asked, trying to sound like I wasn’t about to pee in my pants.

They didn’t answer. Their expressions got darker.

“We’re looking for Winn Farrow,” Spader said.

Those were the magic words. But it was bad magic, because as soon as they heard the name “Winn Farrow,” they circled us, cutting off any hope we had of escape.

“We’ve got to see Farrow,” I said. “We got a message for him.”

The thugs started to tighten the circle. Spader and I went back to back. We didn’t stand a chance in a fight against these brutes. I could see them clenching their fists, which made the knotty muscles in their forearms flex. Now that they were in close, I could smell them too. Didn’t these guys know about deodorant? It was getting real ugly, real fast.

“It’s a message from Max Rose,” I said in desperation.

The thugs stopped. I actually saw hesitation in their focused, killers’ eyes. We were seconds away from adding to the stains on their hands, but hearing Max Rose’s name made them freeze. Better, they looked scared. Up until that moment we had only heard about what a tough guy Max Rose was. Seeing these thugs turn all Jelloat the sound of his name confirmed it. Max Rose wasn’t somebody you messed with.

Suddenly the garage door of the building flew up and four more guys stepped out. These guys were just as vicious looking as the smelly guys surrounding us, except they wore gangster-looking suits. They also had shotguns. I suddenly felt safer with the guys who only worked with their fists. One of the new thugs-I’ll call him Shotgun-motioned toward us. Instantly the smelly thugs frisked us up and down, looking for guns. Of course they came up empty.

“We have a message from Max Rose to Winn Farrow,” I said. “We don’t want any trouble.”

Shotgun looked back at the other thugs and laughed. The smelly thugs laughed with him. “You don’t want any trouble?” Shotgun laughed. “Well, golly gee-whiz, we wouldn’t want you to get into any trouble!”

The thugs laughed even harder. Great. Not only were our lives in danger, we had to be insulted, too.

Shotgun then barked, “Inside!” He motioned toward the garage door with his gun. Spader and I walked inside. The shotgun boys followed close behind us, but the smelly thugs stayed outside. I wasn’t going to miss them.

Inside we saw what was once a busy slaughterhouse. Luckily for us, it wasn’t in operation anymore. It was a big, open warehouse room that stretched up for three or four stories. There was a track running on either side of the ceiling with ugly metal hooks hanging down. My guess was this was where they strung up the cattle when they did the yucky stuff. There were cement troughs in the floor that I’m sure caught most of the yuk. At the end of the track were long rows of wooden tables where all the slicing and dicing happened. Yuk. It’s impossible to overuse the word “yuk” when it comes to this place. I like hamburgers as much as the next guy, but I never wanted to see where they came from.

“What is this place?” asked Spader.

“You don’t want to know,” I answered.

“Pipe down!” shouted Shotgun. They marched us through this big room to the back of the building, where there was a large, open metal door on the back wall. “In there,” ordered Shotgun.

I was starting to get nervous. Okay, I was already plenty nervous, but now I was getting close to that hairy edge of panic. I had a fleeting thought that we were being marched to a quiet back room where these guys would start blasting away.

“Max Rose sent us,” I said again. “We want to see Winn Farrow.”

I was cut off when Shotgun poked me in the gut with his gun, pushing me into the next room. Spader shot forward and grabbed the gun, but the other thugs jumped him and threw him in the room after me.

The next room was almost as big as the first. There was a big stack of wooden crates full of I don’t know what. There were also hundreds of metal hooks that were evenly spaced along the walls and ceiling. A flight of metal stairs led up to a catwalk that ringed the walls over our heads. I’m guessing they stored the sides of beef high and low in here. There were only two doors-the one we came through and another off the catwalk above us. There were no windows.

“Tie their hands,” ordered Shotgun. One of the other thugs pulled out a length of rope and immediately started tying our hands together.

“If Max Rose finds out you wouldn’t let us talk to Winn Farrow, there’s going to be trouble,” I said, trying not to sound too pathetic and desperate.

“Really?” said Shotgun without a trace of concern. “And how’s he gonna find out?”

“Oh, he’ll find out,” was all I could think of saying. Great comeback. I’m not a good bluffer. The thug finished tying our hands so Spader and I were now roped together at the wrists.

“I’m saying this for the last time-” I said.

“You got that right,” came a voice from the door we had just come through. “You’re doing a lot of things for the last time.”

Spader and I shot a look at the door to see a man standing there. I knew instantly that this had to be the one and only Winn Farrow.

It’s not that he looked like the tough gangster we were expecting or anything. It was more the way the other guys reacted to him. They all backed off like they were afraid to be in his way.

To be honest, Farrow didn’t look all that intimidating. He was a short guy. I’m guessing no more than five feet. No joke. He looked more like a gangster doll, than a gangster. Of course, I wasn’t about to tell him that. He had on a suit that was probably nice at one time, but now looked kind of shabby. The material was faded and the elbows were worn through.

That pretty much described all of Winn Farrow’s gang. Even though they wore suits, they all looked ragged. Where Max Rose’s gang was all spiffed out with expensive, handmade clothes, Farrow’s gang looked like they’d been wearing these same outfits for a long time. I guess that’s the difference between being a successful uptown gangster and a hungry downtown crook. This was definitely the B team of gangsters.

Farrow entered, followed by two more of his gang. When Farrow walked, he took quick, short strides. He had to. His legs were so short that if he wanted to cover any ground quickly, he had to walk really fast. It was kind of funny looking, like a cartoon. But I wasn’t laughing. Oh no. That would have been suicidal.

The men with the shotguns backed off as Farrow moved past them. He stopped in front of us and stood with his legs apart, firmly planted. For a second I thought he was going to put his fists on his hips and shout, “Hi yo, I’m Peter Pan!” Though he may have looked like an elf, his eyes had an insane gleam. I didn’t doubt that he was capable of all sorts of mayhem. He was no Peter Pan. After looking us over, he spat on the ground, barely missing my foot.

“So you’re the two brats who have been givin’ me headaches,” he snarled.”Ishould plug you right here.”

“Max Rose wouldn’t like that,” I said, trying to pull that bluff again.

It was the wrong move. Saying “Max Rose” in front of this guy was like waving a red cape in front of a bull. His eyes lost focus, then rolled back slightly into his head. It was totally creepy. His gang didn’t like it any more than I did. They all took a step back, as if expecting him to blow up or something.

A moment later his eyes snapped back into focus. But in my opinion he had just gone another notch higher on the crazy meter.

“You think I care what that rat thinks?” he snarled. “Max Rose is garbage!” He turned to his men. As if on cue, they all chimed in with: “Yeah! Garbage! Rat! Yeah!” Farrow held up his hand and his men instantly shut up. I think they had done this before. It looked rehearsed. Farrow then turned to us and got in close.

“You say he’s got a message for me?”

I glanced to Spader, which wasn’t hard seeing as we were only about six inches apart. He nodded, giving me encouragement. I had to choose my words carefully. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing and set this evil munchkin off. Trouble was, how could I possibly deliver the message I had to deliver without sending him off the deep end?

This plan was now officially stupid. But we were in it now so we had to keep going.

“Yes,” I said calmly. “He wants you to know that he’s not mad you tried to bump him off. He’s willing to forget it ever happened.”

“Well,” Farrow said with a smile. “Ain’t that gentlemanly of him.”

So far so good. “But,” I added.

“But?” Farrow echoed.

“Yes, there’s a but. He’d like you to back off. That’s it. He’s just asking, very politely, I might add, if you would kindly back off.” I hoped I hadn’t softened it so much that I sounded like an idiot.

“Oh? Is that all?” asked Farrow. “And what, may I ask, will happen if Idon’tback off?”

We had come to the hard part.

“Well,” I went on, clearing my throat. “He said, and I quote, that if you don’t mind your own business, he’ll come down here and put a hurt on you like you’ve never seen before.”

I winced. That was it. That was the threat. All that was left now was to see how Farrow would react.

At first he didn’t. He just kept looking at me like he was trying to understand what I had said. Then, after a few seconds, Winn Farrow started to laugh. I swear, he burst out laughing. All of his men started to laugh with him, but that didn’t mean anything. They only did what Farrow did.

“He’s going to come down here and put a hurt on me?” he laughed out. “Who is he kidding? That rat has already hurt me worse than if he put a bullet in my skull.” His laughter was slowing down. It was being replaced by anger. “He’s the reason I’m in this dump in the first place! We were partners. We ran this town. But he got too full of himself and turned on me. Now he’s up there in his castle eating steak and drinking champagne while I’m down here scrambling for crumbs. He’s gonna put the hurt on me? He can’t hurt me any more if he tried.”

He then walked right up to me and stuck his nose in my face. I could smell his sour breath. The guy had been drinking. I guarantee it wasn’t expensive whiskey with a shot of Three Stooges fizzy water.

“But I’ll let you in on a little secret,” he seethed. “I’m gonna get him back where it hurts the most.” He turned away from me and made a motion to one of his goons standing at the door.

Spader and I exchanged looks again. What didthatmean?

The goon walked up to Farrow and handed him something. Farrow then spun back to us with a big smile. He held what looked like a rocket on a stick. No kidding, a rocket. It was red and about a foot long. One end had a pointed nose, the other had fins. Sticking out from between the fins was a wire that had to be a fuse.

Farrow waved the rocket thing under our noses. “I ain’t gonna hit him,” he said playfully. “I ain’t gonna hit any of them saps who work for him neither. You know what I’m going to do? I’m gonna put the mighty Max Rose out of business with this little beauty.”

“What is it?” Spader asked.

Farrow pretended to play with the rocket, making it fly up and down like a kid with a toy airplane.

“Oh, just a little toy I got from some friends over in Chinatown. I think this one’U do just fine, but I’m not sure yet. I’d like you boys to help me decide.”

“Decide what?” I asked. “What are you gonna do with it?”

“It’s very simple,” he answered, sounding as if he were talking to a child. “We’re going to play a little game. It’s called, How many sparklies will it take to light up old Maxie Rose? One? Two? Or maybe even three? That’s what we’re going to see.”

I was beginning to think Winn Farrow was a nutburger.

He turned to his goons and made a motion. Quickly the guy who had tied us up came forward with another length of rope. He tied one end around our wrists and threw the other up and around a meat hook over our heads. This was bad. We were going to be strung up like sides of beef.

“I’ve got a better idea,” I said, trying to think fast. “Why don’t we go back to Max and tell him he’s the one who’s got to back off. Yeah, that’s it! I’ll tell him you’ve got a nasty trick up your sleeve and if he doesn’t let you back in the gang, you’ll use it.”

“Yeah,” added Spader. “You could be living up in the penthouse yourself!”

Farrow looked at us with dead eyes. All the creepy, happy game stuff was over. “All I want,” he seethed, “is to see that scum suffer like I did. I want him to crawl down here and beg me to takehimin. That’s what I want. That’s what I’m gonna get.” With a nod, the thug yanked on the rope. First our arms were pulled over our heads, then we were hoisted up into the air with our feet dangling several feet over the floor. Farrow walked over to us and held out the rocket.

“Now, let’s see how many of these I’m going to need, okay?” He then turned and hurried out on those short little legs. It wasn’t funny anymore.

“What are you going to do?” I yelled with a shaky voice.

“If I told you, it wouldn’t be a surprise!” he called back over his shoulder.

Yeah, nutburger. He left through the door, followed by the two guards and the goons with the shotguns. Spader and I were left alone, hanging from the meat hook.

“Now what?” Spader asked.

“We gotta get loose,” I said while struggling to get my hands free.

We went to work on the ropes, but it was painful. Our weight made the rough rope dig into our wrists.

Spader glanced toward the door and said, “Hey, what are they doing out there?”

I turned to look and I think my heart stopped. I now understood what kind of game Farrow was planning. The group of gangsters were gathered together about halfway back, in the large slaughterhouse room where we first had entered. The black stick that was attached to Farrow’s rocket was now nailed into a wooden crate. The crate was on its side and the rocket was aimed through the door…

At us.

“What is that thing?” Spader asked.

I didn’t tell him. He was going to find out soon enough.

“Work faster!” I ordered. “We gotta get outta here!” I worked on the ropes, but had to glance back to the other room. Farrow took a cigar from his jacket and plugged it into his mouth. He pulled out a match and struck it against the crate. He then took his sweet time about lighting his cigar.

This was torture. I looked at the ropes to see we were working them loose, but it was going to be too late.

Farrow finished lighting his cigar, then touched the still flaming match to the fuse on the back of the red rocket. Instantly the fuse sparked to life like a Fourth of July sparkler. In seconds the rocket would ignite.

“Pendragon? What is that?” Spader demanded to know. “What’s going to happen?” Fear had crept into his voice.

“Keep working on the ropes,” I said.

A few seconds later…

Ignition.

“Cover your eyes!” I shouted.

Spader turned his head to the wall, but I had to watch. The rocket shot from its makeshift launch pad, flew across the slaughterhouse and sailed right through the center of the open door into the room where we were hanging. Bull’s-eye. I turned away at the last instant, ready to get hit.

But the rocket missed us. Instead it blasted into the pile of wooden crates. A few more feet to the right and we would have been torched. We were spared, but not for long. This wasn’t your ordinary firework. This was meant to do damage. It must have been loaded with some kind of flammable stuff because it exploded and sent a wave of fire over the crates. In seconds the pile was engulfed with flames.

Spader and I stared at the growing fire with fear and awe. It was growing impossibly fast. I could already feel the heat.

“There’s my answer!” shouted Farrow over the roaring flames.

Spader and I turned to see he was standing in the doorway.

“One of those babies is all I’m going to need,” he said while puffing on his cigar like a proud papa. “Now, boys,” he said, “let’s see how fast this dump burns to the ground. Thanks for playing!”

With a laugh, he. spun around and strolled out of the room. The door was slammed behind him and I could hear the sound of a heavy lock being thrown. A quick glance at the fire told me that this room would soon be an inferno. All Spader and I could do was dangle there helplessly. Winn Farrow had proven to be as crazy and evil as predicted. Max Rose was going to get his answer. Farrow was not going to back off. The proof would be our deaths.

That’s when I heard a voice.

Given that the heat from the fire was already roasting us, I didn’t think it was possible, but when I heard that voice, I got a cold chill.

“Hello, Pendragon,” the voice said calmly. “Enjoying your visit to First Earth?”

Spader and I both shot a look to where the voice was coming from, to see a man standing on the catwalk over our heads. It was one of the gangsters who had followed Winn Farrow into the room earlier. At least helookedlike a gangster. His voice told me otherwise. This was a guy from another place and time who finally decided to reveal himself.

“You certainly took your time finding me,” he said with a cocky smile. “I was beginning to think you had lost interest.”

Saint Dane had dropped by to watch us cook.

(CONTINUED)