Blood in the Water

BLOOD IN THE WATER

Eric Del Carlo

www.loose-id.com

Warning This e-book contains sexually explicit scenes and adult language and may be considered offensive to some readers. Loose Id® e-books are for sale to adults ONLY, as defined by the laws of the country in which you made your purchase. Please store your files wisely, where they cannot be accessed by under-aged readers.

Blood in the Water Eric Del Carlo This e-book is a work of fiction. While reference might be made to actual historical events or existing locations, the names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Published by Loose Id LLC 1802 N Carson Street, Suite 212-2924 Carson City NV 89701-1215 www.loose-id.com

Copyright © August 2008 by Eric Del Carlo All rights reserved. This copy is intended for the purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this e-book may be reproduced or shared in any form, including, but not limited to printing, photocopying, faxing, or emailing without prior written permission from Loose Id LLC.

ISBN 978-1-59632-748-1 Available in Adobe PDF, HTML, MobiPocket, and MS Reader

Printed in the United States of America

Editor: C. B. Calsing Cover Artist: Anne Cain

Dedication To all who lent a hand, thought a good thought or shed a pitying human tear: gratitude. To those who met Hurricane Katrina with indifference, incompetence or barbarity: a pox on your houses.

Chapter One

In the cargo pit of the shanghai-taxi, Nickerson’s gen-stimmed olfactory sense detected the aromas of hot oil, metal shavings, and sweat-dank desperation. A catjob’s sense of smell, catjob hearing, catjob reflexes. He had also the enriched visual capacity of a feline; that leg of the transformative procedure had given him the telltale vertical pupils that identified him as the product of gen-stimming. This hardly made him an abnormality. Many people had undergone the change. It was how catjob had entered the language. But Nickerson’s enrichment was prime quality, state of the art. Those who had recruited him from the urban wilds of Earth had wanted a master assassin, which was precisely what he had become. But Nickerson needed none of these amplified senses to perceive that trouble was simmering in the swaying cargo pit. The airtruck’s hold was a great hollow egg mounted on gyros, designed to sustain a level attitude regardless of how the craft itself moved. But Nickerson had seen the counterfeit inspection tags when they’d boarded. This vehicle was no longer the commercial freight hauler it had been in its initial incarnation. It was a shanghai-taxi now, and its cargo was people. As a part of that cargo, Nickerson knew they were growing restless.

2

Eric Del Carlo

The whine of the gyros buzzed in his bones as the scuffed metaplastic floor pitched and yawed, laboring ineffectually to stay level. Nickerson had planted himself on the deck against a sloping wall. His arm lay across BlaqJaq’s broad chest, a hand fastened to the brawny biceps, securing the younger male while he dozed. BlaqJaq had been depleted by the rapid series of events that had overtaken the two of them, experiences new to the streetmuscle -- former streetmuscle, Nickerson corrected. Just as he himself was now a former assassin. His cat eyes fell to the head nuzzled in his lap. Long, dark hair spilled about. Such a beautiful kid, half Nickerson’s forty Earth years. Nickerson, however, had spent little of the time since his enrichment on this corrupt and barbarous ball of mire. Nickerson’s career as an assassin had played out off-rock, up among the colonies and worldlets, the clean environments, the paradises. It had been his task to keep those places unsullied, unspoiled, to prevent any of the Earth-based criminal cartels from establishing the least toehold. And so he had done. Until his superiors had betrayed him, until he’d been offered up as human meat for sport in that diabolical Hunt of Nine, which BlaqJaq had assisted him in surviving. With his bandaged right hand, he gently brushed unruly hair from the younger man’s cheek. A pleasant ache of emotion touched him, along with the first stirrings of a hard-on. BlaqJaq had lived in the undercity, in the rotting labyrinth of tunnels beneath the skin of the street. In that lawless maze, he had worked successfully as a freelance enforcer, a streetmuscle. Now that city was behind them. Nickerson had bought passage on this transport. It hadn’t been easy to arrange. Without his palmchip he was an identityless entity, an off-grid person, without money, without clearances. He’d had to trade his valuable camofiber coat; BlaqJaq had surrendered his leathers, a streetmuscle’s unofficial uniform. The young male now wore a threadbare bodystocking and kelp-canvas vest. Nickerson’s simple shirt and trousers weren’t any more stylish.

Blood in the Water

3

He turned his hand over, saw the flaking blood marking the bandage. He’d cut out his palmchip himself, after he had learned of its perversion into a tracking device in the Hunt of Nine. The chip had already been corrupted, however; on the city’s surface, it had ceased to function properly, registering only the null mode of steel sleet when he’d tried to interface with any official systems. His superiors wielded far-reaching powers. They had effectively crippled him by taking away his identity. No. Nickerson had already proven himself something other than crippled by escaping the city aboard this black market transport. Still alive, still mobile, someday he might yet have his revenge against his betrayers. Besides himself and BlaqJaq, thirteen other individuals occupied the cargo pit. They were desperate types, fellow off-gridders and the like. Palmchips kept Earth culture more or less functioning, regulating a person’s identity and monetary worth, keeping the population accountable within the system. But some people always slipped free. Better conditions predominated up in the wide black, on the off-Earth stations and colonies where scrupulous social harmony prevailed, where Nickerson had operated like a ghost, dispatching malignant presences before they could germinate… He’d almost drifted into reverie, but his enriched senses, keen and automatic, pulled him back. The individual among the rest of the human cargo who he’d judged the most likely threat was about to make her move. He had seen the metallic red incarceration chevron on her left cheek, had noted her aggressive manner and measuring appraisals of everyone else riding in the shanghai-taxi. He’d also caught her testing the unstable ’plastic deck, trying her footing. Now she sauntered across the pit, her balance impressive. Muscle made her bare legs rigid; veins mapped her arms. Her ghostly hair stood in straw tufts. A scalding violence waited behind her eyes.

4

Eric Del Carlo

She came to a halt, glaring down at Nickerson and BlaqJaq. “Eeza pretty. I wanz a bite of him.” Nickerson gazed up at her, expression mild, almost impassive below his lightly colored hair. His sleek shape hid a taut musculature. His appearance and demeanor did not draw attention. His meticulous training allowed him to operate with minimal fanfare. “If it’s him you want, why speak to me?” BlaqJaq continued to slumber with his head in Nickerson’s lap. “Eeza you bitchboy, innie?” “We’re just good friends.” Nickerson surprised himself. He hardly ever used humor. But he had bought the few extra seconds of evaluation that he’d wanted. Even without the brand of the prison chevron on her cheek, this female proclaimed her status as a hardened jail rat. Put into any sort of enclosed setting -- this cargo pit, for instance -- she would automatically try to dominate. Though Nickerson had given up the camofiber coat designed to confound detection systems, he retained his private arsenal, the tools of his trade. These he carried inside a flex’plastic bag presently serving as a cushion for his lower back. He’d scavenged the bag from a trash heap when he and BlaqJaq had emerged from the undercity by way of a sewer grate. He could get to his weapons easily. But he had no way of recharging the implements, and so he had determined that he would deal with this antagonist by purely physical means. “Yooz the pretty’s daddy. I say you I wanz a bite. Yooz give him up. Or am I gotz throw down blood?” She shifted subtly into a combat stance. Nickerson didn’t doubt she’d prove a worthy opponent, but he didn’t fight for the sport of it. Jail-yard fight codes meant nothing to him. His muscles tightened. He readied himself to spring. The other passengers in the shanghai-taxi’s pit watched the contest’s preliminaries fearfully, though taking pains to appear to ignore everything. Black market transportation services made no claims to providing for passenger safety.

Blood in the Water

5

A light snore rose from BlaqJaq. Nickerson deeply regretted the inevitability of waking him when, abruptly, the younger man bolted, bounding up from the lurching deck. Nickerson, even with his enriched feline responses, found his arm clutching empty air as the erstwhile streetmuscle went leaping at the woman who so ardently wanted a “bite” of him. Despite the relative bulk of his muscled body, BlaqJaq kicked out with his leg, the move smooth and nimble. It caught the female in her sternum, but she too had swift combat skills and had retreated a half step, just enough that the blow didn’t land with its intended fight-ending impact. She staggered but didn’t fall. Nickerson had a foot planted, ready to launch himself -- this female with the colorless, tufty hair couldn’t stand against both of them -- when BlaqJaq, landing, threw him a swift, meaningful look. Nickerson didn’t spring. BlaqJaq, as an undercity streetmuscle, had operated according to a code of honor. Apparently he saw the necessity for adhering to some arcane set of rules here as well. Perhaps he saw the woman’s challenge as an honest one, worthy of a fitting response. Nickerson could scarcely comprehend it. He had conducted his operations clandestinely throughout his decidedly violent career. He had worked in the shadows, dwelled on the fringes. He had received his assignments and carried them out unquestioningly. In the end, it had proven very lonely work, but he hadn’t really understood that until he’d met BlaqJaq. The woman circled BlaqJaq out in the center of the cargo pit. The airtruck indeed carried more than human freight. Bolts held metaplastic containers, roughly coffin shaped, here and there, to the deck. No one had tried to meddle with them nor with whatever variety of contraband they contained. The black marketeers had to get the most from this operation. A career in crime paid no better than any other means of making a living, unless one belonged to the executive structure. BlaqJaq kept pace with his adversary, his hands up and ready, body in a fighting crouch, taking particular care to maintain his balance on the tilting floor. Perhaps taking too

6

Eric Del Carlo

much care. Nickerson thought his lower half overly tensed. He rocked stiffly from heel to toe as the shanghai-taxi jounced along carelessly through the skies. This vehicle hadn’t launched on an extra-atmospheric flight, not even a suborbital, just a fast and dirty jaunt southward. Nickerson had only wanted to get the two of them clear of the city, away from all the ubiquitous interfaces that endlessly demanded an individual’s functioning palmchip. The aggressive female saw the flaw in BlaqJaq’s defense and moved immediately to exploit it. She feinted a step then pivoted the other way, stooping and swinging out her leg. But BlaqJaq leapt quite suddenly. The woman’s leg swept underneath him, connecting with nothing, which took her off balance. He came down, the heel of one foot almost catching her kneecap but clipping the hard meat of her thigh instead. A shot to the knee would’ve ended this confrontation also, but the woman, turning the momentum of her missed leg kick somewhat to her advantage, managed to grab at BlaqJaq’s ankle as she slew around. She couldn’t hold the grip, but it served sufficiently to disrupt his landing. As the ’truck lurched with startling force, the dark-haired youth dropped to one knee. The overtaxed gyros, bubbling lubrication, did little to keep the deck level. The female sprang deftly back to her feet. Her teeth bared. It gave her a feral look, beyond the merely violent. She looked…unevolved, proto-human. She fought for a mate, Nickerson thought with distant horror. After all, she meant to take BlaqJaq himself as a prize in this contest, even if she ended up maiming him. This world dismayed Nickerson. BlaqJaq found his footing before his foe could move on him decisively. The two circled again, exchanging blows. The kid certainly kept his cool, behaving professionally. Nickerson saw him moving more fluidly now, adapting to the rolling ground. The fight might have gone on some while more. Nickerson still wanted to intervene. He could imagine no gain from allowing this combat to stay more or less evenly matched. But BlaqJaq wanted it this way. Very well. He would acquiesce to his lover’s wishes.

Blood in the Water

7

Of course, if this woman truly harmed BlaqJaq, she would spend the last few heartbeats of her life earnestly regretting it. The female with the facial chevron managed to get a fist into BlaqJaq’s ribs. He, in turn, landed a grazing, but still effective, open-palmed blow across her jaw. It rotated her head a few degrees and let him drop a chop on her left forearm. Nickerson, still sitting on the floor, heard the bone fracture more clearly than anyone else in the pit. The woman snarled, tucked the wounded limb against herself, and resumed combat. The airtruck bounced and rocked some more, enough nearly to dislodge one of the cargo coffins from its moorings. The woman stumbled. BlaqJaq landed a solid blow, vaulted on her, caught the broken arm, and twisted it up behind her. She went limp and dropped as the pain rendered her unconscious. Nickerson nodded. It had never been his job to leave his targets alive, but he could appreciate the art with which BlaqJaq had prevailed over his opponent. At that moment, the intership speaker awoke. “So nicely done. Congratulate yourselves. For the both of you…this is where you get off.”

8

Eric Del Carlo

Chapter Two

The black market men bristled with weaponry. The airtruck hovered; BlaqJaq had felt the craft come to a pause. Nickerson stood. Twelve of the other passengers had retreated into a huddle at the aft of the cargo pit. The woman with the red tattoo flash-lacquered to her left cheek stayed in an unconscious heap on the floor. BlaqJaq, standing over her and betraying no fear, watched the marketeers approach. None of the rugged-looking lot appeared wealthy or even particularly well fed. “Who’s first?” “She cost me money.” The armed trio seemed to regard the pit’s occupants as payload, unworthy of acknowledgment. One slotted a key, and the metaplastic deck’s bay doors retracted. A dizzying view opened up, wisps of cloud and the impossibly broad spread of land below. BlaqJaq had lived his life in the undercity. He’d stolen up to the surface a few times, out of curiosity, but he could never have made it in the overcity without a palmchip. His birth outside the system made him just another discarded person living in the underground. But there he had survived, even thrived, using his natural physical talents to work as a streetmuscle, oftentimes to settle scores for people who couldn’t do it for themselves.

Blood in the Water

9

He had given up the only life he’d known to stay with Nickerson. He didn’t regret the decision, not at all. Not even now. One of the men prodded the female whom BlaqJaq had fought toward the open doors. He pushed with his boot, his features showing only annoyance. The woman flopped over then over again, never stirring; then she tumbled out of the ship. BlaqJaq watched her dwindle as she fell. What an amazing way to die, he thought, awed. He had never gone up in an air transport before. Would she wake up before she hit the ground? His heart still sped from the combat, but he could fight again. He meant to do just that if any of these rat-eaters tried to push him out as well. At the very least, he’d take one of them with him on the long fall. “This one made me money,” said one of the market men, eyeing BlaqJaq. “Only because you skipped this boat all over the sky,” another said contemptuously. BlaqJaq kept Nickerson in the corner of his eye. The older catjob male, he knew, still had that bag full of deadly tech tricks. Between them, they might be able to take out this trio. But no doubt this ’truck had other marketeers on board. “Don’t be a bad sport. Put us down,” this last the armed marketeer seemed to say to nobody present in the cargo hold. Almost immediately, though, the ship started to drop. BlaqJaq had to look away from the view of the landscape now rushing up at them; it made him feel like the one falling from this incredible height. A moment later, the craft settled on struts. Greenish, wavy fronds blanketed the ground that now lay only a meter or so below the open bay doors. That was grass, BlaqJaq realized. They’d traveled to somewhere far away from the city -- from any city. One of the men jabbed him with the maw of a weapon. BlaqJaq understood the implication, but he stood frozen. Recent events had already been fantastically disorienting. He’d never had experiences like these before in his young life. But he just couldn’t conceive of stepping off this ship into the natural wilds of this world.

10

Eric Del Carlo

Nickerson, treading softly, crossed the cargo pit to stand by BlaqJaq’s side. “That one thinks he’s going with this one,” a marketeer observed. “Who said he could?” “You saw when we were watching earlier. They’re mates.” “It would be generous of us to let them stay together.” Taunting talk. BlaqJaq had dealt with types in the undercity who imagined themselves unbeatable. More often than not, he’d convinced them otherwise. “Finish up back there. We’re not scheduled for this.” The disembodied voice that had spoken earlier sounded impatient now. Nickerson met BlaqJaq’s eyes, the look reassuring. BlaqJaq gave his lover a nod, and the two of them hopped down through the opening, landing on the soft, grassy ground. Nickerson gave his arm a tug. “Hurry.” Stooping, they scurried quickly out from under the airtruck, as if Nickerson worried that one of the men might impulsively use a weapon on them at the last second. The ship, pitted and old, rose while they still retreated. BlaqJaq narrowed his eyes against the hot roar. The struts withdrew, and the craft soared up and away into a crisply blue sky, an amazing sight. But, as he grew truly aware of his surroundings, he decided that this nearby scenery appeared even more fantastic. Vegetation -- he knew that word, vegetation -- massed everywhere around them. Not just grass underfoot, but bigger clumps of the greenery. It crawled and wound; it was wild and independent. It seemed to breathe on all sides, incredibly alive. No other people appeared anywhere in sight, no hint of anything made by humans. “Where is this?” he heard himself ask, not really expecting an answer, not guessing there could be an adequate one. His whole life, spent in rotting ’plastic and concrete tunnels…

Blood in the Water

11

“Half a continent from where we started,” Nickerson said. BlaqJaq didn’t know what sort of distance that meant. He gazed all around in the warm daytime, mesmerized by the sights, by a sky that wasn’t awash in fumes. He couldn’t believe the richness of the smells. The organic odor almost stung his nose, different from something rotting, more like the scent of fresh food, which BlaqJaq had experienced from time to time in his life. Before he fell hopelessly under the spell of the place, though, he turned to Nickerson and said very solemnly, “I’m sorry I got us thrown off that ride. It was me fighting with that bruiser that did it.” Nickerson shrugged. “It’s probably for the best.” “Say?” The older male still had his bag. He inventoried its contents. Offhandedly he said, “When I still lived on this planet -- when I was your age -- transports like that one were called shanghai-taxis.” Nickerson had a wealth of outdated terminology stored in his memory. BlaqJaq usually found the expressions funny. “What for?” “Because half the time the transporters would deliver their passengers into some form of slavery or other. Traveling without a chip is a very risky gamble.” Nickerson offered a smile. “So you likely did us a favor.” His cat eyes flashed away, surveying their environment. BlaqJaq smiled back. Despite the strangeness of these circumstances, he felt a kind of glee. “What now?” Nickerson’s nose crinkled. He pointed. “There’s running water just past that line of trees.” Unable to contain himself, BlaqJaq went scampering. A soft breeze moved the warm, free air over him, so different from the stale reek of the undercity. He passed through the trees -- trees, Nickerson had said -- and found the water beyond. It was indeed running,

12

Eric Del Carlo

tumbling along in a long, natural ditch, sparkling and gurgling, just there, with nobody watching over it. He felt suddenly clammy and grimy in his bodystocking. He missed his streetmuscle’s leathers, but those clothes would’ve drawn too much attention. A grin cutting his handsome features, he hopped from the mossy bank right into the flowing water. Waist deep, he sent up a foamy splash. Though he’d never before seen enough water in one place to even dunk his head, he submerged himself completely before coming back up with a happy roar. Nickerson, looking amused, stood on the bank. BlaqJaq grinned up at him then hunkered once more into the water. When he came up this time, he had his bodystocking bunched in one fist. The garment made a heavy slap when he tossed it onto a rock bordering the stream. His bare, broad chest gleamed wetly. Dark hair clung to his neck. Standing in the water, his pubic curls just visible, the rest of him remained enticingly hidden below the gushing surface. The current tugged, but his footing stayed sure. The two men locked gazes. The grin cooled on BlaqJaq’s face as his heart quickened and his skin started to tingle. Nickerson set down his bag and shed his clothes. He stepped down into the water, his body trim and muscled. BlaqJaq had never seen a better catjob physique, so sleek, so beautiful. Nickerson approached, and they embraced, flesh cool and slippery. The water’s clean scent refreshed. Lips brushed lips. Mouths parted. Tongues touched. BlaqJaq’s arms tightened around the older man’s taut torso. His hands roved the firm back, finding the stalk of the spine, sliding over slick skin. Nickerson moaned into BlaqJaq’s open mouth, breath hot and familiar. Nickerson pressed his sinewy body against BlaqJaq’s brawnier one. Nipples, hardened by temperature and excitement, rubbed together as the grinding kiss prolonged, broke,

Blood in the Water

13

renewed. Nickerson’s tongue slavered over BlaqJaq’s. Urgency shivered through BlaqJaq’s body. His cock, swelling below the water, met Nickerson’s organ, also rising. BlaqJaq grunted deep in his throat. Nickerson clutched at a taut hemisphere of his ass now, the fingers active, busy. They probed the tempting valley between, finding the body heat that the water couldn’t cool, grazing the sensitive ring of flesh waiting there, grazing it again, tenderly. Pleasure seethed through BlaqJaq from the contact. He shifted his hips, ground his ass brazenly onto those fingers. Nickerson settled one fingertip firmly on his hole. Pressure was applied. The stream’s insistent current seemed to increase the sensation. BlaqJaq felt the slow penetration, the fantastic stimulation that went with it. He broke their kiss, put back his head, and made a mewl of pleasure. He reached between them, beneath the flowing level of the water, and grabbed Nickerson’s rampant cock, as hard as metaplastic and as alive as anything could be. BlaqJaq felt his lover’s pulse there, the force of blood and life in him. Nickerson’s fingertip probed deeper, BlaqJaq’s ring now grasping his knuckle. Sharp chirping sounds rode on the soft winds. Eyes drifting open and shut and open again, BlaqJaq caught glimpses of small, fast shapes above the treetops. Birds. He didn’t know where he’d heard the word before. He let his head drop back down and looked deep into Nickerson’s eyes; those vertical pupils dilated with excitement. “I want you,” BlaqJaq said, “to fuck me.” The cock in his eager fist surged. Smoothly, as if all this had been neatly planned out ahead of time, Nickerson slid BlaqJaq’s body around in his embrace. Wet stones shifted under their naked soles as they planted their stances. Nickerson kept an arm hooked across BlaqJaq’s middle, body tight behind, trimly muscled thighs against the backs of BlaqJaq’s thick legs. Sharp nipples brushed his shoulder blades. He felt breath on his nape. Then came the positioning, the adjusting; finally, the cock intruded.

14

Eric Del Carlo

The sweet invasion flamed sensation through BlaqJaq, a bright excitement that sought out every part of his being. Nickerson’s cock penetrated deeper and deeper. Again BlaqJaq ground himself back onto the pressure, needing this intrusion, needing this part of his lover inside himself. Finally came the conquest of the last centimeters. BlaqJaq’s ass flattened against Nickerson’s pelvis, completing the filling. They held the pose a moment. Then the thrusts started. Such a wonder. BlaqJaq had had lovers. Things happened fast in the undercity. Violence could flare just about any time. Sex moved at the same speed. You got what you could, when you could. He had usually enjoyed those encounters with other males. But he’d never had the physical fun have such emotion to go with it. Never had he had a feeling like this, so perfectly matched with this older man. Never had there been… Well, love. This felt like love, didn’t it? Yes. “I…I…” BlaqJaq started to say I love you. But the words never left his mouth. He couldn’t just come out and say something like that, words he’d never said to anyone before. Could he? Nickerson plunged into BlaqJaq now, again and again, the two men standing belly to back in the waist-level stream, joined below the running water. Nickerson’s thrusts grew urgent, critical. BlaqJaq’s own cock remained hard, his balls stirring. The excitement of both men kept pace, stayed parallel, rising and rising. BlaqJaq found himself amazed that he didn’t even need to touch himself to keep his mounting arousal going, didn’t need Nickerson to reach around and handle him. When Nickerson’s liquid warmth sprayed him deep inside, it set off BlaqJaq’s own cum. His body, still circled by Nickerson’s arm, wrenched with pleasure. The orgasm struck powerfully. Nickerson held him impaled, grunting and shuddering. Spidery strands of BlaqJaq’s semen spilled away on the current. Finally, Nickerson’s forehead, slick with sweat, dropped against BlaqJaq’s shoulder. Panting breath slowed. After a time, they disengaged.

Blood in the Water

15

Both men dunked themselves languidly into the water, then climbed out to dry their bodies in the warm air. Cheerful, gazing up at the unbelievably large vault of the sky, BlaqJaq again murmured, “What now?” Silence answered. BlaqJaq finally glanced over, seeing Nickerson with eyes closed, head back. “That water’s flowing.” “It is.” “It’s flowing somewhere. Do you want to go see where, streetmuscle?” BlaqJaq’s gaze trailed slowly down his lover’s luscious, naked form. “Sure, catjob. Let’s go see.”

16

Eric Del Carlo

Chapter Three

BlaqJaq had evidently encountered difficulty in absorbing the concept of unclaimed territory. Nickerson sympathized. Certainly he recalled the adjustments forced on him when he himself had escaped the undercity half a lifetime ago. He had vivid memories also of those first instances of culture shock when his recruiters had taken him off-rock, to the grand vistas of other worlds. He had beheld wonders that had wrested his soul at the roots. Later, after his gen-stimming and intensive training, he had quite proudly policed those pristine colonies, to assure their safeguarding against malignant Earth-born influences. Now he had come back to this depraved planet. Circumstances had marooned him here, at least for the present. BlaqJaq, of course, kept him from brooding overmuch on his fate. The very sociopolitical system Nickerson had faithfully served for so many years had proven unconscionably corrupt. BlaqJaq, fresh from the badlands of the undercity, possessed refreshing honesty, honorability, and trustworthiness. Nickerson saw something of himself in the younger male, decidedly, but the strong attraction he felt came from another source.

Blood in the Water

17

BlaqJaq satisfied some heretofore unidentified emptiness within himself. Love broke down into just this most basic equation, after all. Still, actually speaking those fabled words --

I love you -- to BlaqJaq felt beyond his courage for the present. “All this…” BlaqJaq said, breath still hitching in wonder. “All this. Far as my eyes can see, you said. It’s nobody’s.” “It’s unincorporated land,” Nickerson supplied the subtle correction. The intelligent younger man would understand the distinction soon enough. Nickerson would assume the role of his teacher gladly. “That means…” “Officially all this is a holding -- property. But it’s essentially abandoned. Most of the continent is like this. Lands have gone wild. Overgrown. After the environmentally induced die-offs a couple of centuries ago --” “I know ’bout that. Waters rising, storms.” “After all of that, the people who survived mostly retreated to the cities. The bulk of Earth is like this. Reclaimed by nature.” And yet, thought Nickerson, it still managed to be a dangerous and dissolute world. BlaqJaq shook his head as the lush scenery drifted past. “Thinking about how crowded it is in the ’city. So many people, not enough food to go ’round. Then there’s all this.” He waved a hand at the tropical greenery flanking both banks of the waterway. The raft that the two men had assembled out of logs and vines somehow hung together. The stream had swelled slowly into a river. They traveled at a decent clip. But to where? Human-made sites and roadways, strung willy-nilly with populations, had almost certainly once dominated the landscape through which they passed. But nature, unchecked, had moved back in, breaking down structures and objects into their components, then to their original elements. Plentiful vegetation also infused the off-rock colonies, which, with their uncontaminated panoramas, existed in harmony with their native terrain. Of course,

18

Eric Del Carlo

those worlds had all undergone Earth-forming to render them habitable, so perhaps “native” didn’t pass muster as the proper term. The two of them had broken off a pair of long branches to punt their primitive watercraft along. Nickerson, resorting to his bag of weaponry, had hunted several rabbits -he thought they were rabbits, at least -- for food over the past few days. The river water looked and tasted clean enough to drink. They should manage to nourish themselves until their journey’s end. And what would that end be? Nickerson guessed that he had more concern about this question than BlaqJaq. The former streetmuscle remained preoccupied with the splendor of his new surroundings, but Nickerson wished for more definite information. These decidedly warm and moist conditions indicated a tropical climate. The vegetation seemed to conform to classically torrid forms. That shanghai-taxi had taken them southward. Estimating roughly, that would put them near the southern edge of this northern hemisphere continent, according to the amount of flight time. Luckily they hadn’t yet traveled out over the water, on their way to the southern continent, when the black marketeers had dumped them out. Again he felt the prickling of eyes on him, tugging him from this brooding state. BlaqJaq had left off his study of the enveloping wilderness for the moment. Stretched out comfortably on his side of the small raft, he regarded Nickerson. “Is there something you want to know?” Nickerson asked. The erstwhile undercity dweller nodded, his attractive face set into an intent cast. “What’s life like…up there?” It surprised a chuckle out of Nickerson. He’d told BlaqJaq about himself, what profession he had once practiced. “This isn’t interesting enough for you?” Nickerson swept a hand at the scenery, countering the kid’s question. Annoyance twisted BlaqJaq’s lips. “Not sayin’ that. Maybe I just want to know more.”

Blood in the Water

19

He indeed had intelligence. He possessed more than mere honed instinct or survival skills; he had a predisposition toward improving himself. Once more, these traits impressed Nickerson. His lover, a worthwhile individual, justified his love. “That smile for something?” BlaqJaq asked curtly, misinterpreting it, unamused. “No.” Nickerson sat up. In the late morning, the air had grown especially wet and warm. Last night they had pulled the raft up and slept on the riverbank. Tonight perhaps they should just sleep on board, let the craft continue drifting downriver on its own. “No,” Nickerson repeated. “I can tell you about life off-rock, if you’d like. But the view I had of it isn’t how most people experience it.” BlaqJaq listened raptly as Nickerson explained the particulars of living on the stations and colonies, of the social organization that governed the worldlets. The descriptions came easily. He remembered it all quite clearly, no need to embellish to make the extra-Earth environs sound more exotic and tempting. In terms of economic comfort and public safety, such places were indeed paradisiacal. Yet, hearing his own words as he spoke them, Nickerson felt the first inklings of doubt. He had covertly served to safeguard those meticulously engineered societies, true, just as true as his betrayal by his superiors. But, as he never had before, he found himself beginning to wonder if the worlds colonized by humans really possessed such social perfection. What sort of paradise, after all, would manufacture a killer like him in order to preserve itself? “It makes my head” -- Nickerson had paused, and BlaqJaq was struggling to articulate -“feel funny.” The dark-haired male shrugged sharply. “That’s not it. You know what I mean, though?” Nickerson smiled tenderly. “I understand. Yes. There’s nothing like hitting the black for the first time…”

20

Eric Del Carlo

As if he could see the panoramic void above the sun-brightened sky, BlaqJaq gazed upward. Nickerson’s tales of life off-world had put that sparkle of wonder in his eyes. “I’d like seeing it myself.” His voice was soft. Unexpected emotion tightened Nickerson’s throat. “And I’d like to take you up. Someday.” He’d had this impulse before, to deliver the younger man off this world, to show him all those marvels. BlaqJaq yelped a sudden laugh. It didn’t sound bitter to Nickerson’s ears. “Too bad we’ll never get this raft here airborne.” “Much less into orbit.” Nickerson too laughed. But the thought remained with him: someday, somehow, get the two of them off-planet… A few moments later, the log raft lurched beneath them. A stronger current had taken hold. Nickerson saw the river widening still further. Streams had fed it along the way. Now it foamed and flowed, bearing their little craft with greater force. He didn’t need any of his devices to know that they’d been moving generally southward these past days, perhaps making for the southern rim of the continent; perhaps this waterway drained into the ocean. BlaqJaq peered over the side at the rushing depths, his expression wry -- and a little fearful, Nickerson thought. “What do we do if this thing breaks apart on us?” Nickerson had tied the ropy vines himself and judged the craft reasonably secure. He said, “If it comes undone, we swim.” BlaqJaq, propped on an elbow, continued to gaze down into the water. “We what?” His tone sounded arch and -- yes -- somewhat anxious. A more demonstrative person than Nickerson would have slapped his own forehead at that moment. Of course. Who in the undercity knew how to swim? Nickerson had committed a stupid oversight. “Swim. It’s a way of staying afloat on water. It keeps people from drowning.”

Blood in the Water

21

“That’s when you die ’cause you can’t breathe water. That’s drowning. Right?” He had a right to be afraid, Nickerson thought. By now, these waters ran fairly deep, and the potent current would complicate any mishap that might occur. “That’s right,” he finally answered. BlaqJaq at last looked up. “Seeing that woman get dumped out that ship, seeing her fall so far -- that was a new way to die. Something I never seen before. Now…” He gave the gushing water another glance. “Lots can happen out here. Say?” Nickerson tried to adopt a reassuring expression, unsure if he succeeded. “We’ll be safe.” Whatever else, they weren’t engaged in the Hunt of Nine, where deadly professional mercenaries representing Earth’s criminal cartels had followed his trail. He and BlaqJaq had both survived that ordeal. They would outlive this adventure. Surely they would.

***** Yesterday, on land, Nickerson had skinned a rabbit and cooked its meat, employing the same blade he’d used to extract his own palmchip and a powered implement to ignite a fire. The two men chewed strips of that meat as evening purpled the sky and the trees grew dense and black. They did not put the raft up onto the bank. The food made both of them drowsy. BlaqJaq, languorous, wanted to make love, and once he’d broached the subject, so did Nickerson, but the precarious raft didn’t allow for such turbulent movements. Nickerson remained good-natured about it, though the awakened sexual impulse remained quite distracting. BlaqJaq’s gorgeous masculinity drew him. Nickerson had known fewer lovers in his lifetime than he might’ve preferred, but his career had precluded much, had obliged him to pass almost unseen through the worlds. Lying on his side of the lolling raft, head pressed atop a curled arm, he let sleep come for him through the carnal memories and vibrant anticipations surrounding thoughts of his young lover. But he did not sleep long.

22

Eric Del Carlo

His senses shifted into startling sharpness as he jolted upright. Hearing, smell, catjob eyes flashing wide and perceiving the night’s depths; these perceptions only confused him for the first instant of consciousness. Then his training kicked in, alerting him. He had control of his gen-stimmed faculties. Just because no one employed him as an assassin any longer didn’t mean that his abilities had become invalid. Another craft moved on this river. Nickerson reached across the raft and closed a hand over BlaqJaq’s ankle. He tugged sharply and felt the young male stir. Nickerson, ducking low again, scanned the starlightsilvered watercourse and saw the vessel -- an actual watercraft, not a raft like theirs -navigating downriver, moving under power, rapidly approaching their position. Homing in toward them? Nickerson, keen mind analyzing swiftly, didn’t believe so. This didn’t look like an attack track. The boat simply chugged along. BlaqJaq’s streetmuscle instincts appeared to take hold nearly as fast as Nickerson’s had, and once again the youth’s bearing and skills impressed Nickerson. BlaqJaq slid over onto his belly, one hand automatically grabbing one of the long branches they’d been using for punts. Nickerson had already pulled his flex-’plastic bag to him and reached inside, prepared to snatch whichever precious instrument would best suit this situation. Only a sprinkling of running lights were visible, not a large boat. Nickerson knew he could see in much more detail than BlaqJaq. The vessel appeared weathered, patched, without any official markings, vastly more ramshackle than the shanghai-taxi belonging to those black marketeers. Whoever handled the craft didn’t even bothering with the pretenses of propriety. This boat, Nickerson realized, belonged to this wilderness, to these unclaimed territories, which meant that those who ran it would have no interest in seeing either his or BlaqJaq’s nonexistent palmchips. These people operated as far off the grid as they did. Too bad that such a shared condition didn’t necessitate an automatic solidarity.

Blood in the Water

23

Nickerson’s fingers had wound themselves over the grip of his sleek pistol, a fingertip alighting delicately on the firing stud, programmed to respond only to his print. BlaqJaq threw him a fast glance but remained crouched at the ready. What if the kid, unable to swim, ended up in the water? Nickerson would rescue him, of course, but that would leave them both exposed, and if combat commenced… The boat’s engine thrummed louder in the nighttime. Abruptly it changed pitch; then the shabby vessel slowed. A moment later, it came nearly alongside the raft. A spotlight suddenly blazed on the deck, contracting Nickerson’s pupils to the narrowest slits. This served him an instant later when phosphorous gunfire poured down, cleaving the water, making for their little craft.

24

Eric Del Carlo

Chapter Four

BlaqJaq raised the length of wood. Muscles bunched at his shoulder then went fluid as he hurled the branch, javelin-like. A sharp crackle rewarded his good aim. After a spitting of sparks, the light on the boat’s deck went dead, but the glowing bullets were still stitching toward the raft. The water. He had to dive. For a flashing instant, he thought of that woman falling out through the airtruck’s bay doors; then he jumped. Amber light blazed while he still dove through the air, and somebody screamed, but it all vanished for him when he hit the water. It did feel like falling, like having nothing under you. Fear grabbed hold of BlaqJaq as he sank. He kept his breath in his lungs, but it already burned there. Blood rushed in his veins. The water, cool and as dark as death, engulfed him. Which way back up to the surface? And how would he get there? Wait! Light. Streaks of it, a little way off. Instinct warned him to stay away, however, and a heartbeat later, his brain put it together: the luminous bullets cutting through the water. Getting off the raft had left him safer, but still definitely in danger -- and not just from drowning.

Blood in the Water

25

From the bullets’ trajectories, though, he managed to orient himself. He’d stopped sinking so fast. The downward momentum from his plunge subsided. In fact, now, he felt himself rising. But too slowly. The air he held seared his lungs. His eyes, pounding in his skull, turned the watery darkness a frantic red. He approached the edge of blacking out. The river’s current had also taken a grip and pulled on him. BlaqJaq lashed with his arms, a panic impulse, but it had an effect. He moved himself. Controlling his motions and fighting off the reddening unconsciousness that came for him, he propelled himself toward the water’s surface, or so he hoped. He needed to breathe.

Needed. To. BREATHE. He spluttered as he broke through, gulping the air, so sweet, so fantastically fresh. But again, his momentum wasn’t unlimited; already he dunked back into the water. What had Nickerson said before? Swimming, a way of keeping afloat on the water. Too bad BlaqJaq didn’t know how to do it. But before his head slipped back beneath the river’s rushing surface, a strong arm caught him around the middle, a secure hold. The arm towed him. He let himself go limp, tired out from the ordeal, adrenaline fizzling in his body. A moment later, someone deliberately placed his hand on some solid outcropping. “Can you hold on?” BlaqJaq nodded, wet hair plastered across his eyes. Nickerson had asked the question. BlaqJaq hung on, keeping his head above the water, drawing in air. He heard another harsh rattle of gunfire, then other indistinct sounds. His ears were ringing. His feet had never touched the bottom of the river. He would’ve surely drowned if Nickerson hadn’t saved him. His lungs gradually ceased to ache. He finally swiped a hand across his eyes. He held on to a hook of some sort. It projected from the hull of the boat that had overtaken their little raft. That log vessel had disappeared. His kelp-canvas vest had vanished too. Even with his strength returning, BlaqJaq didn’t try to move from his position. He didn’t want to sink in

26

Eric Del Carlo

this water again. Already the experience had branded itself in his mind. It would make for a gut-curdling memory. Not in all his years as a streetmuscle, facing the dangers of the undercity, not even during Nickerson’s lethal Hunt of Nine, had he ever undergone anything quite like this. Not even when that outlandish vicious gen-stimmed creature had attacked him in that air duct. “Give me your hand.” Again, Nickerson. He reached down from the deck’s edge immediately above BlaqJaq’s perch. BlaqJaq was clutching the hook with both hands; it took an effort of will to let go. Nickerson hauled him up. He had that pistol of his in his other hand; the deadly amber light had come from the gun earlier. He tucked the spike into the waistband of his pants. His wet clothes molded his sleekly muscled shape, his light-colored hair spiky. Blood spattered the front of his shirt, visible in the faint starlight. “It’s not mine,” Nickerson said, evidently able to read the jolt of concern on BlaqJaq’s face. “What…happened?” Suddenly something seized in BlaqJaq’s gut. He turned and spewed up a mixture of bile and river water. He must’ve swallowed some when he was under. The brief convulsion left him shivering. “You should sit down.” “I’m okay.” BlaqJaq felt a strange prickling of shame. “BlaqJaq --” “What happened here? Who’s on this boat -- who was ?” Looking past Nickerson, he saw a body splayed, unmoving. A shoulder-mounted weapon, barrel still smoking, lay next to it. Worry etched Nickerson’s features, deep enough for BlaqJaq to see. Finally the older man said, “They’re smugglers. Or pirates. Or…I don’t know, precisely.” A note of disgust crept into his tone. “Maybe this is just the way people do business out here.”

Blood in the Water

27

BlaqJaq saw the spotlight he’d taken out. Shards of glass littered the deck. “How many were there?” Once again, he felt that trace of shame and this time identified it. Nickerson had had to fight alone. Once BlaqJaq had hit the water, he’d been useless. Worse than useless. Nickerson’d had to come rescue him. “Three,” Nickerson said. “One’s still alive. Unconscious. I’d better go secure him.” BlaqJaq watched him cross the deck, stepping over the splayed corpse. All sorts of nameless gear jumbled the small boat’s surface. The motor still idled. At a pulpit, controls winked and glowed. Another body lay crumpled nearby. Nickerson, seizing a length of something flexible, quickly tied up this person. BlaqJaq didn’t see a third body. Maybe it lay below, or Nickerson had already dumped it overboard. He spat, still tasting the bile in his throat. He picked up the gun from the deck, careful of its heated barrel. This had fired those glowing rounds into the water. The weapon’s heft felt good, like something capable of inflicting a lot of damage. He’d never used anything like it in his profession, but he felt sure he could handle the big spike. “I don’t think this was a deliberate attack.” BlaqJaq looked up from his study of the gun. Blood glinted on it. “Seemed like they meant to do what they did,” he observed. “Agreed. But I don’t think they knew we were there until they were on us. Then they panicked and just opened up on us. It was, at any rate, a sloppy assault. You did good, taking out their light. That threw them into chaos.” BlaqJaq’s jaw hardened. He dropped his eyes again, seeing the gun, seeing the carcass on the deck. A portion of its torso had been charred away. “Don’t gotta say that,” he muttered. Nickerson glided toward him, his steps almost soundless. A hand curled over BlaqJaq’s shoulder, the one that hadn’t been injured in that duct and had since healed. Fingers squeezed, the touch gentle, loving. “It’s true. You did your share.”

Eric Del Carlo

28

It meant, of course, that Nickerson knew. He understood the shame BlaqJaq felt, and he was trying to alleviate it. “I --” BlaqJaq’s voice abruptly choked. The hand stayed on his shoulder. Nickerson stepped nearer and put his lips to the younger man’s. It was a moment before BlaqJaq responded, then the kiss softened, deepened. Finally it broke. “Thanks,” BlaqJaq said. Something stirred on the deck. The person Nickerson had bound moaned raggedly and tried to roll into a sitting position. Still carrying the heavy gun, BlaqJaq followed Nickerson, who came to a halt, standing over their captive. “I don’t know you.” Graying stubble barbed the man’s jawline, his expression lax, eyes blinking and wandering. “Don’t know you at all.” A bruise swelled one side of his face. “Why did you attack us?” Nickerson’s tone was level, reasonable, but BlaqJaq heard the hardness underneath the words. The bound man seemed only now to fully realize his situation. Arms and legs struggled uselessly. “This isn’t right,” he commented. “Your cohorts are dead. If you don’t tell us what we want to know, you’ll be joining them.” One eye slitted shut with the bloating bruise. Through the other, the man looked past Nickerson, at BlaqJaq. “Is that your chopper?” he asked in a reproving tone. He meant the gun, BlaqJaq realized. He glanced at Nickerson. “What’s wrong with him?” he asked quietly. They had questioned a captive that they’d taken during the Hunt of Nine. Nickerson had needed information, and BlaqJaq, employing his talents as a streetmuscle, had extracted it for him. He wondered if he’d have to do that again. An odd smile quirked Nickerson’s mouth. “I think he’s drunk.” BlaqJaq peered closer at the man lying on the cluttered deck. He had a sharp smell about him, sweat mingled with something bitter. He still hadn’t managed to sit upright and continued to flop about pointlessly.

Blood in the Water

29

“This is not how it’s supposed to go,” the man said, overenunciating, as if this were something that desperately needed to be communicated. “What do we do with him?” BlaqJaq asked, the implication plain. Did Nickerson want him to bang on this man until he made sense? Nickerson lifted one shoulder a few centimeters then dropped it, a very economical shrug. “I don’t know that we need to do anything with him. I would venture that all three were drunk. Look at the state of this boat. And how slipshod that attack was. They’re just…cowboys.” “I am not that,” said the man on the deck. Nickerson ignored him. “We should check this boat out,” BlaqJaq said. The immediate shock of his experience in the water had faded. The blood-spattered gun cooled in his hands. What other equipment would they find on board? They left the drunk man where he lay and explored the craft, about ten meters from tip to tip. A short ladder led to the crowded hold belowdecks. Nickerson found a toggle that activated a light. The third body sprawled here, a chunky male near the foot of the ladder, his head turned at an unthinkable angle. BlaqJaq poked around at the cargo, a mishmash of gear and goods. Most of it looked castoff, semicorroded. “I’d say they were nothing more than salvagers, rather than pirates,” Nickerson said. “I can’t imagine anybody killing for this stuff.” BlaqJaq turned a thoughtful eye on the older male. “But…where were they taking it?” “That’s a question worth asking.” The two men climbed back on deck. The bound salvager had wormed over onto his side. His head rested atop a stray piece of greasy equipment with both eyes closed. Nickerson nudged the head with the toe of his shoe. “Ggggguh --” “Wake up.”

30

Eric Del Carlo

“Uhhhhhh…” Apparently the man had lost interest in any further conversation. BlaqJaq stepped past Nickerson, knelt, and jammed the mouth of his newly acquired weapon against the man’s stubbly cheek. He pressed it in until it ground against the salvager’s teeth. “This how you want to spend your last little bit alive?” BlaqJaq’s finger wrapped the trigger. He was aware of an urge to curl that finger tight, to open up on this fucker, to turn his head to slush. After all, this bunch had fired on him and Nickerson for no good reason. Because of these people, he’d ended up in the water, in the racing dark of the river, probably no more than a few panicky heartbeats away from drowning. The one eye was now totally swollen shut, but the other stood wide. The man appeared quite attentive. Nickerson asked, “What is your destination?” BlaqJaq reluctantly withdrew the gun barrel so their captive could speak. “We’re going to Carnival,” he said, again articulating carefully. It made no sense to BlaqJaq. Nickerson, just as puzzled, asked, “Carnival? What carnival?” The single eye merely gazed back, bewildered. Wondering aloud, BlaqJaq asked, “Carnival. Is that a place?” The drunken salvager looked incredulous, as though he’d suddenly found himself talking to idiots. It seemed obvious to BlaqJaq that something wasn’t coming across. “Carnival. Carnival.” The man seemed to be trying to gesture emphatically, even with his hands tied fast behind him. “Carnival. Where is it?” Nickerson asked, taking a new tack. “Down the river.” “How far?”

Blood in the Water

31

“To the end. Down…the river.” Annoyance flickered across Nickerson’s normally stoic face. “You get one last chance. Where were you and your confederates taking those goods?” BlaqJaq’s gun remained at the ready. The direness of the situation appeared to be sobering the man. Fear glinted in his one open eye. He said, “It’s Carnival time. We’re going there. Everybody goes.” It was closer to an answer, thought BlaqJaq. Nickerson was nodding. “Okay. Carnival’s an event. Where does it take place?” He was -- BlaqJaq was sure -- about to say down the river again, but the man caught himself. He swallowed. He eyed the maw of the gun barrel fearfully. Very clearly, he said, “It happens in New New Orleans.”

32

Eric Del Carlo

Chapter Five

“Just get a feel for it…there. Yes. That’s good.” Nickerson stood behind BlaqJaq’s enticingly brawny form, the younger man’s dark hair blowing in his face. BlaqJaq stood at the boat’s controls. Step by step, Nickerson had guided him through the operational mechanics. The vessel, a decidedly tumbledown affair with its engine in dubious repair, still functioned for the moment. Nickerson, in his life up among the colonies, had long since grown accustomed to a much more sophisticated breed of machine. Even so, this craft represented a mighty step up from their log raft. “Ease into it. Good. Good.” BlaqJaq absorbed the lessons. The boat no longer lurched under his guidance. They navigated downriver. They’d found no reason not to take this vessel. They had evicted its last living original owner -- presuming those three salvagers hadn’t stolen the boat from someone else -- leaving the man in the riverbank’s mud. Nickerson had meant simply to toss him into the water, still bound, but BlaqJaq had suggested untying him and putting him off on the ground. Had he wanted to make a randomly humane gesture? Or had BlaqJaq’s own experience in the water made him reluctant to visit a similar fate on another person?

Blood in the Water

33

Nickerson had thought it curious at the time. His many years as an assassin hadn’t allowed for any such mercies. The vessel had a certain shabby charm to it, he had to admit. BlaqJaq appeared quite taken with it. Even now, he let out a little bark of laughter as he maneuvered the boat along a bend in the river. The abutting greenery only grew more lush and tropical. The new day had brought an intense heat. The breeze stirred up by the vessel’s movement cooled the sweat that beaded on Nickerson’s face. “I like this!” BlaqJaq declared. Nickerson could see the grin stretching back toward the hinge of his jaw. “You’re doing good.” Infected by the younger male’s enthusiasm, Nickerson couldn’t resist planting a kiss on the side of his neck. BlaqJaq made a happy murmur. He leaned back into Nickerson, turned his head. Unable to resist the moist lips, Nickerson, craning a bit, set his mouth atop them for a slow and melting kiss. Beneath the ragged bodystocking, Nickerson could feel the dampness of BlaqJaq’s flesh, pressed back against him. One hand came off the controls. It groped behind, caught the swelling ridge in Nickerson’s trousers, and squeezed. A thrill of pleasure danced through Nickerson’s body. “Maybe we should park this thing,” BlaqJaq said as he broke their kiss. Nickerson reached past him to thumb a few buttons. “It’s got an autopilot.” Still, the kid should learn to drive the vessel himself. Anything might happen on this river. BlaqJaq turned about. He jammed his body up against Nickerson’s, the bulge of his own burgeoning hard-on rubbing on Nickerson’s crotch. Their mouths came together once more, passionately, tongues searching. Nickerson ground his lips on his lover’s. He slurped out the delectable taste from his mouth. Nickerson tugged at the ’stocking. Excitement trembled his hands. He peeled the tattered garment down BlaqJaq’s robustly built body, revealing the broad chest, the firm

34

Eric Del Carlo

abdomen, finally sliding the bodystocking over his hip bones, yanking it sharply to uncover the lusciously erect cock that sprang so eagerly into view. The breath left Nickerson’s lungs. The midday heat simmered in his head. He lowered his mouth onto the solid mound of BlaqJaq’s pectoral. His lips smeared over the sweat-slick skin, seeking and finding the swell of the nipple. He closed his teeth delicately over the little bud. BlaqJaq let out a pleasured moan. Nickerson sucked harder then shifted lower, lapping salty perspiration as he descended over rigid abdominal muscles. His knees found the boat’s deck. His mouth moved closer toward BlaqJaq’s waiting cock. With the point of his tongue, he precisely picked off the dot of milky liquid that had welled on the tip of the organ. The precum left a tang on his tongue, promising more lively flavors later on. Nickerson put his lips around the bulb of BlaqJaq’s cockhead. The younger man grunted. He braced his hands on either side of the open-air control booth. The ’stocking stretched between his muscled calves. Nickerson’s cheeks sank in around the cock as he took it into himself, centimeter by centimeter. His distended lips kept the shaft encased as the ring of his mouth descended. His tongue explored the pliable veins lining the shank. He savored the rich, sweaty taste of the flesh; he inhaled the succulent, primal scent as his nose slowly buried itself in BlaqJaq’s dark, wiry curls. His forehead butted gently against the tight belly. He had swallowed the cock to its hilt. BlaqJaq’s swollen knob was in Nickerson’s throat.

I have him, he thought with a charged wonder. I have him all. But he didn’t linger over this thought. He cradled BlaqJaq’s balls tenderly in one hand and set about blowing him with great zest. He slid his mouth back up to the sweet cockhead then dropped it again, taking the full length of the shaft with each new plunge. His lips stayed sealed around the cock, aiding the suction his busy mouth created.

Blood in the Water

35

Muscles stood out in relief on BlaqJaq’s legs, splayed on either side of Nickerson. Peripherally he could see fingers whitening where BlaqJaq’s hands gripped the control rostrum’s sides. He was now thrusting back with every accomplished lunge of Nickerson’s mouth. Sweat showered down on his head. He spared a glance upward and saw the young male whipping his damp hair back and forth, his becoming features tightening into a mask of agonized ecstasy. Soon he was humping helplessly against Nickerson’s mouth, cries of pleasure ratcheting louder and higher, fast approaching the final crisis point. Nickerson kept hold of his balls, feeling them stirring. Saliva drooled from a corner of his stuffed mouth, but he continued to suck BlaqJaq’s cock. A last yowl sounded from the kid. Then the warm, glorious load started jetting. Nickerson’s mouth was flooded with the cum, tangy and viscous. He swallowed, then swallowed more, grateful to have this part of his lover inside himself, to be -- literally -consuming this token of their love. When he slumped back on suddenly unreliable knees, Nickerson released BlaqJaq’s cock. He rocked back on his haunches, still dressed, his own cock needfully hard inside his pants. Wiping his mouth on the back of his hand, he looked up once more at the onetime streetmuscle, at his body glistening in the tropical sunlight. BlaqJaq, broad chest heaving as he caught his breath, smiled down dreamily. “Fantastic,” he murmured. “Now I want my taste of you.” The ragged bodystocking was still shackling his legs as he tried to kneel. BlaqJaq, with an annoyed and hurried grunt, paused to strip the garment off entirely. Naked, he put a hand to Nickerson’s chest and, grinning, shoved. The older man lay back on the sun-warmed deck. It popped where it was warped with a sound like a knot of wood bursting in a fire. Savoring the taste in his mouth, he let his eyelids droop as BlaqJaq further busied himself stripping off Nickerson’s pants. Bare below the waist, he reclined, face turned up into

36

Eric Del Carlo

the cascading sunlight. Nickerson’s eyes closed, and a red webwork appeared on the backs of his lids, shifting and pulsing. He felt the heftier male hunker between his legs, solid shoulders insistently pressing apart thighs. Nickerson raised his knees, giving his lover whatever admittance he sought. He felt slick lips daubing his balls. A tongue curled over the crinkly flesh, moistening, batting playfully. The stimulation tickled a laugh out of him, which hitched almost immediately as his pleasure heightened. BlaqJaq mouthed both his testicles at once now, making a soft suction. A single vein throbbed from red to pink on the back of Nickerson’s eyelid. His cock quivered, the swollen head hopping eagerly just below his navel. Eyes still shut, squeezed tightly now, he waited for his lover’s mouth to move up onto his needy shaft. Instead, there was a redistribution of weight -- the warped deck popped again -- and a snuffling and delving. BlaqJaq’s lips and tongue explored past Nickerson’s balls, into the rift of his ass. New excitement seizing him, he planted his heels and lifted his buttocks, allowing easier access. BlaqJaq set on his puckered hole. Nickerson trembled as his young lover found his sweet vulnerability. The tongue’s tip thrust out rigidly as it flicked across his cinched flesh. Warmth lapped him. Saliva dribbled in the valley formed by his taut ass, making for a delicious sensation. BlaqJaq’s tongue entered him, probing deeply. Nickerson’s knees shook as he held himself up for this encroachment. He heard the younger man’s eager slurping, heard the panting breaths of his thorough and enthusiastic rimming. Finally, Nickerson dropped his ass back to the deck. More shifting came. Still sightless, he heard a dreamy murmur, “Sweet ass…” Then BlaqJaq’s mouth fell, quite unceremoniously, down around Nickerson’s achingly tense shank. It bucked his entire body and jolted open his slit-pupil eyes, but he snapped them shut again, enjoying the tactile intensification that came from not using his eyesight. BlaqJaq had him in a ferocious oral grip. One hand settled on Nickerson’s spit-slick balls, the other busy somewhere else, probably propping up BlaqJaq. Wet, encircling lips rushed down the full

Blood in the Water

37

length of Nickerson’s cock, bringing the heat of an avid mouth and the nimbleness of a skilled tongue. Pleasure hammered at him, with every furious downward plunge of the kid’s mouth, no niceties offered, none expected. Nickerson, already overcharged from the balls sucking and rimjob, wanted the blowjob just this fast and fierce, and BlaqJaq, sexual instincts calibrated to his own, sensed his needs. That in itself made Nickerson joyful. Never had he had a lover so attuned to him. In his life, he’d never possessed the luxury of time for a true relationship, for learning another man’s flesh and spirit. The ring of BlaqJaq’s enclosing lips, when Nickerson finally did open his eyes and lift his head, was a blur. He’d only wanted to see himself jet into his lover’s mouth, but of course BlaqJaq didn’t relinquish the organ as the final pleasure struck and his spurts released; and so Nickerson was denied the sight of his cum coating the young male’s tongue and pouring into his throat. The denial did little to spoil the experience. Orgasmic bliss wrenched Nickerson’s body. His ass lifted instinctively off the deck once again, jamming his unloading cock as deep into the willing orifice as possible. When the final jarring gush was done, his muscles untensed, one by one, and he found himself spread slackly on the boat’s softly droning deck. BlaqJaq laid his more muscular body down alongside Nickerson’s. Oily lips brushed Nickerson’s cheek, where a shadow of stubble grew. He smiled. He thought that the right moment might finally have arrived, when he could softly murmur the words. I love you. Instead, lethargy overcoming him, he closed his eyes again. An arm flopped across his chest. Sleep came buzzing over him, and he lost himself among the soft whirs, languid and happy.

***** That arm left an uppercase L of sweat across his chest as he started to his feet, only fully waking when he found himself standing at the boat’s controls. His flex-’plastic bag of weaponry was at his feet, where he’d cached it. The sun had moved some distance, but the air remained a buttery weight.

38

Eric Del Carlo

“Celebrating early, eh, no pants?” The salvage boat chugged down the river, the autopilot keeping an unimaginative but stable course. The water had grown wider and muddier. Another craft, smaller and in better repair, had come alongside. Its style appeared several decades old, and its lack of license markings asserted that it belonged no more to the world of palmchips and officialdom than this vessel did. “BlaqJaq, wake up.” Nickerson heard the startled grunt, but didn’t turn to see the former streetmuscle rise to his feet. He kept the other craft in sight. It held two occupants, a male and a female, and couldn’t conceal any others. Neither of the pair had a weapon in hand. Nickerson didn’t reach into his bag. “Ho! There’s a bigger one. Hello, all naked. Some celebrating you two’re having!” The woman spoke now; the man had hollered before. Both appeared tanned, jovial, and looked perfectly at ease aboard their vessel, which appeared quite lived-in. Did a subculture dwell on this river? Pirates and salvagers and waterborne vagabonds? BlaqJaq had stepped to the rail, making no effort to hide his nudity. That automatic gun he seemed so fond of lay on the deck one meter to his right. Nickerson felt quite sure BlaqJaq knew precisely where it rested, and how many seconds it would take to snatch it up and open fire on the other craft. The new boat kept pace, matching the speed of this larger boat. Waves slapped back and forth between their hulls. If these two people recognized this vessel, they showed no sign. “Where you bound?” asked the man after a moment’s pause. Plainly they expected some sort of similarly cheerful response to their friendly overtures. Nickerson decided to give them one. In as chipper a tone as he could summon, he said, “We’re going to Carnival.”

Blood in the Water

39

It produced twin howls of exuberance from the couple -- and from their manner, how they stood and casually touched, these two certainly did seem to be a couple. BlaqJaq, glancing over, gave Nickerson a wry look. Who are these two, really? he might’ve asked aloud. Nickerson returned a short tilt of his head, as if to say, We’ll see. “Carnival! Yeah. Great.” The man sported a beard, a hairless, bronzed pate, and a short and thickset body. The woman stood taller, as stout, with rings gleaming in her earlobes and flashing on her fingers. She suddenly stooped. Nickerson checked himself before diving for his pistol. BlaqJaq too let her rise before grabbing his weapon. Both men eased their battle readiness slightly when the woman held aloft a bottle swirling with some rich brown liquid. “Maybe we trade, yeah? Want some drink? We could use a few supplies, and you look like the ones to haggle with…”

40

Eric Del Carlo

Chapter Six

The autopilot couldn’t cope with the thickened, waterborne traffic, and BlaqJaq was determined to prove himself better than the self-operating gear. So far, so good. His threadbare bodystocking had become suffocating. With the aid of Nickerson’s blade, he’d lopped off sleeves and leggings, and now his body could breathe. Sunlight had broiled his exposed skin, pale from a lifetime in the undercity. Nickerson found some ointment on board and slathered relief over his red, sensitive flesh. He liked the grumbles and groanings of the boat. He liked how his least touch of the controls affected the vessel. He felt connected to the great lumbering machine, a fresh experience for him. Certainly no vehicles existed to operate in the tight maze of his home ’city. This seemed, to him, vastly sophisticated technology, even as he recognized the knocked-together and shoddy nature of this craft. Nickerson saw to some quick repair or other on the deck, within sight of BlaqJaq. He smiled secretly at the catjob man as he went efficiently about his task. This boat must seem much less impressive to him, what with all the wonders he’d seen up there. Nickerson’s tales of the off-rock colonies had captivated BlaqJaq. Those places sounded infinitely more wondrous than the overcity they’d passed through so briefly, after making their escape out of

Blood in the Water

41

the underworld through that sewer grate. BlaqJaq didn’t believe his lover had embellished his stories at all. BlaqJaq, one day, would love to see it all for himself. A horn brayed. Vessels jostled, a dozen nearby and more behind and ahead. Muddy spray created short-lived rainbows in the bright daylight. The river yawned wide, but still a lot of hull-bumping and good- and not-so-good-natured jockeying for position occurred. The maneuvering seemed pointless. The current bore everybody downriver, even the unpowered crafts, even those not much better than that log raft he and Nickerson had ridden on to start with. BlaqJaq worked his controls. A cup, its contents sloshing, stood in its holder by the blinking panel. He lifted it for a stinging sip. He still hadn’t decided if he liked the stuff, but it apparently served as a valuable trade good on this river. Over the past couple days, they’d done quite a bit of bartering with other vessels. Their boat had a lot of tradable wares in its hold, they’d discovered, mostly scavenged mechanical parts for which people willingly gave up food and water. And booze. Nickerson had handled the trades. Though he lacked a certain personable touch, he seemed deft at these exchanges once he’d figured out what he called the “mercantile parameters.” One of the items they’d taken aboard with that first swap was a bottle of whiskey. Or so the stout woman with all the rings had called it. Nickerson, later, giving it a sniff, murmured disdainfully, “It’s not any brand I’m familiar with.” BlaqJaq hadn’t known what that meant and, by now, had decided he didn’t care. The booze softened up his mind and body, just a little, just enough to take away the lingering ache of sunburn and keep him interested in standing here at the controls hour after hour. You could find lots of ways to get your brain bent in the undercity, and lots of folk there spent their time doing nothing but that, but not BlaqJaq. He’d practiced a profession, that of a streetmuscle, and he’d needed his head clean and clear.

42

Eric Del Carlo

But, he mused with the cup rising for another swallow, he didn’t work as a streetmuscle anymore. The dark brown, fumy liquid washed that thought under. His gun stood propped by his feet. He’d found more bullets for the big spike’s magazine, and Nickerson had showed him how to load the weapon. He maneuvered in the traffic. Tributaries feeding into this river continued to disgorge a steady stream of vessels. Their craft appeared bigger than most, but that didn’t keep some of the littler ones from whipping back and forth across his way. He enjoyed meeting the challenges. This felt like something of a sport to him. “Do you want me to spot you?” BlaqJaq glanced aside. His head felt slightly buoyant. “You want a turn?” “Not especially. By now you can probably run this tub better than I could.” Nickerson’s smile seemed meant to reassure. Looking past the former assassin’s shoulder, BlaqJaq saw the dead, mounted spotlight, its glass broken out, the only contribution he’d made to the taking of this vessel from those gun-happy salvagers. That fact still rankled him. But Nickerson, obviously, didn’t mean to remind him of that. “I’m handling it,” BlaqJaq said and heard himself overstressing the words. “As I just noted.” “Sorry.” Curiosity put an indentation between Nickerson’s brows. “For what?” BlaqJaq had been apologizing for his tone, which evidently had gone unheard. Instead he said, “For wallowin’ in the water that night while you had to deal with everything.” “That’s nonsense.” “It’s not --” “It is.”

Blood in the Water

43

BlaqJaq blinked. He realized he’d nearly launched into a self-disparaging tirade about his conduct on that night, realized further the uselessness of that. The incident had passed. Meeting Nickerson’s concerned gaze, he said, “I want to know how you swim. Teach me that.” The older man nodded. The sun had deepened his color as well. Earth’s exposure must be more intense than on the other worldlets. “I can do that. When we get where we’re going. Are you drunk?” The question struck BlaqJaq as thoroughly amusing. He giggled. “New New Orleans,” he said, then louder, proclaiming it, “Carnival!” “Carnival! Carnival!” Those on nearby vessels took it up, bellowed across the wide river’s breadth, a ragged chorus, maybe something like a war cry. Everyone on this waterway apparently had the same destination. Carnival came but once a year, so the two men had learned. And people could only celebrate it in the city of New New Orleans, at this river’s end. Nickerson went back to work. BlaqJaq lifted the whiskey cup to his lips and kept their boat bearing steadily downriver through the devilish, wringing heat.

***** A day later, the flow of water churned. Rock outcroppings presented themselves, and the river dropped in gradual but inevitably jarring stages. The many vessels navigated these gradations carefully. BlaqJaq guided their boat painstakingly, using every bit of ability he’d accrued these past days. “It was seismic activity,” Nickerson, gripping a post by the control stall, was saying, “centuries ago. When the climate was going crazy, this region was hit by earthquakes. Injury to insult.” The landscape did indeed look rather fractured. “It dropped the land level just as the seas were rising.”

44

Eric Del Carlo

BlaqJaq had first thought that Nickerson had stationed himself so close to take the controls if things should go awry. But he was wrong; the older male had confidence in his talents. He surely kept near in case the boat flipped over on one of these white-foaming switchbacks. The notion of falling overboard into these violent waters brought a chill to BlaqJaq’s gut despite the day’s temperature. He kept at it, and the still-growing caravan made its way down the river, toward a vicinity that eventually leveled, then broadened dramatically. “Delta,” Nickerson commented. BlaqJaq merely nodded, surveying this new territory. The water fanned out wide, bordered by marshy land, into which smaller individual watercourses searched fingerlike. There was little current here, and the water wore a blazing metallic sheen of minerals. “Where’s the city?” BlaqJaq idled the engine. Nickerson too scanned the terrain, lips pursing. “I don’t think it’ll be a city like anything you’ve been expecting. Or I’ve been either. This is still off the grid. That’s good for us. Just follow the other boats.” The vessels spilled out into the delta, with much celebratory commotion and more rowdy jostling. A weird sense of community had sprung up, BlaqJaq realized fully only now. Folk they’d done trades with the past few days waved as they passed the salvage boat, calling out vulgar greetings. BlaqJaq grinned back. He turned the drudging craft in the collective direction of the others. Underfoot, the deck rumbled. Nickerson had done a lot to tidy it up. “Don’t sound right,” BlaqJaq said, hands easy on the controls. “Hear that? That…” He tried humming the odd note that had crept into the laboring engine’s growl. “I’ll have a look.” BlaqJaq glanced behind, but Nickerson had already gone belowdecks. He’d made several patch-up repairs since they’d commandeered -- commandeered was another of Nickerson’s words; it meant stolen -- this boat. The engine qualified as a barely functioning

Blood in the Water

45

assortment of machinery, according to the fair-haired man. But he had hopes of keeping it going until their journey’s end. Then, of course, the question became: What would happen to them in New New Orleans? Before, BlaqJaq had only been worried about -- and enthralled by -- their jaunt down the river. Soon they would have a whole new set of circumstances with which to deal. The vessels fell into a surprisingly orderly single file as they slipped into the various narrow waterways that cut through the swampy land abutting the delta. Here mossy greenery ran riot over everything. Birds and bugs flitted aimlessly across the bow. A rich stink of decay and life filled the air. Sweat saturated the remains of BlaqJaq’s bodystocking. It felt as if his flesh were oozing with the sweltering heat. Here and there, ramshackle structures appeared on the random humps of semisolid land. The lean-tos were made of what looked like castoff sheets of metaplastic and other materials. Hovels. This passed for the city to which they all traveled? Apparently not. The line of watercraft nudged carefully onward, mindful of the grimy banks and the moss-dripping trees. BlaqJaq scraped the hull on a lazily curling bend but pulled the boat out with a forceful jog. He concentrated. The engine was still making that funny sound. Finally, as a low-dangling gnarled branch splashed its damp mat of leaves over the deck to the side of the open-air control booth, BlaqJaq saw where they were going. He pushed clammy strands of dark hair off his face. His eyes widened. He sucked in a breath. “Nicker --” “I’m here.” BlaqJaq started. On catjob-quiet feet, the other man had come up on him. Glancing sidelong, BlaqJaq murmured, “What you think?” “I think it’s New New Orleans,” Nickerson said, tone hushed. “Now that I consider it…what else could this place have been?”

46

Eric Del Carlo

The view broadened as their boat slid free of the winding channel. Ahead lay another ample body of water. This one stretched away until it touched the sky. An ocean? The water seemed so tranquil. It also looked clearer, with a restful emerald veneer to it. Islands appeared on the wide water. Neither more marshy land, nor boats, again they’d come upon human-made structures, these afloat on the water. They looked a lot like the tumbledown dwellings BlaqJaq had seen earlier. As he navigated out among them, they bobbed visibly, though they stayed moored to their positions. The structures had platforms attached, with other vessels hitched to them. The water brimmed with crafts on the move, wakes crisscrossing, horns blaring. It appeared, to BlaqJaq, a more fantastic sight than the overcity, even with its soaring black towers and a sky swarming with aircars. This place, this floating city, seemed like something totally outside the scope of his imagination, itself pretty formidable. The slapdash structures appeared strangely durable, as if, despite their construction, they’d stood some long time and would go right on abiding. Festive pastel paint coated the slabs of ’plastic and metal that made up the walls, the colors recklessly eye-catching. Over the labored drone of the boat’s engine BlaqJaq thought he heard…music? Yes, music as untamed as the colors giving gusto to this city atop the water. It echoed out over the water as the brutal sun finally slid away, out of the sky. Lights already burned. BlaqJaq slowed the salvage boat. He drew in the air, tasting a tang of salt. His flesh tingled. This place felt…alive. “So, what do we do here?” A grin pulled at his face before the question left his mouth. A small craft -- it looked like the battered shell of a two-person aircar with an outboard engine affixed -- streaked past. Someone aboard held aloft a bottle sloshing with a red liquid and howled exuberantly, “Happy Carnival!” Nickerson’s cat eyes tracked the vessel. A smile finally touched his lips. He said, “I guess we celebrate Carnival.”

Blood in the Water

47

Chapter Seven

Once, on a moon that was still being Earth-formed for formal habitation, Nickerson had seen a cyclonic storm agitating the landscape. It was an anomaly, one the engineers had assured, a rare but inevitable repercussion of rewiring a worldlet’s entire native atmosphere. That storm had picked up a hunk of vegetation -- a tree already introduced to the environment -- and had whipped it wildly about, back and forth, tossing it away and snatching it back up in the manner of a cat playing with its prey. Nickerson, at this moment, felt something like that poor uprooted tree. And yet this was…well…fun, wasn’t it? Their arrival in the city had proven a busy one. New New Orleans covered some aquatic area, its structures strewn about with deceptive randomness. Only after cruising slowly about had they discovered the districts, residential and commercial, just as in other Earth cities. They’d come upon an artificial atoll, a wide horseshoe of scrap walls and docks, where they could safely moor the boat they’d commandeered. BlaqJaq, for some reason, found that term amusing; fair enough, since some of the kid’s undercity jargon sounded just as comical to Nickerson.

48

Eric Del Carlo

A portion of their salvaged goods paid for the moorage, Nickerson happily discovered. In fact, they’d traded more merchandise for what passed as local money -- stamped metallic chits. Nickerson had asked the man who operated the moorage atoll what the currency was good for. “Food, drink, whores, beds,” he rattled off on callused fingers. He also assured, “Nobody fuck wit’ y’r can,” pointing out the guards on the walls who watched over the passel of berthed vessels. They’d locked down the boat as best they could. BlaqJaq, after some deliberation, had left his adopted gun aboard. No one else they’d seen was so conspicuously armed. Nickerson, however, had brought along his bag of weaponry. It might be possible to recharge a few items. Electric light burned in many of these floating structures, which had aging solar sheets blanketing their roofs. One got around the city by quite simple means: one hitched. It surprised Nickerson how readily this worked. One flagged a passing craft and went wherever its occupants happened to go. Thus he and BlaqJaq, after a few jaunts through the colorful, lighted network of the city, found themselves delivered to an eatery. The chits bought the two men a meal of broiled seafood at a table with proper cutlery. It all seemed vastly improbable to Nickerson. The rather crowded establishment operated like a typical restaurant. It had waiters and savory food, quite skillfully prepared. “Fantastic,” BlaqJaq said of the meal, or perhaps it was a comment on the eatery’s operations. Certainly to a person newly emerged from the undercity, this restaurant must be a wonder. Nickerson remembered his own days living beneath the surface. He recalled still some of the things he’d eaten that had passed as food. Afterward, standing on the dock outside, Nickerson had stretched languorously. The metaplastic planks creaked underfoot. The whole structure swayed slightly. On the water, the other buildings looked like gently bobbing lanterns. “I can’t believe this place,” BlaqJaq said, a grin chopping his handsome face.

Blood in the Water

49

Nickerson gestured, but it conveyed nothing. “Yes,” he finally said, feeling some part of the younger man’s excitement. “Let’s go get some drinks.” “All right,” Nickerson said, raising a hand at a passing vessel. Now, here inside a garish, noisy music hall, the press of bodies swept them forward and supplied an endless, sweaty heat. Nickerson had hold of BlaqJaq’s hand, for fear of losing him in the giddy swirl of the lively place. Twice Nickerson felt anonymous, groping hands on his person. He kept his flex-’plastic bag tight against himself and batted off anybody probing his pocket for chits. Music scoured the air, a great blaring wreck of rhythm and melody, poured out with such zeal that he couldn’t distinguish one note from another or tell what sorts of wrangled instruments produced such sounds. Glimpses past bobbing heads and flailing limbs revealed musicians on a stage. Patrons danced and milled. BlaqJaq beat a path through. Nickerson blinked, dizzy, when they reached the far side of the crowd. The cavernous hall, contained by a building riding atop pontoons, had walls painted a fervent yellow that threw back the blazing lamplight. “She wants chits!” BlaqJaq had to yell against Nickerson’s ear. A woman, beleaguered but not impatient, waited until the stamped chits were on the bartop; then she put down a pair of drinks. BlaqJaq snatched his up immediately, but Nickerson caught his arm and tapped the glasses’ metaceramic brims together. He would’ve proposed a toast, but BlaqJaq was gazing at him perplexedly, not recognizing the custom -naturally -- and besides, Nickerson would’ve had to shout the salute. So, after giving the drink a dubious sniff, he downed a tentative swallow. He had expected the fiery stuff to be even cruder than what they’d traded for on the river. He’d long ago grown more accustomed to cordials and aperitifs, to the finer luxuries available among the colonies. This place definitely wasn’t off-rock, he thought as he put

50

Eric Del Carlo

down another swallow, and he had no real idea how he might ever get himself off-planet again. Without a palmchip, it would prove virtually impossible. Here, along the bar, with the crowd less thick and frenetic, he could see the people doing their dancing. He also had a better view of the stage. The musicians, something like half a dozen, evidently gave it their all -- drums pounded; strings raked; brass contrivances blown through with desperate lungfuls of air. They flung sweat. They growled and yowled lyrics, all of it frantically festive, and now Nickerson could discern the musical patterns, could appreciate how swift and deft the passages sounded. He couldn’t guess at the type of music, but it felt decadent, archaic, vivacious. When it all came crashing to a climax a moment later, a roar of appreciation went up from the crowd, loud enough to make his eardrums quiver. BlaqJaq, seeing others applaud, put down his glass and gamely smacked his palms together, over and over. Nickerson handed over chits to the younger man and said, “I’m going to find out what we’re celebrating.” The curiosity nagged at him gently, a minor concern. The musicians had taken a break as the crowd regrouped itself. He circulated out into it, among sweat-wet bodies, some half naked. Many of these people appeared drunk, the celebratory mood intense, almost insistent. “Excuse me, what is Carnival?” It got him odd looks and some braying laughter, but finally someone -- a woman, whose sheer top boldly outlined her large breasts -- said, “Why, et’s win way find out who the new Mardis are, dahling.” Her accent was thick and lazy, and it made Nickerson think, strangely, of rich, syrupy sauce dribbled over some dessert. “What are the Mardis?” A brow arched over a slightly unfocused eye. She smelled of alcohol. “The Mardis are…” She gestured meaninglessly. Plainly she considered this common knowledge. “The Mardis do…whatever they want,” she settled on finally.

Blood in the Water

51

It didn’t help much. “When do we find out who the new Mardis are?” “Why, during the Cahnival, silly. Three days from now.” Her face twisted with a leer. She’d lived at least as many years as he had, likely more, and those years had cost her, it looked like. She stepped closer to him and set hands on his shoulders. “Say now…what’s your name, dahling?” He wriggled free with a polite but slightly pained smile. He could question others and probably eventually arrive at a full understanding of this festival, but it suddenly seemed unimportant. Local customs embodied their own logic. Even the colonies had absorbed rituals over the years, though certainly none as raucous as this was. He started back toward the bar, which was now busy with clamoring patrons. Everyone fueling up before the band came back, he judged ruefully. He was feeling a little muzzy himself from the one drink he’d -Senses jumped into extreme alert, perhaps half a heartbeat behind the gunshot that splintered the hall’s frothy ambience. Fear crossed the oversized room. Nickerson had already performed a neat tuck and roll, coming around in the direction from which the shot had rung, his hand in his bag, pistol gripped and ready to draw. First, though: assess. The crowd, of course, was slower to respond -- and more riotous about it. A round of screaming commenced, followed by violent movement. Nickerson, crouched with feet planted, managed to stay upright as people scattered. There was no consensus about where to go, however, and a lot of running in circles ensued, upsetting furniture that he hadn’t seen earlier. Swiftly he pulled a small table to him, hunkering behind it. Was BlaqJaq all right? Had BlaqJaq gotten shot? Worry burned in him, but two quick looks behind didn’t show him anything. Surely the kid would’ve taken cover. He still had his streetmuscle’s instincts. The concern stayed with Nickerson, nonetheless. The bullet, fired from a compression gun by the sound, hadn’t killed anyone. At least, no corpse lay in view on the floor of the

52

Eric Del Carlo

music hall after everyone had finished scattering. Many of the people now cowered along the walls or had vaulted the bar. He could finally get a clear look. No one had actually fled the establishment, no doubt because of the five figures standing just inside the entrance, one of whom held aloft a big black smoking pistol and sported a grin of delighted malevolence. Even at a distance, his teeth appeared prominent, pronounced, coming to unnatural points. Dogjob, Nickerson thought immediately, a less refined form of gen-stimming, one that had reached its peak as a fad before his birth. The enrichment had once had military applications, but better means had come along, namely the blending of feline capabilities with human. The canine enhancements had produced aggressive, blunt, and -- frankly -- dogged personnel, but the types of armies they would once have populated so effectively no longer existed. Earth, a degraded ball of mud in Nickerson’s view, at least didn’t wage global war on itself anymore. As the dogjob male slowly lowered the pistol and took a first swaggering step forward, Nickerson judged him drunk. Not the usual state of smeary ineptitude, such as he himself might achieve with a few more cocktails; this looked instead like the intoxication of the professional drinker, where senses and mannerisms only took on a preternatural acuity, no matter what zombie level of alcohol he consumed. Probably that gen-stimmed metabolism had partial responsibility as well. From the cover of the table lying on its side, Nickerson watched the male advance, followed by four people plainly acting as his disciples. About BlaqJaq’s age, he sported dusky flesh and belligerent muscles. His every move seemed calculated to proclaim his supremacy. He exuded an imperious fearlessness as he sauntered across the floor he’d cleared so decisively with the gunshot. He appeared pleased with the results. The other four actually kept several paces behind, as if royal retainers. Three males, one female, of various ages but none older than, say, twenty-five. Nickerson saw no obvious weapons on their persons. They all seemed to share some part of their dogjob leader’s haughtiness, sneering at the huddling patrons of the music hall.

Blood in the Water

53

The group came nearer. Deliberately Nickerson took his finger off the trigger stud of his sleek handgun; he withdrew his hand from the bag, empty. The canine-enriched male saw him then. His gaze lingered, and for one finely etched instant came the possibility that the smoking black pistol would rise suddenly, but Nickerson had judged correctly, and sizable teeth merely bared again. “Careful, kitty. I might chase you up a tree.” A -- literal -- bark of laughter followed. Nickerson’s cat-eyed gaze remained impassive. The dogjob and his entourage passed by. He watched as the group crossed the hall leisurely. He nearly started when he at last picked out BlaqJaq, squatting at the far end of the bar among a clutch of other cringing figures. The former streetmuscle gave him the briefest of reassuring nods, and relief, hot as a fever, spread through Nickerson’s body. No one spoke, though here and there an individual whimpered quietly. The dog-man held the dozens and dozens of people so completely in thrall. Quite a sight. Nickerson decided that this male and his group had come here looking for something -- for someone. He took his time, increasing the tension with every strutting step he took and relishing that intensifying uneasiness. They feared this man, and this man liked that fear. When he started toward the end of the bar where BlaqJaq crouched, Nickerson again dipped into his bag. But the dogjob had halted. With his back to Nickerson, a sneer visibly knotted the hinge of his reconstructed, outsized jaw. The man he loomed over had sparse, whitening hair, a drawn face. He knelt on the floor, but as Nickerson watched, he stood on quivering legs, head bowed. The dogjob turned about, and the group escorted the meek older man back across the dance floor and out of the hall. From beyond the entrance, a moment later, Nickerson heard an engine catch, then a droning that quickly faded away. He went jogging over to BlaqJaq. “Fine, I’m fine. Spilled my drink, though.”

Eric Del Carlo

54

Nickerson fought off an urge to embrace the younger male. If he did, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to let go for some while. “Well, let’s see if we can get you another.” A number of people were abandoning the place. Others, shaken, were trying to procure drinks for themselves. Eventually BlaqJaq traded chits for two new glasses. Nickerson, leaning over the top of the bar, asked the woman, “Who were they?” She blinked rapidly. “My gawd, you tourists really don’t know anything…” Her face had paled. She shook herself. In a more decisive tone, she said, “That was Fang, of course. He --” “He and the others are the Mardis,” Nickerson blurted, realizing. The Mardis do

whatever they want. He wondered if they had any responsibilities or duties, if they adhered to any kind of behavioral code. In three days, new Mardis would be chosen. How would that be done, exactly? Absently he took a swallow from his glass. For the first time since arriving in New New Orleans, he found he had more than just a passing interest in Carnival.

Blood in the Water

55

Chapter Eight

There were other places in the crazy floating city to go drinking, and as the two men hopped randomly, grabbing rides as they came, they traded more chits for more booze. BlaqJaq, evidently enjoying the stuff more than Nickerson, drank more. And now he was feeling it. Nickerson shrugged at the question the younger man had just asked. “It works because all these people agree it does.” BlaqJaq, looking at the stamped chit in his hand, said, “I know about palmchips. Even with never having one. Money is added up and taken away, and it’s all recorded. Electronically. But…” The speck of metal fascinated him. “It’s an improbable economy, I agree.” Nickerson’s drink, barely touched, sat on the low table between them in the small and open-air place. Squatting to one side, a plump man sawed on something made of taut, glittery strings that cut soft, sad sounds through the night. “Alcohol is a part of this economy. There are crude distilleries -- those lean-tos we saw -- on those last swampy pieces of land we passed before arriving here. I asked. They supply this city.”

Eric Del Carlo

56

BlaqJaq had the feeling it had gotten quite late. Overhead, stars shone through the cloud cover. The sight of them didn’t so much awe him as the fact that no ceiling hung one meter over his head. He lifted his own glass but had to pause for a yawn that stretched his mouth. “We could get back to the boat,” Nickerson suggested. “Or find someplace else to bunk.” “This drink’s done. I want one more.” “You might regret one more tomorrow.” BlaqJaq offered a grin that stretched his mouth the other way. “Or I might regret not…might not regret… Wait, I…” Nickerson was chuckling. He pushed his glass across the table. “There. No regrets.” Feeling a beaming affection for the older man, BlaqJaq took up the drink. His emotions felt enlarged. A rushing passion for the feline-enriched male came over him with great force. He found himself gazing wide-eyed. His free hand reached out, groping. “I…love you.” The words just spilled out of him. For some time he’d held them pent up, waiting to say them,

wanting to say them. A sudden, breathless fear gripped him. Nickerson caught his hand and squeezed, the move very deliberate. Taking a steadying breath, he said, “I love you too. Of course.” He sounded vastly relieved. Had he too waited? Something warm loosened in BlaqJaq’s chest, and his breath returned to him. He had meant to say this to his lover under other circumstances. Was he acting dumb? Better say something else. “What’re the Mardis, anyway?” After a pause, Nickerson squeezed BlaqJaq’s hand again, then sagged back in his chair. “I think they’re royalty. Like feudal lords. A woman told me that they can do whatever they want.” BlaqJaq ignored the words he didn’t recognize. “What’s Carnival, then?”

Blood in the Water

57

“It’s when these Mardis are chosen. A yearly event, I take it. I’d imagine there’s a…competition. Of some sort.” Thought showed itself as a crease between Nickerson’s brows. BlaqJaq had just told this man that he loved him. Should he have said that, words he’d never ever spoken to anybody else in his life? Was this the regret Nickerson had been talking about before? Trying again to cover his embarrassment, BlaqJaq asked, almost at random, “Why’s this city float on the water? Why isn’t it on land?” He swept an arm toward where he thought the river emptied, but it might be completely the opposite way. The stars wheeled a bit. “‘Cause this’s Old America’s first drowned city, youngster.” The stringed instrument no longer scratched out sad notes. The chunky man stood by their table, wheezing slightly. BlaqJaq realized the other patrons had left the place. “Would you care to join us?” Nickerson gestured cordially. But it was like he just pretended the politeness, like he only wanted something from this man. Info, BlaqJaq guessed. “Well, I own this joint…but why not?” With a soft heave he sat. A worker set a tall glass, brimming with froth, in front of him almost immediately. The two who’d served the tables now busied themselves tidying up. “My young friend was interested in Carnival,” Nickerson said, “but I didn’t know all the details. Perhaps you could…?” “I’d guess you wouldn’t know. Bandaged palm -- and no chip under it, I’d wager. And that accent. Or lack of accent. Nobody talks that flat wasn’t up in the wide black awhile. Well, sure our city must seem strange.” His beard twinkled with sweat. He wore a smug expression. BlaqJaq hadn’t quite followed what had just been said, but he didn’t like that look. “Don’t be bumpin’ my friend,” he said warningly.

58

Eric Del Carlo

Nickerson made a quieting gesture and waited to see that BlaqJaq saw and understood it. To the plump owner, he said, “Right. It’s strange because it’s new. But I remember reading a history somewhere that mentioned Southern hospitality.” This produced a vast froth-spraying guffaw out of the man. Wiping his thick wrist across his bearded mouth, he said, “Okay, strangers. Not every tourist knows the tally. Most just come for the celebratin’, but that’s fine. We need that influx of goods, need the ’conomy stimulated. In three days, Carnival comes. Then the reigning Mardis either hold on to what they got. Or they don’t.” BlaqJaq pulled his glass’s brim up toward his mouth and sipped, a more difficult feat than a short time ago. Nickerson regarded their table guest. “That’s Fang and his bunch.” The wrist wiped the foamy mouth again, which set suddenly into a grim line. “That’s who. You met ’em?” “Tonight.” “Lucky you’re in a piece. Mardis always get crazy when the next Carnival comes ‘round. Knowin’ they might well lose what they’ve been having. But this krewe…” The bearded man delineated the odd spelling of the native term. “Fuck. Fuckin’ animals. Acting like maniacs all the year. Now they’re settlin’ up their every last score. Everybody who’s ever crossed ’em.” BlaqJaq thought of the frightened, white-haired man he’d seen being marched out of the music hall earlier. The crease had returned between Nickerson’s brows. After a moment, he asked, “What good is it to be Mardis? Royal privilege? You get to lord your social status over everyone else?” A trace of amusement played over the rounded man’s features again. “Oh, that,” he drawled, then shrugged elaborately. “Also the Mardis can have whatever they want --

Blood in the Water

59

whatever New New Orleans has to offer. Booze, pussy, soft beds. Like, you, just fah instance, cat-man… You could get yourself a brand new palmchip. Perfectly legit, totally functional. And a nice sum of credit on it. One for your muscle-bound young friend too. That’s what y’all could have, if you were part of a krewe that won Carnival.”

***** In his bones, he still felt the jouncing of the little boat that had buzzed them here. Everything swayed, and he swayed with it. He liked the fun feeling. But it was costing him, and he knew it in some part of his dwindling awareness. A streetmuscle couldn’t afford to get into this condition, but New New Orleans didn’t have streets, did it? That hilarious thought provoked a burst of laughter. His feet slid out from underneath him with every other step, but someone steered and propped him up, and he didn’t fall, not until he found himself lowered onto a soft expanse that smelled vaguely of flowers. He heard a door shut. Light, faint but bright enough to make him squint, came on, revealing a room. “We’re not on our boat?” He had to put effort into shaping the question. Turning his head right and left, he saw he was lying on a bed. The bedding smelled of perfume. “I got us a room. We can afford it.” Nickerson was somewhere out of his view. “I like it,” BlaqJaq said. Over a dull ringing in his ears, he could hear passing motors and shouts. Not everyone in the city was in bed, it seemed. “What -- what did he say…?” “He?” “About drowning. He said drown.” The point suddenly seemed important to BlaqJaq. Nickerson loomed into sight. BlaqJaq still lay flat on his back. Nickerson had stripped, at least to the waist. Gently he cuffed the remains of BlaqJaq’s bodystocking down his body, wriggling it under shoulder blades and buttocks. BlaqJaq only belated thought to lift his hips.

60

Eric Del Carlo

“The owner of that last place we were at, you mean,” the older man said. “His name’s Morrow, by the way. He said this was Old America’s first drowned city. What he meant, of course, was that what’s underneath us is that drowned city. This flotilla is moored above those ruins.” “That’s why it’s New New…” BlaqJaq was pleased with his deduction. The ’stocking was drawn down his legs, and sweat cooled slightly on his flesh. A tingling sensation roved his bare body. “This Carnival,” Nickerson, out of his view again, was saying, “is important. People come from all over the region, people living in the wilds, off the grid. Salvagers and scavengers and scroungers. It’s a cultural event. They bring in all sorts of reclaimed gear, foraged out of the abandoned cities and --” “I wanna fuck.” BlaqJaq felt the swelling crown of his cock sliding up his thigh. “I can see that.” It sounded like there was a sudden thickness in Nickerson’s throat. He stepped forward as BlaqJaq tried semisuccessfully to lift his head. “Do you think you might be too drunk to come?” “Wanna fuck your sweet ass.” Muscles in his lower abdomen pulled taut as his now fully hard cock strained, aching to connect to his lover. He could see that Nickerson was indeed naked. Such a beautiful man, BlaqJaq thought fuzzily. Beautiful… Nickerson offered a gentle smile, but lust had lit his eyes. He stepped to the foot of the bed, off which BlaqJaq’s feet still hung. The fair-haired head dipped, and BlaqJaq sucked in a whistling breath as the warm mouth slavered over his erect cock. The alcohol muddled the sensation a little, but it thrilled him to his core anyway. Pleasure went rippling. His ass tightened under him as he thrust himself up into the wet maw. Nickerson lapped busily at his shaft, coating it with his tongue. When the catjob male reared up once again, BlaqJaq shivered at the mild chill that gripped his moistened cock and at the keen anticipation of joining himself to his lover.

Blood in the Water

61

Nickerson straddled him, reaching behind to guide BlaqJaq’s cockhead up against his hole. Then his ring cinched down around the spit-lubricated cock, sliding downward over the veiny centimeters. BlaqJaq cried out, and Nickerson grunted with the happy effort. Nickerson rolled himself on BlaqJaq’s crotch, grinding, taking in the full length of penetrating meat. A delirium of pleasure took hold of BlaqJaq’s skull. Nickerson was tight around his shank, and the sliding of his clenching ring drew more moans from the younger male. Eyes fluttering, he saw Nickerson repositioning, planting his feet on the mattress next to BlaqJaq’s hips, settling his balance; then, grinning, he rose and dropped, using his knees. BlaqJaq didn’t even need to move, probably for the best. Nickerson’s succulent hole pumped him like a fist. “Fuck,” BlaqJaq panted, “that’s good…” Nickerson appeared perfectly aware of how good it felt. His own cock, having hardened, bobbed with every plunge. He took BlaqJaq all the way, every time. BlaqJaq could feel the tense curves of Nickerson’s ass coming flush with his balls at each drop. BlaqJaq ran his tongue over his palm, then reached out for his lover’s cock. Nickerson’s grin tightened as BlaqJaq dutifully worked his shaft, savoring the warmth and beauty of the organ, of the man to whom it was attached. Nickerson continued to ride him, showing no signs of slowing. Probably that catjob system of his could keep him going all night. But BlaqJaq wouldn’t need the whole night. Despite what Nickerson had said about maybe being too drunk to come, the ultimate pleasurable release gathered over BlaqJaq. It felt like currents of excitement pulling inward from his every extremity, gaining heat as they converged toward his cock. He fisted Nickerson’s shank almost recklessly now, feeling it pulse, hearing Nickerson’s growls above him. BlaqJaq’s impending orgasm still cascaded inward when slick warmth suddenly strung among his fingers and sprinkled across his belly

62

Eric Del Carlo

and heaving chest. A drop even found the corner of his mouth, and his tongue darted out to taste the salty residue. It flashed a final signal through BlaqJaq. His orgasm, when it hit a few hammering heartbeats later, felt like a weight lifted or a weight taken on, a great shifting of sensation, a gush of pleasure that expressed itself, quite naturally, by geysering his seed up into Nickerson’s ass, a more dizzying experience than anything that the booze had done to him tonight. Their connection softened, but Nickerson stayed on top, slumping over onto BlaqJaq’s slick chest, head resting on his collarbone. BlaqJaq brushed his lips against the light brown hair. He said, “I meant it. I love you. I meant what I said.” “So did I.” BlaqJaq felt the hum of Nickerson’s voice against him. “I’ve wanted to say that. But I didn’t know when I would.” BlaqJaq crossed his arms over the other’s back. Nickerson kissed his shoulder. “Morrow told me a lot about Carnival. I’m not sure you were hearing.” “Oh?” BlaqJaq vaguely remembered sitting at that table toward the end, aware that the other two men were still speaking intently but giving up on any effort to follow along. Nickerson drew and released a breath. “I think we should take part in this Carnival. We’d have a lot to gain.” “That I did hear. But, uh, what --” “It’s a contest. You fight to win. You know how to fight, and so do I, and apparently not too many are eager to take on Fang and his krewe. But it’s a fight under the water. We’d be down there, among the sunken ruins of New Orleans. Do you think you’d want to be a part of that?”

Blood in the Water

63

Chapter Nine

The kid did look a little like he regretted last night. Not the sex, certainly, and not declaring his love, Nickerson hoped with quiet fervor. But the alcohol, yes. BlaqJaq shaded his eyes, his features a bit slack. Both men had dressed in the swimming briefs that Nickerson had found in their rented room. He had finally discarded his bandage, though this revealed the scar on his palm. He’d even found time this morning to shave with a razor in the room’s tiny bathroom. “You’re sure you’re up to this?” “Stop asking that,” BlaqJaq mumbled petulantly. “I just want to make certain.” Nickerson could’ve teased the younger man about his condition but didn’t see the point. “We’re going into the water. You’ve got to be able to focus.” “Got to do this.” BlaqJaq dropped his hand and squinted levelly at Nickerson. “I said I would. And we’ve got to, for the Carnival.” Nickerson nodded. “That’s right.” They stood on a rocking sheet of ancient, scratched metaplastic, the landing of the lodge where they’d slept last night; a few small craft were tied

64

Eric Del Carlo

up here. The establishment had about half a dozen separate units. They creaked and groaned in the morning’s swiftly building heat. Bright emerald water slapped the pontoons. Despite being enriched with feline capacities, Nickerson did not have an aversion to water. He was worried, though, about BlaqJaq. Nickerson had rescued him from that river, where he probably would’ve drowned without the help. “All right,” Nickerson said, “here we go.” The somewhat salty water felt tepid and soothing. Nickerson eased the brawnier male down into it slowly, hands on his hips, making sure BlaqJaq could grab the dock’s ’plastic edge. Nickerson had learning to tread in mind as the first order of business. BlaqJaq, dark hair gummed around his neck and shoulders, took to the lessons grimly, determinedly. His face was set, eyes narrowed and shot through with red squiggles. Nickerson guessed he felt fear, but he saw no reason to say anything about that. He ought to feel afraid, the former assassin thought. Of the water, of the blood sport of Carnival. If BlaqJaq couldn’t master swimming in the little time they had, then they would engage in no contest with Fang and the others. There would also be no palmchips, no way back into official society at all. The two men would have to spend their days here…or someplace like it, somewhere away from interfaces, unconnected, scrabbling like animals to survive, living off the centuries-old remains of an Earth that had existed before the climate had turned merciless, before the coasts had vanished. Nickerson had lived off-rock for so long. It had instilled in him a profound respect for civilization, which acted as a bulwark against anarchy, against humankind’s basest instincts. Nowhere but in an off-grid environment like this could the Mardis fly so flagrantly in the face of civilized law. One could mistake New New Orleans for charming, but Nickerson saw its barbarity plainly. He shook his head sharply, flinging drops from his nose. BlaqJaq needed to focus, so he’d said. Well, he had to do the same.

Blood in the Water

65

They took a break when the younger male, having grasped how to tread water, had also swum a few tentative laps back and forth just beyond the landing’s lip. He was showing early promise. They sat on the metaplastic brim, feet dangling. BlaqJaq regarded his pruned fingertips. “It’s a sight.” “That’s just from being in the water. Don’t worry.” BlaqJaq turned and arched an eyebrow. “Talking ’bout that. Down there.” The sun had shifted, no longer dazzling on the water’s surface. Below, a new world had opened itself wide, a grid of softly undulating greenery. Ruins. Roofs and walls had vanished. Streets, once supplied with traffic, with people, with all the activities that occurred on solid land, had crusted over. A city. An actual city had stood here, something more than a historical notation of interest. Old America’s first drowned city. Yes, it might well bear that distinction. But New Orleans had to have existed as something more, something before. The ghostly macabre necropolis belonged to truly ancient times, to lost peoples, to the Peloponnesians, to the Carthaginians. Pompeii more rightfully belonged down there. The enormity took hold of him and for several moments refused to release him. He realized he’d come to the verge of an emotional display, maybe even tears, but he kept himself in check and hoped that BlaqJaq hadn’t noticed. They had no time for sloppy sentimentality. Finally BlaqJaq murmured, “What dumb fuckers let that happen?” The question sounded abstract, almost existential, but Nickerson had an answer anyway: “All of them.” He shook himself and stood, returning briefly to their rented room. “Here, put this on,” he said, coming back and handing over one of the breathers that Morrow had given him last night. Evidently the local business owner had an interest in seeing Fang and his krewe not renew their tenures as New New Orleans’s Mardis.

66

Eric Del Carlo

“What’s it do?” BlaqJaq frowned over the clear half mask, molded to fit over the nose and chin. It had a black rubbery bit meant to be gripped by one’s teeth. Nickerson had encountered such breathers -- albeit, more sophisticated versions -- on colonies still in the process of being Earth-formed. “Put it on like this” -- Nickerson demonstrated -- “and you’ll be able to breathe in the water.” “You’re sure about that?” “I am.” BlaqJaq grated a laugh. “Wish you’d just given me this when we started. I’ve been scared the whole time.” His eyes darted away, no doubt toward memories of being in that river. “We’ll be going under this time. We’ll have these breathers during the Carnival. I’ll show you how to swim under the water.” Though Nickerson hadn’t been specifically trained in water combat, he felt confident his general fighting background would serve him well. They submerged. BlaqJaq needed a moment to reassure himself that the mask functioned, but once he had, he behaved with a commendable lack of fear. The adhesive edges of the breather held snug to Nickerson’s face. The rubbery bit tasted vaguely medicinal. He helped BlaqJaq to acclimate to the pressure and to the slowed movements of his limbs. After a time, the younger man was cutting a fairly straight line through the water, arms working in rhythm, legs chopping neatly. The wavery, greenish light played over his strapping body. His toned muscles flexed, and dark hair streamed out behind him. Nickerson couldn’t be sure, what with the breather clinging to his face, but he thought BlaqJaq might be grinning. Fish, their tropical colors dazzling, flitted here and there. Below, fronds waved languidly from the tops of broken-off walls. Probably a lot of the materials that had gone

Blood in the Water

67

into the construction of New New Orleans had been taken from these ruins. It was a ready source. Once again, Nickerson found himself struck by the inescapable melancholy of the relics. The two men had worked their way down gradually. Now, perhaps twenty meters below the surface, they practically skimmed at what would’ve been rooftop level. They didn’t, in the end, find much to see. Everything loose had long since been scoured away into the ocean. The ruins looked more organic now than human-made. Coral had repaved the structures and streets; polyps, with unimpassioned single-mindedness, had taken up residence wherever convenient. Fingers brushed his shoulder. He turned and saw BlaqJaq pointing upward, toward the brighter wash of daylight. Nickerson nodded. They kicked off toward the surface, following the anchorage line that kept the lodge from drifting away. “Getting tired?” Nickerson asked as BlaqJaq levered himself, dripping, onto the landing. The dark-haired male set aside his breather and drew deep lungfuls of air. “Sure. That. But it was getting boggle down there. I was starting to see people walking around.” Nickerson climbed up next to him. One of the vessels moored here earlier had gone now. The sun stood high. “Really?” “Don’t gotta look at me like that. I know none of it was true. Still…” BlaqJaq shook his head. Nickerson swiped strands of heavy, wet hair off his forehead. “I understand.” He looked out across the water, at the many structures floating on the emerald surface. Craft were darting about. Faint strains of music wafted on the soft breezes. “I can almost understand now what this city’s doing up here. Whoever first had the lunatic notion of creating it must have felt a strong attachment to what’s down there.” He continued to gaze out on New New Orleans. After a moment, tone dulled with uncertainty, BlaqJaq asked, “So, how’d I do?”

68

Eric Del Carlo

“You did good. Congratulations. You know how to swim now.” “Am I good enough to be in the Carnival? Are you?” “We’re warriors, you and I. Different varieties, same breed. We’ve had training and experiences I doubt anybody else around here has had.” BlaqJaq indulged in another long breath. The air probably tasted very sweet after having that breather on for so long. Finally he asked, “What happens if we lose?” “The Carnival? Losers are lucky if they don’t come out of it maimed.” “Or dead?” “Or dead,” Nickerson said, turning and putting a hand on BlaqJaq’s shoulder. He summoned a grin that came with surprising ease. “But you’re a streetmuscle and I’m a catjob assassin, our retirements notwithstanding. Losing isn’t what we do. Is it?” After a twitch of hesitation, the younger man’s features split in a responding grin.

Blood in the Water

69

Chapter Ten

They rested and undertook more diving in the afternoon. The Carnival contest allowed only a single blade per participant. Nickerson would drill his pupil in combat techniques tomorrow. For now, BlaqJaq still showed promise. More than that, really. BlaqJaq had confidence in his own physical being. He’d made his living in the undercity by dint of his brawn and agility. He need only adapt to this new medium, the watery underworld instead of claustrophobic tunnels. Nickerson had trained for his erstwhile profession exhaustively. His employers had literally transformed him into the individual they wanted over a period of several years. Here he had two more days until the blood sport of Carnival. Two days to prepare BlaqJaq, and two for himself. As evening came on, BlaqJaq declared himself ravenous. They set out into the city, which proved itself livelier even than last night. Music cranked and yowled across the darkening water. Boats of drunken revelers cut careening paths among the floating structures. It created a palpable mood of jubilee. It took some persistence to find a restaurant where they could be seated. Nickerson shoved several chits into the hand of the person who passed for a maître d’, and some while

70

Eric Del Carlo

later, amidst the fluster and flurry of the overcrowded eatery, he and BlaqJaq dined once again on grilled fish. Nickerson had to admire its spicy, idiosyncratic zest and culinary flair. Perhaps this tradition had survived from the city drowned beneath them. Perhaps other customs and rituals had endured, in some form, as well. “That was good.” BlaqJaq’s flesh had picked up more color today, though he didn’t seem to be sunburning anymore. Nickerson settled up the bill. “We have to meet up with Morrow.” Tumult ruled the water, recklessness the night’s theme, an overcharged revelry. A man with a sun-leathered face ferried Nickerson and BlaqJaq through the clutter. “Gahdamn tourists don’t know shit,” he observed. “Not that they bad folk, y’understan’, and we need them, I know, I know, but still…” The boat -- little more than a motorized canoe -- buzzed past a young male flailing in the water, alongside the sideswiped remains of another vessel. People from two other craft had already effected a rescue. Splintered boards went adrift. One of the rescuers howled with derisive laughter. Nickerson and BlaqJaq both eyed the scene with dismay. “It just gets crazier an’ crazier closer we get to Cahnival,” said their pilot with disgusted fatalism. At Morrow’s open-air establishment, bartenders poured drinks at a breakneck pace. The small platform rocked visibly with the antics of the rowdy patrons. Morrow came out onto the fronting dock immediately, daubing his glistening forehead with a patterned kerchief then gesturing with it. “C’mon, this here’s mine. We’re going where it’s quiet, where you two can meet proper the people I want you to meet.” After BlaqJaq and Nickerson were secure on the vessel, Morrow cast off and bounded aboard with surprising nimbleness, settling at the controls. “I hope those fools don’t sink my joint,” the plump owner ruminated aloud, though he didn’t sound especially concerned about this eventuality.

Blood in the Water

71

He could always just build another tavern when Carnival ended, Nickerson thought with more uneasy wonderment. What a strange city, this New New Orleans. They headed for that city’s outskirts, where the wakes of careless boats didn’t quite reach, where the drones and growls of overtaxed, slipshod engines receded into dullness, like distant thunder. Morrow lived in a decent dwelling, considering it was, essentially, a raft atop which scrap construction materials had been assembled into the shape of a home. He bumped his way gently between two other vessels already moored outside. The rather well-appointed interior had proper furnishings, the walls, floor, and ceiling solid. The surroundings even possessed a certain graciousness. “Everyplace one goes,” Morrow said, giving his brow a last swipe with the kerchief, “there must be a gentry. Even one that’s as phony as a damsel with a morning hard-on. C’mon in, friends. This here’s Trumpet and Spark, and that one there’s Twain. If all goes well, you’ll be the krewe that takes apart Fang and his cohorts.” Nickerson had already surveyed the three, of course. Trumpet and Spark, male and female, respectively, both seemed nearer to BlaqJaq’s age than Nickerson’s. Tanned, taut of limb, probably energetic and agile. Twain, farther back into the room than the rest, returned Nickerson’s quietly measuring gaze. Graying hair, sheared, stippled a narrow skull, with eyes large, dark, and quite calm. With arms folded and long body casually leaned back against a wall, this one betrayed a surety of physical ability. In a fight, he would come out of nowhere, Nickerson judged. “Anybody need a drink?” Morrow was asking, making for a credenza that belonged in a home not built from salvaged parts. Beside Nickerson, BlaqJaq shuddered. “Had enough of that last night,” he muttered. “I’ll bet you did, youngster.” Morrow had poured himself a generous glass of something the color of mahogany. He dropped in ice. Electric light burned liberally in here. Nickerson

72

Eric Del Carlo

had seen the solar sheeting coating the roof. “Sit, everyone. Please. Nicky, you can put that bag down if you like.” While he’d been giving BlaqJaq his first swimming lessons earlier, Nickerson had left several devices to recharge from the current that powered their rented room, though rigging interfaces had been tricky. He felt better with the weaponry in a more ready state, even though no such implements would be permitted during the Carnival, naturally. Nickerson settled into a plush chair, the flex-’plastic bag in his lap. BlaqJaq took a seat alongside. He gazed around at the rather eye-catching decor. Curios and even art of a sort hung on the walls. There was carpeting underfoot. Morrow had called himself “gentry”? It seemed apt. Trumpet and Spark might’ve been brother and sister until they sat together on a couch, his hand settling comfortably atop her knee, the contact familiar. Lovers, then. Twain’s posture, even seated, was deceptively relaxed. Nickerson sensed the coiled musculature. Ice rattled in Morrow’s glass as he finally sat. He wiped his beard and smiled grimly at his guests. “I’ve been waiting a whole year for you five. Fang and those others have been despicable Mardis. They’ve pissed all over the tradition. Mardis are s’posed to be magnanimous, stately, dignified. They preside at important weddings and funerals. They give the proceedings some weight, some class. It helps everybody take these things a little more seriously than they might. Without a government, we at least need figureheads to keep off total chaos. Oh, natch, it’s expected they’ll be rough ’round the edges. They’ll exploit their positions a bit. Considering what they’ve had to go through to earn their titles, who can lay blame? But these…these fuckin’ brownies…they’ve outright abused the customary privileges of the Mardis. They haven’t acted like royalty. Not a whiff of noblesse oblige off these characters.” Morrow’s beard bristled as his lips twisted. “Fang’s krewe have been through my place on more than one night. Raising cain, scaring my customers. Fang, that dog-fuck sumbitch, waving that gun of his around. You know this. Y’all’ve seen it yourselves. Well,

Blood in the Water

73

you three have. As you know, Nicky and Blacky here are out-of-towners. I’ve tried to explain…” “We grasp the situation,” Nickerson said softly but evenly. He didn’t add that how the winners of the previous year’s Carnival had behaved in the meantime didn’t much interest him. The tradition seemed vaguely ridiculous, probably something bastardized out of all recognition from its original form. Only how he and BlaqJaq could take advantage of it concerned him. “You do?” Twain, elbows on the arms of his chair, pressed thumbs and two fingertips together over his lap and made the gesture seemed inexplicably menacing. He had pitched his question as faintly yet forcefully as Nickerson’s statement. “It’s been explained,” Nickerson said. “Gentlemen,” Morrow said, “and lady, we’re here in hopes you’ll agree to form a krewe, a five-person team that will vie with Fang’s five-person krewe during the coming Carnival.” “If we’re here to present credentials,” Nickerson said, “I’d suggest you look closely at my eyes. I’ve received feline enrichment of high quality.” Trumpet said, “I…we all can…see the cat eyes, but…” “A catjob? High quality? How d’we know that?” Spark, whose hair was far lighter than Nickerson’s, lifted eyebrows that were like bleached streaks on her tanned face. “I was a streetmuscle. Any you don’t know what that is, it’s the living I made. I had to be stronger than everybody else I handled, and I had to be smarter.” BlaqJaq let a satisfied smile cross his features. “And I’m still alive.” Morrow seemed about to intervene again. Nickerson gestured more brusquely in his direction than he’d meant to. “A catjob and a streetmuscle. What’ve you three got?” Trumpet and Spark both worked as fisherfolk, experienced divers. Fishing, naturally, constituted an important profession here, and Nickerson could see how those abilities would

Eric Del Carlo

74

translate into viability as a Carnival contestant. Trumpet, who’d been relating these qualifications, finished, “We’ve both swum with sharks, so we can swim ’gainst Fang and his pals.” Nickerson gave the young man with the sun blond hair a brief, firm nod. Then his eyes ticked over toward Twain. Silence held the room a moment as the fit, gray-haired man leaned slowly forward in his chair. His serene eyes centered on Nickerson as he said, with vast aplomb, “I’ve been a Mardi myself.” After another pause, BlaqJaq burst out laughing, and a small smile finally creased Nickerson’s face.

***** Morrow devolved into first tipsy, then inebriated speechifying, though he never became so debilitated as, say, BlaqJaq had last night. The plump, bearded man did nothing to disguise his outright delight at the prospect of a strong krewe to go against Fang and the others. This craft they’d boarded belonged to Trumpet and Spark, who both sat aft at the outboard motor. Nickerson and BlaqJaq occupied the prow. Between them, a young woman with hair straggled over her face periodically vomited over the side. The two fisherfolk had stopped to pick her up when she’d flailed her arms for a ride. Nickerson rocked the opposite way each time she bent her head over the gunwale, counterbalancing the small vessel. Twain had departed Morrow’s home in the third vessel moored there. “The formal challenge isn’t till tomorrow night. It’s all feathers and masks and voodoo…” “You’ll love it!” Spark finished brightly, and Trumpet planted a kiss on her cheek. The two looked happy together.

Blood in the Water

75

“Two days before Carnival,” BlaqJaq said, apparently trying not to look too closely at the woman shuddering nauseously at the boat’s midpoint. “Cuts it close. One day for us to train together.” Nickerson had to agree. A week of intensive drills for their krewe would’ve been better, much better. A month would’ve been better than that. “Preparin’ for Carnival don’t mean much,” Trumpet said. “It’s being willing to do it at all -- that’s what counts.” That sounded vaguely like adolescent posturing, but Nickerson didn’t remark on it. BlaqJaq, however, said, “And we’re all that’s willing. Right? Morrow’s been wanting to put a krewe together all year, and he only does it now? Why’s that?” The two young divers traded a meaningful look. Spark, less vivaciously now, said, “’Cause nobody wants to go against Fang’s krewe. Last year…it was ugly.” It was answer enough for Nickerson. Before BlaqJaq could say anything more, their young female passenger, discolored mucus dribbling from her chin, lifted her head as best she could on a boneless neck and pronounced, “I had…not…thought it would…be like…this.” It prompted a merry chuckle from Spark. Trumpet, shaking his head, said, “Never fails to amaze. People come to New New Orleans an’ think that all physiological laws are suspended. They can drink whatever they like, how much they want.” He leaned toward the girl. “We’re going to drop you off soon, sweetheart.” Then his eyes flicked toward the prow. “Morrow’s not the only one who’s been tryin’ to put a challenge krewe together. Lots of folk want Fang and the rest gone.” “From what Morrow has mentioned,” Nickerson said, “I gather that Mardis are put into their positions of social superiority and are then expected to behave themselves, to follow the traditions.”

76

Eric Del Carlo

“Right. They officiate at…well, I guess you’d call them civic ceremonies. Mostly they just are Mardis. Royal figureheads, like Morrow always says. Makes people feel like somebody’s in charge.” “And if they don’t act like they should? The people have no recourse?” “Recourse?” Trumpet frowned over the word. “I take it you’ve got nothing like a police force here.” Nickerson already knew the answer. “Nope, no long sticks, no skull-breakers. No government, not really. It’s just…folk.” He gestured wide. Beyond the confines of the little vessel, the city had reached full celebratory swing. Music rattled from structures they passed; howls of merriment -- or something approximating it -- came from everywhere. The generally understood lanes of waterborne traffic had become a virtual free-for-all of watercraft. Trumpet steered nimbly through, his reflexes encouragingly quick. With these two and Twain, a past winner of this potentially lethal sport, this krewe might just succeed, thought Nickerson with burgeoning confidence. He recognized the gunshot when it sounded, close, followed immediately by a yowl of malicious laughter. Firelight bathed the water, coruscating orange and yellow across undulating black. Another shot sounded, which Nickerson heard while crouched below the bow of the boat. He’d reached up for BlaqJaq, but the onetime streetmuscle had already made a low dive for midships, grabbing the drunk female and pulling her down. Nickerson didn’t pause for a smile of admiration -- nor even to wonder why he’d waste his time seeing to this stranger’s safety -- but instead reached yet again into his bag. Glad indeed now to have at least some of these implements of his old trade recharged, he seized his sleek pistol and drew it. Trumpet veered neatly, but someone, also trying to avoid the sudden blaze ahead on the water, knocked into them with a jarring thump. Nickerson kept the gun in his sure grip,

Blood in the Water

77

gazing over the prow, past the floating building crackling with flame. One vessel, in among the confusion of other craft, cut a decisive course away from the vicinity. Nickerson’s cat eyes, pupils narrowed to slits by the fire’s brightness, picked out the canine-enriched male on that fleeing boat; his ears differentiated the fresh bark of laughter from the muddle of panicked noise erupting all around. Someone else on board that vessel tossed away a torch that extinguished itself on the water. Fang and his krewe were leaving the scene. One more blast, fired purely for effect from a big black pistol, sounded in the raucous night.

***** It took some while for Trumpet to work their way out of the snarl, even after the building had quickly burned down to a frame, even after the limp corpse of a white-haired man was dragged out of the water and onto the deck of someone else’s vessel. Nickerson recognized the man from the music hall last night. His chest had been torn open by a bullet. The wound was utterly bloodless; he’d already bled out into the water. “His name’s…was LeGaux. He talked about fraggin’ Fang,” Spark supplied, all joviality now absent. “Doin’ it before Carnival. Word got ’round.” The drunk girl had fallen unconscious on the bottom of the boat. BlaqJaq again sat next to Nickerson. In a secretive whisper, he asked, “You could’ve zeroed him, right? I saw…you had your spike, and that was Fang. Could you’ve killed him? Then and there?” Trumpet continued to idle them away from the jam. Nickerson, voice just as hushed, said, “If I had, then we couldn’t take that krewe on during Carnival. We couldn’t win anything. And we need to win.” We need those palmchips, he added silently. Eventually BlaqJaq dipped his head in a nod, but his handsome face remained solemn.

78

Eric Del Carlo

Chapter Eleven

BlaqJaq’s clamping teeth had knotted an ache into his jaw, but he continued to hold tenaciously to the mouthpiece of the breather. The mask gave him air, processing it somehow straight from the water itself, and without it he would be lost and helpless underneath the vast green weight of the sea and -He caught the thought, not for the first time today, before it gained speed. Nothing wrong with being afraid, but being nothing but afraid was useless. And he had never considered himself a useless man. By now, after hours of this, he had a nearly perfect awareness of the other four human shapes in the water. They skimmed through the depths, over the rubble of the old ghostly city. He’d discovered a whole separate world down here, so much life -- all the fish, the jellies, the crazy array of plants, the pulsing and flitting things he couldn’t even try to name. All this life belonged in the water. Incredible. The five of them darted along, life forms from above quietly intruding. Loose silt stirred, made fanciful tangles, and resettled. Sunlight from the surface seemed to fold over onto itself, to twist and warp.

Blood in the Water

79

Over the course of the day he, Nickerson, Twain, Spark, and Trumpet had gone through drills. Awkward and abashed at first, BlaqJaq had felt like the one out of the five who least knew what to do -- which was true, of course. But yesterday’s lessons had stuck. Nickerson had taken him through the basics. Now he applied what he knew. They’d agreed on a concise set of hand signals, which helped. Now they could move through the water, five fairly graceful human forms, coordinated and decisive. BlaqJaq’s right fist held the regulation knife. Even in the water it had a notable weight. Not as inspiring as that big spike he’d had to leave aboard their boat, it still looked like an obviously effective instrument. He hadn’t used weapons as a streetmuscle in the ’city, but after the exercises Nickerson had run him through, he had enough confidence that he could make use of this blade when the time came. Carnival. Tomorrow. There would be blood in the water then, for sure. Beneath the gently bobbing undersides of New New Orleans’s structures and the bubbly wakes of passing craft, among the encrusted moorage lines, their five-person party moved with orderly purpose, responding to the signals passed one to the other. They converged on imaginary targets; they made their practice kills. BlaqJaq, after a time, felt as though he truly belonged among these others, a strange feeling. As a streetmuscle, he’d had only himself. He couldn’t rely on anybody else during a job, not even whoever had hired him. Now he had not just Nickerson, but this whole krewe. The light had changed. The depths smeared toward murkiness. They’d stayed down here long enough. The pressure made BlaqJaq’s head throb a bit. But he waited for the signal, waited until they’d successfully performed a final efficient drill. A few moments later, they all climbed out of the water, onto the dock that fronted Morrow’s home. He waited, sawing on that musical instrument of his, slicing a few last notes into the onset of twilight. He wore a jacket of shiny fabric with fancy quilted lapels, though

80

Eric Del Carlo

it still felt oppressively hot up here. It made BlaqJaq briefly miss the relative cool of the water. He slipped his knife into the sheath strapped to his thigh. Morrow’s bearded face looked gravely drawn. For a moment, BlaqJaq thought him angry, but when he spoke, his voice choked with poignant emotion. “Gawddamn,” he said softly, “you five give me hope.” Then he blinked sharply and waved with his instrument toward his open door. “C’mon in. We got to get you ready to make the challenge. As always, there’s drinks. And more than usual, this would be a proper time for one.” Towels had been left on the dock. The krewe members silently dried themselves then one by one followed inside.

***** The dressers had been circling and circling them, adding fine touches, conferring -sometimes arguing, indignantly -- with one another. It made things quite busy inside Morrow’s home, what with all these others. The five members of the krewe, seated in chairs, submitted themselves to this fuss with different degrees of agreeability. BlaqJaq found the whole business funny. “You look the cock of the walk,” one dresser said, thread and needle in hand, eyes full of fierce appraisal. Nickerson, this man’s subject, muttered, “If you say so.” His tone was unamused. More than these mask workers had come to Morrow’s place. Various rituals had gotten under way inside the elegant dwelling. BlaqJaq, scolded repeatedly to keep his head perfectly

still while his dresser labored over him, could only see the others when they passed through his fixed field of sight. They wore costumes; they carried strange implements; they raised a weird hullabaloo of words he didn’t recognize. Odd smells came and went, like burning flowers.

Blood in the Water

81

All this meant to prepare the krewe for the challenge. It seemed silly to BlaqJaq, though Nickerson, just in the corner of BlaqJaq’s right eye, didn’t find any humor at all in this. “See what happens when traditions get out of hand?” Nickerson asked peevishly, as if he and BlaqJaq had actually been having a conversation on the topic. “It’s just…” BlaqJaq started to shrug then caught himself. Hands were busy on the mask that weighed atop his head, heavier and a lot more elaborate than the breather he’d been wearing for the past several hours. “A game,” he finally finished. “This is no game.” Nickerson spoke in a muffled growl. BlaqJaq had heard a name -- Rupert -- repeated again and again, over however long a time he’d been sitting here, and had only understood it after someone said the whole thing: “Rupert LeGaux had the right idea, gawddamnit!” It was spoken out of BlaqJaq’s vision by a voice gagging with anger and sadness. “Should’ve cut that brownie dog’s throat in the night!” He thought this might be Morrow, until Morrow himself said, “There there, Chappy. Better we remember Rupe with a fond titter and a glass upended toward the stars. Tears and temper for later. Much later. Here, let me concoct you another cocktail.” Rupert LeGaux. The white-haired man who’d turned up dead in the water last night. Somebody had eventually put the events in their right order. Fang and his krewe had grabbed LeGaux -- he was another local business owner, like Morrow -- out of that big place where the music was played. Fang, who’d heard of LeGaux spouting about fragging him before the Carnival, wanted revenge. They’d planned to leave LeGaux inside his own home while they set it on fire, but LeGaux must’ve regained consciousness or gotten loose from his ropes or something. When he’d tried to escape, Fang had been forced to shoot him dead. Fang had botched the effort. A sloppy operation, Nickerson would’ve called it. But it meant good news for this krewe, Rupert LeGaux’s unfortunate death aside; it meant Fang and partners thought they could do anything -- only they couldn’t.

82

Eric Del Carlo

Still, he remembered Nickerson, spike in hand, with Fang within killing distance in that other boat. But he dismissed the thought. The catjob was right; the two of them needed the Carnival. BlaqJaq tried to relax in his chair. After some time, all the fussing and primping and quarreling ended. So too did the wild chants and the waving around of totems or whatever the carved-wood implements were called. A hush, full of held-breath wonder, took hold. The five at last could stand. BlaqJaq had to catch his balance. His head felt awkwardly heavy. He turned and, looking through his mask’s eyeholes, saw Nickerson. The older male’s skull was fitted with an array of feathers that rose up and up, making a crest brighter than anything BlaqJaq had seen on any bird during their time in the wilderness. “Don’t smirk,” grumbled Nickerson. “You should see yourself.” But BlaqJaq grinned anyway. Trumpet and Spark wore masks glittering endlessly with multicolored beads. Twain’s looked like some sort of fake animal’s head, with big ears and fur of a color that probably didn’t exist in nature. Everyone else in the room -- even more people than BlaqJaq had thought -- broke into sudden applause. BlaqJaq didn’t know how to respond to that, so he just kept his grin place. After a while more, Morrow came forward and said, with some heavy sense of ceremony, “Now it’s time to challenge.”

***** The boat, large enough for all five of the krewe, droned solemnly across the water. The sounds of the engine and the frantic jubilee going on all around them couldn’t smother Nickerson’s irritable tone. “These masks don’t function as disguises. Maybe in some dim past, if this is in fact some thoroughly bastardized aspect of a local custom, masks once did conceal identities, during the

Blood in the Water

83

original festival, say, perhaps the better to loosen inhibitions…” He shook his head, which waggled his mask’s feathers. “None of us will be difficult to recognize.” Frenzy gripped the city. Lights blazed, revealing the revelers. The celebration had just about reached riotlike levels. On every floating structure they passed people swarmed, dancing, hollering, drinking. Vessels on the water, piloted too fast, glanced off each other. Celebrators dived recklessly from rooftops, splashing and yowling with crazed laughter. BlaqJaq sat alongside Nickerson in the boat. “This looks more dangerous than Carnival.” The older man said somberly, “Don’t kid yourself.” “I wasn’t. I was joking.” BlaqJaq offered a wry smile and waited until Nickerson’s grave expression softened enough for him to sniff out a tiny laugh. They continued through the animated city. On the next bench seat forward, Trumpet and Spark were holding hands; beyond them, Twain sat in the prow, his finely muscled body draped casually, the ears of his animal mask flapping in the wind that the boat stirred up. Glancing aside, BlaqJaq saw that Nickerson’s gaze too had rested on Twain, measuring, studying, then flicking away. BlaqJaq wondered what his lover truly thought of the onetime Carnival champion. Twain acted very sure of himself but wasn’t showy about it. Apparently he’d competed as part of a krewe that had first won the contest five years ago, then again the following year; the third Carnival running he’d declined to participate. “I’d had enough of the blood, enough of the pomp,” so Twain had said when asked. Now, however, he’d decided to enter into it again for the sake of deposing Fang’s krewe. “He’s poison.” Twain would say nothing more about the dogjob male. Their boat, deftly steered by a broad-shouldered stoic woman whose name BlaqJaq hadn’t caught, aimed toward a large structure directly ahead. Traditionally the reigning Mardis lived here. The edifice looked pretty grand, in a tumbledown sort of way, as though built from the best salvaged parts available. It had two stories to it, every window glaringly

84

Eric Del Carlo

lit. Music poured out over the shifting black water. Craft crowded the landing. People, though not Fang and his krewe, lounged about or caroused, some watching the boat’s approach with lazy wariness. Morrow, in his briefing to the five challengers, had warned them about the Mardis’ hangers-on. “Court sycophants” Nickerson had called them, and again BlaqJaq had been amused by the unnecessarily fancy words. “Lookit…with the funny hats!” An arrogant grin went with the drunken catcall. Someone else, perched precariously on a railing, said, “Why don’t we hannel ’em here ourselves…” She lifted a bottle as if she meant to hurl it. But another person glided up behind her, gave her a shove that sent her into the water, and waved forward the boat, clearing space for it at the dock. The girl in the water spluttered obscenities, but the vessel moored before anyone thought to haul her back onto the landing. The individual who’d facilitated the docking had a pitiless face crossed with two pale scars. In a neutral, almost deadened, voice, he said, “Come on up. I’ll go get who you’re here for.” They stepped onto the rocking landing, Twain first and BlaqJaq last. The court sycophants had all cleared space for them. No one was laughing at the elaborate masks now. A seriousness had come over the scene. Everyone here understood the implications. BlaqJaq carefully maintained his balance, not letting his headdress, whatever it was, tilt too far to one side or the other. They waited silently. After a few moments, the music within the overly constructed building ceased sharply, and a few more moments after that, the five Mardis appeared in the wide doorway. Fang, naturally, stood at the forefront. Long, pointed teeth gleamed. Behind and flanking posed the other four, whose names BlaqJaq had learned: Bullet, Hazy, Carter, and Newt, the lone female. These Mardis had reigned over New New Orleans for the past year, misusing their

Blood in the Water

85

status, bringing misery to the city’s residents. Now they’d come to the eve of either their renewal or undoing. BlaqJaq had figured that Fang would sneer and bluster and threaten. It was what people, in BlaqJaq’s experience, did when they didn’t have any real fight in them. But Fang seemed to recognize and accept the gravity of this occasion. In a mild, reflective tone, he finally said, “I thought maybe this year nobody was gonna challenge.” Twain, as if helpfully explaining to a child, said, “There is always a challenge.” The drunk, wet girl started to cackle out a laugh, but the scar-faced man, still standing nearby, turned a glaring eye her way, and she hiccupped into immediate silence. They made the ceremonious, carefully recited challenge. Morrow had related the words, but BlaqJaq hadn’t followed them then and couldn’t do so now, as Spark repeated the speech in a clear, even voice. He would’ve thought that maybe Twain would make the recitation, but Spark seemed to do just fine. Afterward, Fang looked over each of the masked visitors. Finally the trace of a smile showed itself around the dog’s teeth that grew so brazenly from his reconstructed jawline. Black market gen-stim engineers had no doubt performed the procedure, Nickerson had said, and it looked it. The smile didn’t qualify as a sneer; it possessed no heat at all, not even the comforting ember-warmth of anger. “We’re gonna cut all you brownies into food for the fishes,” said the dusky-skinned dogjob. Up until then, BlaqJaq had thought the word brownie -- an insult he’d heard more than once in the city -- had something to do with the color of one’s flesh. Apparently not. Their boat’s engine was restarted. The five challengers climbed back aboard without any further word. Nickerson removed his mask, grimacing at its feathers as he set it in his lap. BlaqJaq left his on, taking a strange comfort from it, even though he’d yet to see it himself.

86

Eric Del Carlo

Chapter Twelve

Fear, unfamiliar this time, caused BlaqJaq’s teeth to grind, straining his jawbone. Nickerson, leaning over, said quietly, “It’s stage fright,” which meant nothing and didn’t do anything for his anxiety until the older male briefly explained. BlaqJaq had never had so much eager attention focused on him, so many eyes. But even faced with this unexpected tension, he knew instinctively not to let himself get too distracted by these spectators. They didn’t matter, he told himself. Worry about our

opponents. Only them. The two krewes had convened together atop a square, open-air platform, towed to and anchored at the center of the city. The sultry late morning sported a sky gauzy with ambivalent cloud cover. All around their wobbly metaplastic island, onlookers gathered. They watched from boats and rafts; they stood on landings and perched atop the roofs of nearby structures, hundreds and hundreds more, citizens of the strange floating city and all those who’d traveled here for the spectacle of Carnival. A ragged, hungover anticipation rippled through the crowd. Sweaty knuckles rubbed sore eyes. Queasy stomachs tightened with every gentle slap of the water underfoot. Or so it seemed to BlaqJaq.

Blood in the Water

87

He pulled his awareness back into himself. Had he really readied himself for this? Maybe he couldn’t answer the question, but asking it meant a more productive way to preoccupy himself before the contest commenced. He had dressed in swimming briefs, the knife he’d drilled with yesterday belted around his brawny right thigh. Ready or not, soon he would go into this water, fully engaged in the violent blood sport of Carnival. But, of course, in New New Orleans, nothing could just go ahead and take place. A ritual had to come first. Costumed figures had arrived and departed, their outfits flashy, outrageous, like those masks he and the krewe had donned last night. The ceremonial participants wore full-length gowns and robes, capes, and cloaks, the fabrics lush, the colors eye searing, the styles crazy. Beads twinkled; dyed feathers shivered in the mild breeze; jewelry jingled. They recited words that BlaqJaq again didn’t try hard to follow. It all sounded vaguely musty to him, like old-time language handed down too many times through the years. Mostly he studied the five persons arrayed across the opposite side of the ’plastic platform. They posed and postured, making a big, bluff display of just standing there. Fang stood out as the most prominent, of course, and not just because of those freakish teeth. To BlaqJaq, he represented a type, like those chieftains back in the undercity -- the ones who led successful gangs, not the ones full of bravado who just got everybody under them killed in senseless fights. Fang had presence. He oozed menace and charisma. Making him a Mardi must’ve been like telling a hungry kid he could eat as much food as he wanted, so long as he saved enough for everybody else. Hungry children -- again, in BlaqJaq’s experience -- ate as much as they could, when they could, because you never knew when you’d eat next. So life had gone in the ’city anyway. Bullet, Hazy, Newt, and Carter, standing in the facing row with Fang, appeared all roughly BlaqJaq’s age, fit and tough; but they’d come here as fodder and they knew it, he would’ve bet. They wouldn’t amount to anything without someone strong to follow behind. This wouldn’t make them any less formidable in a fight, though.

88

Eric Del Carlo

Hazy and Bullet both had dark hair and very similar steely physiques. Newt stood shorter, wiry, the toes of her feet wriggling and clenching, plainly eager for the start of this. Directly opposite, BlaqJaq noted the one called Carter. He had pale hair stiffened into tufts and sinister eyes above spiny cheekbones. He kept fingering the pommel of the knife strapped to his leg and eyeing BlaqJaq with calculated menace, a would-be distraction easy enough to ignore. BlaqJaq busied himself taking professional note of this Mardi’s stance, trying to get a sense of his physical predispositions, a way of passing the time. Eventually two elderly figures, both draped in elaborate gowns, got ferried out to the platform. Morrow had said this pair would culminate the ceremony. They belonged to the gentry and got dusted off each year for this. The rest of the time, they just basked in their meaningless social status, earned, BlaqJaq figured, from having lived so long. The crowd had gathered more numbers. The anticipation sharpened, it seemed, fast murmurs audible across the emerald water. The two old figures carried between them a large swatch of worn, colorful cloth. They handled it with something like reverence. BlaqJaq recognized it, of course. This was the prize. This was the object of Carnival. Someone would stake the banner under the water, amid the drowned city’s ruins, and whichever krewe seized it first and brought it back up to the surface would win the contest. Looking now at the piece of fabric -- striped purple, green, and gold -- he thought how fundamentally stupid this whole deal seemed. People would likely get hurt, get killed, over the fetching of that flag. Pointless violence, a make-believe kind of warfare. But, he thought grimly, it did have meaning -- only because everyone agreed that it did. Winning would mean palmchips for him and Nickerson, and that would give them options that they’d never have otherwise. That made the risk worth it. The two old people, a woman and a man, conducted themselves with heavy dignity. They made strange muttery sounds over the striped cloth, and BlaqJaq finally had to release a sigh of pent-up frustration. How long would this dumb stuff go on? He glanced sidelong, to

Blood in the Water

89

his immediate right, where Nickerson still stood poised, waiting for the start of this. A tiny vein pulsed at the former assassin’s temple. Suddenly the old woman raised her free hand. Brittle looking and flecked with spots, she nonetheless made a convincingly fierce fist out of it. Still holding the flag’s edge in her other hand, she turned to take in the crowd, gathered air into her lungs and belted out, “Let this Carnival be played with the finest respect for our traditions! Let it stand, as it must always stand, for justice…faith…and power!” More meaningless words. But the gathered hundreds erupted into wild cheers and applause anyway. In the midst of the commotion, the pilot of the small vessel that had brought over the elders hopped onto the platform himself. The gowned pair handed over the threadbare banner with vast formality. Wearing only swimming briefs, without even a breather, the long-bodied male turned and dived into the water. His graceful form disappeared swiftly from view. At the same time, a brass horn sounded, low, creeping musical notes rising out of the welter of cheers as they slowly died away. BlaqJaq looked, but couldn’t see the horn’s player among the encircling assembly. The tune was elegant but not pompous. For some reason, he had the feeling it was supposed to honor both krewes. Soon enough the diver returned, without the striped flag. Everything ready, then.

Finally. BlaqJaq let the quivering tension in his limbs melt away. He focused. It might seem crazy to think this five-person group of theirs could take on Carnival’s champions after one -- one -- day of training together. But all five had proven themselves rugged, all five dedicated. And Nickerson had said it right: none of these others had the advantages of professional experience that the two of them possessed. That alone might carry this thing. The members of the two krewes now fitted their breathers into place. BlaqJaq’s teeth held the mouthpiece tightly. The seal over his chin and nose felt secure. Both krewes took positions on the platform’s edges, watching behind for the presiders’ signal. The horn player finished doling out the poignant song. Both elders stepped to the exact center of the platform. They raised bony arms, eyes wide and alive in crinkled faces. Then, in

90

Eric Del Carlo

unison and with impressive gusto, they shouted, “Go !” as they brought down their arms in twin slashes. The two competing groups had to dive off their respective sides of the platform. On BlaqJaq’s either hand, his fellow krewe members did just that, making sprightly, headfirst leaps into the water. BlaqJaq too launched himself -- only, catching a flicker of movement behind, he saw someone suddenly rushing at him from the opposite end of the little ’plastic island. He saw a flash of a pale-tufted head, teeth bared beneath the clear mask of a breather.

Carter. BlaqJaq whirled back from the edge, but with his balance compromised. Carter, charging full-out, clipped the old gowned man and sent him reeling. He grabbed for the knife sheathed against his thigh. On his first try, his hand slid off the hilt, but with his second, he’d gripped it properly and drawn the blade. That extra instant gave BlaqJaq the chance to get his feet turned and planted. He’d already gotten set for combat, though he hadn’t expected this particular attack. He didn’t know if this even counted as legal, according to the rules of Carnival. Unimportant right now. BlaqJaq didn’t make a grab for his own knife. Nickerson had shown him some good moves, and he had enough confidence to handle the blade, but Nickerson had demonstrated underwater techniques. Besides, this here qualified as more of a streetmuscle’s fight. Carter had one hand forward to catch BlaqJaq’s wrist or arm, the other weapon-baring hand drawn back for a single, decisive jab. One strike, Carter had to be thinking, and this fight would end. The Mardi charged, bare feet drumming across the platform. The two costumed overseers, still watching, retreated to safety. There might just barely have been time to sidestep. BlaqJaq possessed a nimbleness that his muscular body wouldn’t suggest. Carter might well go plunging right over and into the water. But then he’d still be in the fight. Better, BlaqJaq decided in a cold flash, to take full advantage of this opportunity.

Blood in the Water

91

He swung out an arm, slowly enough that Carter could grab it, but before the Mardi could make his stab, BlaqJaq’s other hand streaked downward, caught the knife hand over the top of the wrist, and halted the thrust. The two spun with Carter’s momentum, but now the pale-haired male had lost his balance. BlaqJaq kept a heel planted as they turned. He applied serious pressure to Carter’s wrist, grinding the small bones there. The fingers loosened, but struggled to hold on to the knife. Carter didn’t have BlaqJaq’s bodily mass, but he had agility and strength. Letting go of BlaqJaq’s arm, he cocked back his fist and shot a blow that clipped the side of BlaqJaq’s skull. BlaqJaq continued to persuade him to drop the blade, stepping in closer, wrapping his arm about the other’s shoulders, drawing him into a very dangerous embrace, what with the keenly edged weapon being wrestled between them. It flicked once across BlaqJaq’s ribs, and a sudden fine line of heat told him that a shallow cut had opened. BlaqJaq only pulled his opponent in tighter. Carter flailed with his free fist, but the punches came in panicky fashion now, ill aimed. BlaqJaq shifted his grip and closed steely fingers on Carter’s knuckles, locking his opponent’s hand on the knife handle, too late now to drop the blade. BlaqJaq wrenched the hand, turning it as it hadn’t been made to turn, manipulating the weapon for his own purposes; then came the penetration, accompanied by Carter’s shrill wail of pain, only slightly muted by the breather over his mouth. Blood spurted and splashed. A moment later, BlaqJaq heaved Carter away. The body struck the platform. Limbs splayed limply, and the blade went clattering off to one side. The two elders looked stunned and a little sickened, but the woman rallied herself, apparently making an immediate ruling on this turn of events. She straightened, shot a fierce gaze at BlaqJaq, and said, “Carnival continues!” He didn’t need to hear anything else. As he turned once more to make his leap, wet with Carter’s blood -- and some of his own -- a roar erupted from the onlookers, Morrow

92

Eric Del Carlo

among them, he hoped. It sounded like a cry of encouragement. BlaqJaq felt sure it meant that. BlaqJaq dived for the water. He sucked hard through his breather, assuring himself that it still worked. Bubbles frothed around him. A sleek, fast-moving shape swam directly up toward him, and a new jolt of adrenaline pumped into his veins. However, he saw immediately that this was Nickerson, his eyes wide and concerned. BlaqJaq swiped at the blood washing harmlessly off him and dissipating into the greenish water, hoping the older man wouldn’t notice the minor gash he’d picked up. He gave a brief “I’m okay” hand signal. Nickerson nodded, pivoted, and streaked for the depths. BlaqJaq followed, quick to orient himself. It stood now at five to four, with Carter dead before he’d reached the water, but plainly a tough fight lay ahead. It was going differently than a drill, even though BlaqJaq’s fellow krewe members stuck pretty well to their planned maneuvers. BlaqJaq’s delay in getting into the water had disorganized things a bit. Teeth clamped on his breather’s rubbery mouthpiece, he aimed toward the lower reaches, where the light lost its dominance. Some distance off to his left, Spark tangled with either Hazy or Bullet. Bodies lashed; water churned. Each had a hold of one of the other’s forearms and, with his or her free hand, threw punches severely slowed by the drag of the water. They turned, twisted, writhed, each struggling to stay out of a more serious hold by the other. Neither had drawn a knife yet. Nearer, maybe five meters directly below, Trumpet had grappled the Mardi named Newt into a shrewd arm-lock. He’d maneuvered behind his opponent, applying pressure mercilessly, veins standing out along his arms. He drove a knee into Newt’s back, no doubt looking for her kidneys. He repeated this action as BlaqJaq continued to dive. Below, the crumbled lines of the ruined city grew. The weight of the water made itself known, even as the light scattered into hundreds of muddling fragments. BlaqJaq concentrated, aware of up and down, knowing where he

Blood in the Water

93

wanted to head and how he had to get there. He moved swiftly and cleanly. He ignored the thread of blood dribbling from his side. His breathing stayed steady, if swift. In his ears, his heartbeat thumped louder than the swish of the water. Nickerson swam ahead. Farther past, BlaqJaq spotted Twain, who moved with speed and poise. Where had Fang gone? Did he simply mean to beat everybody else to the trophy? Grabbing that banner from where it had been planted didn’t constitute victory. In order to win the Carnival, one had to return with it to the surface, to present it officially to those two old judges. Clumps of seaweed drifted. Fish bolted. Silt roiled. New Orleans’s remains lay rife with coral, brightened by clinging sea life. BlaqJaq remembered being down here that first time, when he’d started seeing phantoms roaming the encrusted streets. A trick of the mind; he’d known that. But the ruins felt eerie, nonetheless. Only the basic grid pattern of the original city remained after all these years, no recognizable landmarks. Except one. The Cathedral. Morrow, when he’d briefed their krewe, had told them what to expect. Twain had added his firsthand knowledge. BlaqJaq saw it at the limit of his sight, realized he’d gone a bit off his course and adjusted. The Cathedral loomed out of the watery dusk, imposing only because it stood among a field of so much else that had eroded almost to nothingness. Plainly this lone structure hadn’t really remained intact; the spire supposedly bearing the purple, green, and gold banner had broken off from something larger. The tapering tower tilted at a mild angle. BlaqJaq couldn’t see the banner yet. As he squinted to try to improve his vision in the murk, sudden movement broke from the undulating fronds of a seaweed cluster below and raced toward Nickerson, still ahead. BlaqJaq saw Hazy, which meant that Spark grappled with Bullet back there. Nickerson responded, but Hazy spurted toward him, knife in fist. Instinctively BlaqJaq tried to call a warning, making nothing more than muffled gibberish inside his breather.

94

Eric Del Carlo

Hazy, quick and spry in the water, never wasted a movement, never over- or underestimated his speed. Nickerson’s feline enrichment allowed him to match the Mardi’s fast moves. He drew his blade from its sheath, and the two started to duel. BlaqJaq shifted course again. He had to aid Nickerson, naturally, even if his lover could handle the situation all on his own. The impulse was strong, virtually impossible to resist, like something instilled deep within him, almost a survival impulse. Save Nickerson, save

Nickerson -So BlaqJaq intended to do until he saw past the tussling pair. Twain, swimming ahead of them all just above the gridded ruins, closed rapidly on the broken off spire of the Cathedral. Suddenly he swerved sharply, doubling over, hands clutching his leg. The water, dirtied by the disturbed bottom silt, discolored further, darkening with blood. Twain rolled violently, no longer swimming toward his target. At the same time, up from the disintegrating maze of the old city, the figure of Fang streaked, his body nearly a blur. He looked, to BlaqJaq’s eyes, like a person operating in his natural environment. As he shot from the cover of a kelp-slimed wall, an instrument of some kind, discarded, tumbled end over end. A long rod. A gun. He must have stashed it down here ahead of time. BlaqJaq, putting this together in a single mental flash, felt dismayed by the dishonesty. These Mardis wouldn’t accept a fair fight. Maybe they’d cheated during the last Carnival too. Fang now headed straight for the spire. BlaqJaq could finally see where the multicolored banner, attached to the tower’s peak, gently billowed with the flow of the water. Twain certainly wouldn’t get there now. He continued to writhe, clenching his wounded leg, bleeding out clouds of red. Nickerson’s combat with Hazy had intensified. The Mardi had good moves, and his knife carved the water wickedly. Nickerson neatly parried with his own blade but couldn’t get much done offensively. Nonetheless, he seemed aware of BlaqJaq’s approach and even of

Blood in the Water

95

what had just transpired with Twain and Fang. Somehow he found the time to shoot a hand sign at BlaqJaq: “Main objective.” He couldn’t mistake the order. BlaqJaq’s teeth clenched even tighter on his breather’s mouthpiece, as if he meant to bite clean through. His gut chilled, but he obeyed the command. He swam past the older man and the Mardi and set off after Fang, who continued to near the canted spire. BlaqJaq passed close enough to the thrashing figure of Twain to see that a long metal spike had punched raggedly through the meat of his right thigh. Blood continued to pump into the water, and fish started to swirl excitedly about. BlaqJaq had heard enough about sharks to hope that one didn’t appear. He swam through the mist of Twain’s blood, feeling another grim chill, forced to leave his comrade unattended. This far below the surface, the light was tricky. The sunken relics all around looked mournful, even a bit threatening. Again BlaqJaq could almost -- almost -- imagine the buildings that must have stood here and the people who must have populated this place. All dead. Long since dead…but some vague, lingering, living spirit abided here, something improbable that just wouldn’t die no matter what -BlaqJaq, with a sharp mental shudder, shook off the by now familiar spell. Fang would get to the banner before he did. The dogjob had too great a lead. Fang, right from the moment he’d hit the water, must’ve dived straight for the place where he’d hidden that evil spear-throwing gun. He must’ve planned to pick off whoever of the other krewe got in the lead, while the others stayed engaged. Fang had successfully eliminated Twain from this contest. Only, BlaqJaq had also taken out Carter up on the platform, so the mismatch had already been evened out. Fang, BlaqJaq realized with a warming surge of hope, might not even have spotted him yet. Once more, BlaqJaq shifted course, rising at an angle this time, coming up over the Cathedral’s spire. Fang, he saw, had already grabbed the tattered banner, tearing it loose, clutching it victoriously. But the Carnival hadn’t ended yet.

96

Eric Del Carlo

BlaqJaq had positioned himself shrewdly. Fang, the prize in his hands, obviously meant to get back to the surface as directly as possible. The canine-enriched male kicked off from the Cathedral’s crumbling spire, his trajectory straight up and precise, velocity impressive, but he’d aimed himself inadvertently right at BlaqJaq, waiting above. In the murkiness, BlaqJaq saw the other’s eyes go wide with surprise, then darken instantly with fury. Fang grappled for his knife, forced now to resort to the only authorized weapon of this Carnival. Unluckily for him, his hands were still tangled in the colorful banner. He continued to rise straight for BlaqJaq, who took the advantage, dove two meters, and sought to take his enemy in a neck-lock. Fang, agile and strong, had confidence in his gen-stimmed superiority, even now. He twisted in the grip BlaqJaq tried to establish. He drove an elbow. It hit BlaqJaq near the gash Carter’s blade had opened on him, but the blow didn’t disable him. Fang still fumbled for his knife underneath the rolling folds of the banner. If BlaqJaq could fix the hold on him that he wanted, even for just a second, he could jam his own blade into Fang’s back. They struggled intensely. BlaqJaq still had the advantage, with one arm partially clasped around Fang’s chest from behind. He tried to close that arm all the way and draw it up around Fang’s throat, but the Mardi thrashed, elbowing, kicking, doing everything he could to prevent it. Suddenly the banner drifted free from Fang’s grasp, floating away from the scuffling pair. BlaqJaq’s eyes flashed after it, briefly, just to mark where it went, but in that same instant, Fang performed another forceful twist, reaching a hand back over his shoulder, fingers seizing the breather covering the lower half of BlaqJaq’s face and tearing the device free, even as BlaqJaq desperately tried to hang on to it with his teeth. Fang wrenched the breather loose and flung it away. BlaqJaq, his breathing quickened by the fight, had been in midgasp. Now he cut off his breath, holding it tightly in his chest. He clamped his lips together. Suddenly it felt just like in the river. Water had become his

Blood in the Water

97

antagonist, and it wanted to drown him, wanted to make him a permanent resident of this dead city. His muscles slackened. Fang, taking advantage, started to squirm out of his grasp. At the same time, he had finally successfully located his knife’s hilt and drawn the weapon. BlaqJaq would have no chance. Already a red-tinged blackness circled his skull. His body remembered that earlier near-drowning and sent out insistent fear-bright impulses. His streetmuscle’s instincts, however, also possessed great power. They operated independent of the fear, it seemed, cutting through the gathering panic and the first searing pain of air-starved lungs. BlaqJaq, summoning a ferocious burst of strength from no reserve he could identify, tightened his arm all at once around Fang, the crook of his elbow closing like something mechanical and implacable around the neck. With his other hand, he reached over, seized the Mardi’s reconstructed jaw, and yanked. He felt through his fingers the savage growl in Fang’s throat as the head turned to the side -- turned far too fast, turned against fierce resistance that proved nonetheless futile. BlaqJaq thought he heard the crackle. The head lolled back, the eyes in that head shock wide and disbelieving. They did not blink as the body went limp in BlaqJaq’s hold. He let the corpse slide free, giving it a firm push out of his way as he lunged after the wafting banner. He didn’t see his breather anywhere. No time to look for it. The banner eluded his first grab, its edge curling away like something living. Then he missed it a second maddening time. Finally he caught it, balled a fist in the fabric, and aimed for the surface. He didn’t trust any other orientation at this moment, just up. He had to get back to the air. Just like the first time he’d found himself under the water, he felt the final blackness cinching around him, ominous and eager. His legs kicked. His arms stayed tucked tightly against his body. The banner, luckily, didn’t offer much drag. Only then he realized, in a harsh jolt of belated insight, that he should’ve taken Fang’s breather. He gained speed, and the light shifted. The mildly changing pressure rippled a little wavelet of nausea through him. He definitely couldn’t afford to puke,

98

Eric Del Carlo

not now. He -- needed -- AIR! That absolutely primal need again, eating at his whole being, animating every part of him with the urgency. How sweet the air would taste. How he would drink it in, how delicious it would -Something, which in that very first instant might’ve been only a thick strand of seaweed, wrapped his ankle. Then the fingers tightened, an arm pulled, and his desperate rise to the surface was interrupted. BlaqJaq turned frantic eyes downward and saw Bullet. Teeth, only slightly less feral looking than Fang’s, grinned viciously around his breather’s mouthpiece. The Mardi’s other hand gripped his knife, and as he slashed it toward the leg stretched before him, BlaqJaq kicked furiously, which made his lungs sizzle with hot agony. His vision blurred over. Daylight wriggled on the skin of the water, five or six meters above, so close, like being taunted. Bullet acted as a weight, keeping BlaqJaq mercilessly from the life-giving air. Spark had failed to delay this Mardi, which might mean she’d gotten killed. BlaqJaq managed to evade Bullet’s first, then his second swipe with the knife, but every thrash of BlaqJaq’s legs came at a mounting cost. Numbness slid in to replace the queasiness, and behind that waited an ultimate darkness. He wouldn’t manage to hold the blazing breath in his lungs much longer. When that happened, this salty water would pour into him, fill him…drown him. His hand dropped to his own blade. He had succeeded against this enemy krewe’s chieftain, dispatching Fang with his hands, a victory of which to be proud. This battle, though, probably wouldn’t go so well for him. BlaqJaq’s eyesight started to blacken drastically as he prepared to fight, his knife’s handle wedged into barely responsive fingers, his other hand bunching the banner against his pounding chest. Blood still trickled from his side, staining the water. His limbs no longer felt his to control. He’d come nearer now to the true end than he’d ever gotten in the river. Bullet, below, still grinned malevolently as he readied to slash at BlaqJaq once more. Darkness closed over the water and seized BlaqJaq’s consciousness, and out of both these blacks, it seemed, a new shape emerged, swift, decisive, lethal. It rose behind Bullet.

Blood in the Water

99

BlaqJaq saw only the watery glint of metal. Then a vast cloud of red erupted all around, and the pressure around BlaqJaq’s ankle disappeared. But the release had come too late, some ebbing part of his mind noted sadly. BlaqJaq’s lungs convulsed. Trapped air ruptured violently out of him. He tasted the salt of water and the salt of blood, and then that water took him.

100

Eric Del Carlo

Chapter Thirteen

Dark hair, tangled in drying, fanned across the pillow. Nickerson looked repeatedly, compulsively to the supine figure, seeing no change. His innards tightened with each glance, but he truly couldn’t restrain himself. His methodical training in the management of emotion was useless, it seemed, against the vast gravity of feeling he had invested in this particular individual. “It’s just sleep now.” The Major’s head, hair thinning through to the scalp at his crown, remained bent over Nickerson’s hand. “Sedative’s worn off. He’ll wake when he does.” The Major’s voice was soft, almost tranquil, a reassuring counterpoint to the hysteria and mayhem playing out so loudly beyond the walls of this little infirmary. Nickerson had vaguely imagined that Carnival had already reached its peak. Not so. The contest’s outcome had evidently touched off a fresh paroxysm of celebration that put the previous days to shame. No doubt this was due, in part, to what many in the city regarded as a happy result: the ousting of the former reigning krewe and the induction of new Mardis. An instrument buzzed as a tingling traced its way unhurriedly across Nickerson’s outstretched palm. For some odd reason, it made his nose tickle.

Blood in the Water

101

“I’m taking off this scar,” said the Major. “It’s unsightly. It would make my work look bad.” Nickerson left the man, easily a decade his senior, to it. The Major was plainly competent. Nickerson didn’t need any further clues to guess that he was ex-military and to deduce, from his current situation, that he’d left the service under some dubious circumstance or other. When Nickerson had hauled BlaqJaq, still clutching the banner that meant the contest’s victory, to the platform on the water’s surface, the younger male had made a frighteningly dead weight. Blood flowed from a minor laceration, but his swallowing water had rendered him unconscious, which might mean death without treatment. A great bedlam of cheering had gone up from the crowd, but the noises had barely registered to Nickerson. His every impulse ratcheted up into a frenzy state, he had focused exclusively on reviving his lover. He’d straddled BlaqJaq on that ’plastic platform, pumping forcefully on his chest, breathing air past unresponsive lips, fear and more fear tightening around his heart with each passing instant, threatening to crush it utterly. Only after a time did it fully occur to him that he didn’t know what to do here. As an assassin, he had trained as a killer, not a healer. Fortunately the Major had arrived in time and had, with disarming efficiency, revived BlaqJaq. Then he had bundled him off, away from the crowd’s tumult. Nickerson, naturally, had accompanied them to this infirmary, caring nothing now about Carnival. They’d won; that much he realized. “There.” The buzzing stopped. The instrument clacked onto a nearby tray, and the Major sat back. “Light it up.” He was smiling. Nickerson twitched his right hand, feeling a small, familiar warmth come alive in his palm. “It works.” But he said it almost absently, gaze straying again to the cot on where BlaqJaq lay. The kid breathed regularly, but he hadn’t shifted position in two hours.

102

Eric Del Carlo

“More than works,” said the Major, tone mock affronted and smug. From a low shelf in the small room, he lifted a worn case and thumbed a toggle on its side. The faceplate had cracked, but it looked like it functioned. “Have a try.” He held it up for Nickerson, who put his palm -- no trace of scar, as promised -- to the interface. It responded. No cascading static of steel sleet showed on the readout; no rejecting null mode. Nickerson peered at the number on the plate. The Major’s chuckle was quite self-satisfied. “See? We take care of our Mardis.” Nickerson, still absorbing the amount of registered credit, blinked his cat eyes at the medic. “It’ll be the same for my friend?” “Soon as I give him his chip. I want him awake for that, though.” The Major was replacing the interface scanner on its shelf. “Where did these palmchips come from?” But Nickerson’s question was softly uttered; he might’ve been asking it rhetorically of no one. The Major, however, had an answer of sorts. “Where does anything come from? They’re here. That’s all that matters.” At that moment, BlaqJaq made a sleepy, gummy sound. Nickerson, heart quickening, turned to see the dark-haired head moving on the pillow. He waited anxiously as the eyelids fluttered. He took up one of BlaqJaq’s hands and gently squeezed, willing the younger man back into consciousness. “Nnnnn --” “It’s me,” Nickerson said, voice tightened into a whisper. A great happiness was growing in him with every sign of BlaqJaq’s awakening. The Major had been perfectly confident about his absolute recovery, but that hadn’t kept Nickerson from hovering apprehensively since they’d gotten to this infirmary.

Blood in the Water

103

In a few minutes, BlaqJaq was sitting up on the cot, sipping water, coughing weakly. A few minutes after that he seemed quite collected. Color was coming into his face. His eyes were focused. “We won, right?” he asked, offering a fair approximation of his familiar grin. “We won.” Nickerson felt his own tension easing finally. BlaqJaq nodded. His expression grew solemn. “Who lived and who died?” Carter, Fang, and Bullet of the enemy krewe were all dead. During combat, both Newt and Hazy had been neutralized but not killed; both were still alive, so far as Nickerson knew. Only Spark of the new champion krewe had lost her life during the contest; Bullet had cut open her throat. Though Nickerson said nothing, he wondered how Trumpet was handling that. Twain had been severely wounded by Fang’s spear gun and was still being treated by one of the other doctors in the city, this one a surgeon who the Major said was quite skilled and dedicated. Twain would likely be able to walk again one day, but he’d actively participated in his last Carnival. “So…we got what we wanted?” asked BlaqJaq. Nickerson held up his unscarred right palm. “You can have yours anytime you want.” BlaqJaq sighed out a tired laugh. “That’ll be something new for me. I never figured, growing up in the undercity…” “You’ll like having a chip. Particularly after you see the credit amount.” The young man gazed warmly at him now. He reached out a hand and trailed a fingertip down Nickerson’s cheek. The Major was busying himself in the room’s farthest corner. “I take it you don’t want to stay in New New Orleans?” Nickerson asked wryly. “Being a Mardi for a year doesn’t appeal to you?” “I don’t care anything about that. It’s all…fake.” “Yes, it is.”

104

Eric Del Carlo

“This never would’ve happen to me,” BlaqJaq said in a heartfelt tone, “not without you. Thanks for it. For it all.” Heat caught in Nickerson’s throat. He took BlaqJaq’s hand and pressed his lips to it. They sat like that awhile. After a time, BlaqJaq was ready for the palmchip’s installation. His eyes widened when he saw the number register on the scanner, though he probably had no real conception of just how prodigious a sum it was. At last, Nickerson looked to the Major. “Can we ask another favor?” “None of these are favors, gentlemen. You’re both Mardis. You understand that?” Nickerson smiled. Only a small part of him regretted that he and BlaqJaq wouldn’t be remaining here in New New Orleans for all the festivities that would mark their official coronation. Neither would they be basking in any of the yearlong glory of their status as Mardis, which would last until next Carnival and next year’s inevitable challenge. Nickerson said to the Major, “We just need a short ride.”

***** The overhauled engine’s healthy grumble put a grin on BlaqJaq’s face. The sedative’s effects had dissipated. He was fully awake and eager. The mechanic at the docking atoll where they’d left their boat refused any sort of payment. He had renovated the vessel’s workings on his own initiative, once he’d learned that Nickerson and BlaqJaq were going to challenge the current Mardis. Whatever else, Twain and Trumpet -- the krewe’s other two survivors, and the only ones who would be remaining in the city -- were going to be enthusiastically welcomed to their reign. “We can go far,” BlaqJaq predicted, standing at the boat’s controls. They hadn’t yet cast off from the artificial atoll. “Far,” the mechanic agreed. His stolid face was marked by a red incarceration chevron. He had grease in his pores. “You’re provisioned for anyplace you want to go.”

Blood in the Water

105

“To a port?” asked Nickerson. “To a city, a real city?” “Go west. Old Texas province. They’ve got cities.” BlaqJaq was still flexing his right hand, getting used to the micromuscular twitch that triggered his chip. “Thanks for taking care of our boat,” he said. The mechanic said nothing. Nickerson again held out a handful of metal chits. It prompted no response at all from the man. They were Mardis; they didn’t have to pay. But Nickerson said, “Noblesse oblige,” and forcibly poured the local money into his black-nailed hands. The mechanic stepped off the deck, and workers came to unmoor the vessel. BlaqJaq, plainly delighted, guided them out of the scrap-walled atoll. Night had fallen, and festivity blazed throughout the city. Nickerson and BlaqJaq, following their visit to the Major, had to report to the Mardis’ formal residence, to take ceremonial possession. No doubt this would involve vast quantities of alcohol and debauchery of every kind imaginable. New New Orleans, Nickerson thoroughly understood by now, knew how to celebrate with gusto. BlaqJaq crept them through the pandemonium, winding past the floating structures, past the last of the howling revelers, finally beyond the aquatic city’s limits. Once clear, BlaqJaq worked the throttle. They gained speed, and the drifting lights winked out of sight behind them one by one in the night.

***** The coast, an ambiguous line of green and brown, stayed on their starboard side, just in view. Nickerson, using a greasy fingertip and a patch of deck, had sketched their very general route, and BlaqJaq, like he had a perfect familiarity with life on the sea, had suggested they simply follow the coastline. Whatever ports lay westward, they’d find them eventually. Nickerson liked the practicality of that. Despite the palmchips that promised they could freely enter civilized society, he felt no need to rush. This travel calmed him, especially in such good company.

Eric Del Carlo

106

“That smile for me?” With the autopilot engaged, BlaqJaq sunned on the deck. With the consistently humid weather, he’d taken to living in the swimming briefs he’d worn during the Carnival. Nickerson, who’d just come up from belowdecks, had dressed the same. “Yes. For you.” He hadn’t smiled consciously, but who else could have prompted it? Days now out on the water, without seeing another person, another craft. BlaqJaq’s eyes remained on him, a corresponding curl on his lips. He lay on a mat on the deck, propped up on his elbows. Gulls’ cries echoed. Rain had come yesterday, churning the sea a bit, but BlaqJaq had stood steadfast at the controls. Today the water -- less green now, shading toward metallic blues -- appeared relatively placid. “Come over here,” the dark-haired male murmured. “I’ll give you a real reason to smile.” The promise surged an automatic response through Nickerson’s sleekly muscled form. With the sun’s heat on his shoulders, he crossed to the mat, to the familiar, tempting shape laid out there. That familiarity was only deepening Nickerson’s attraction, his need for the younger man. He hadn’t imagined during his years as an assassin that he would ever find himself requiring another person so passionately -- or that he would feel so comfortable with that need. His love for BlaqJaq made him stronger, not weaker, something he’d been profoundly glad to discover. Nickerson dropped to one knee. BlaqJaq reached up, the movement vaguely lethargic, and curled his fingers around the fair-haired man’s upper arm, tugging him down. His excitement rising and stirring his cock inside the briefs, Nickerson lay alongside his lover. Their bodies came together, arms cinching, bellies and thighs pressing, twin hardnesses finding each other and rubbing through cloth. Their mouths met hungrily. BlaqJaq’s sunwarmed languor evidently melted away as he thrust his tongue against Nickerson’s, their kiss long and searching. Nickerson’s hands roamed the kid’s back, over columns of muscle and

Blood in the Water

107

the flexing ridge of his backbone. One hand ranged lower and took up a handful of firmly molded ass. BlaqJaq moaned appreciatively into his mouth. A hand slid over Nickerson’s pectoral muscle, and two knuckles caught his nipple and squeezed with just enough insistent pressure. Those fingers roved downward over a rigid abdomen, flicking playfully across his navel, then took hold of the prominent ridge bulging his briefs. Nickerson’s hips moved, his body already seeking the fulfillment that these first forays promised. His own hand sought the younger male’s crotch. He slid it down into the briefs’ waistband, low enough to lovingly cup BlaqJaq’s balls. The warm sacs stirred in his gentle clasp. “Got to have my mouth on you…” BlaqJaq said. The dark-haired head pulled away. He shifted on the mat. The deck creaked and popped beneath them. With urgent grapplings, he yanked off Nickerson’s swimming briefs. But Nickerson felt desire just as critically, and the need to have BlaqJaq’s cock in his mouth overwhelmed him, so that he too tore away the other’s scanty clothing. The two men scuffled, limbs flailing, making a joyous game of it, each rushing to fully undress the other first. Nickerson, later, couldn’t have said who won the competition. A sweet delirium drove him. Soon he found himself naked, body basted with sweat, lying on his left hip bone. He held BlaqJaq around the waist, the kid’s meat twitching, upside down, in front of his face. Beads of perspiration glittered among his dark pubic curls. Eagerly Nickerson slipped his lips over the cockhead, tasting that peculiar flavor, unmistakably masculine, indisputably BlaqJaq’s. At the same instant, an engulfing warmth seized the crown of his cock. BlaqJaq’s tongue flitted nimbly, wriggling pleasure through Nickerson’s body. He, in turn, slid the circle of his lips avidly down the former streetmuscle’s vein-lined shaft. The reversed angle

108

Eric Del Carlo

felt odd, but Nickerson delighted in the variation. His arm pulled tighter. He took in the pulsing length until the tip of his nose pressed against BlaqJaq’s sweat-moist balls. BlaqJaq swallowed him too, a perfect joining, mouth-to-cock/cock-to-mouth, like a sublimely completed circuit. A fabulous sense of unity soaked through the intense carnality of the moment, even as Nickerson sucked ardently, thrilled by the savor and scent and texture. After a moment, he pushed over onto his back, hauling his lover with him, closing both hands over the flexing ass. BlaqJaq’s cock entered his throat, and Nickerson accommodated the encroachment, welcoming it, needing it. BlaqJaq, now lying full length atop him, lifted and dropped his mouth with greater speed on Nickerson’s rampant cock. Nickerson’s hips were bucking on the mat bunched underneath his ass. BlaqJaq was fucking his face enthusiastically, with Nickerson gamely taking each plunge. He slithered a finger into the young man’s crevice and delved into his waiting hole; that touched off BlaqJaq’s orgasm. Knees banged loudly on the deck, and the dark-haired male’s cry was muffled by Nickerson’s cock. Liquid, slick and salty, streamed into Nickerson’s mouth, coating his tongue, dribbling into his throat. He felt helpless to hold back his own cum. Ecstasy wrenched him, and he released his seed. BlaqJaq’s mouth remained on his cock, taking the living warmth, drinking it. For that moment, the two men sustained each other, each feeding his lover, each supplying the other’s prime, undeniable need. BlaqJaq was softening in his mouth before Nickerson made a move to uncouple himself reluctantly from his lover. With languid sighs, the two readjusted the crumpled mat and lay down again, this time to merely bask in the sunshine and their union’s afterglow. Gulls were still crying. The boat, on autopilot, continued to follow the coast. “It’s not going to be like the undercity.” “No,” BlaqJaq murmured.

Blood in the Water

109

“It won’t be anything like New New Orleans either.” “It won’t…” BlaqJaq’s head was abutting Nickerson’s shoulder. He sounded drowsy, and Nickerson wondered if he knew what his own agreement meant. “I mean when we reach the next city. The real city.” “I know that.” Still Nickerson wondered. As much as the kid had gone through and had to adjust so quickly to, could he handle true civilization? They would both arrive as bona fide citizens, by virtue of their palmchips. No Hunt of Nine would await them there, no Carnival. He would do fine, Nickerson decided silently. BlaqJaq, intelligent and resourceful, an exceptional individual, would have a guide and mentor who would never abandon him. With the hearty engine vibrating below, Nickerson regarded the clouds overhead for a few moments, sure by BlaqJaq’s even breathing that he’d dozed -- sure, at least, until the younger man abruptly stirred, climbed to his feet, and stepped to the boat’s controls. Nickerson turned, watching his naked lover retrieve something from the stall’s floor. It was the automatic weapon, the one that had fired the phosphorous rounds that night on the river. BlaqJaq carried it by its barrel. He found some free space then turned twice in a circle, swinging the object, building centrifugal force. He flung it. It went end over end and struck the water well off the port side with an impressive splash. He’d never even gotten to fire the damned thing, and his expression said so. His eyes fell to Nickerson, still lying on the deck. “I understand where we’re going.” Nickerson nodded. He still had his bag of weaponry, with several of the devices recharged, but those implements were elegant and subtle compared to the bigger gun. They’d been the tools of his trade, and he’d made good use of them over the years of his career.

110

Eric Del Carlo

Propping an elbow under him, Nickerson asked, “Do you still want to see what’s…up

there ?” A smile showed on BlaqJaq’s handsome features. His eyes looked into the sky, straight up, toward the starry black that couldn’t be seen in the daylight, toward places better than this festering Earth. Nickerson felt an eagerness to return to those off-rock environs, even if those former superiors of his had betrayed him, even if he found himself now a marked man among the colonies. He felt no fear. He knew something about stealth, after all. Almost as much as he knew about the discreet art of assassination. Their vessel plied a course westward, on a route that would take them, eventually, to the stars.

Eric Del Carlo Eric Del Carlo’s short fantasy, science fiction and horror have appeared in various publications since the early ‘90s. He is the coauthor, with Robert Asprin, of the sword and sorcery fantasy series Wartorn. He is a native Californian, who returned to his home state after fleeing New Orleans ahead of Hurricane Katrina.