Baader and Meinhof and them. They used to be close like this." He held up a clenched fist.
Hartmann sucked in his lips. Since the terrorist wars had gotten underway for true in the early Seventies, it wasn't uncommon for radical attorneys to come to involve themselves selves directly in the activities of those they represented in court, especially in Germany and Italy. Apparently, if what the kid said was true, Prahler had been a leader in the Baader-Meinhof group and the RAF all along, without the authorities ever getting wind of the fact.
Hartmann looked at Tom Miller. "I'll rephrase my question. How did you get mixed up in this, Gimli?"
"We just happened to be in the right place at the right time, Senator."
The dwarf smirked at him. Puppetman felt an urge to crush that smug face, to tear out the dwarf's guts and throttle him with them. The frustration was physical torment.
Sweat crawled down Hartmann's forehead like a centipede. His emotions were oddly distinct from Puppetman's. His other self whipsawed from rage to fear. What he mostly felt now was tired and annoyed.
And sad. Poor Ronnie. He meant so well. He tried so hard.
The redhead suddenly slapped the seated man on the shoulder. "You idiot, Wilfried, there it was! You went past it." He mumbled apology and dialed back.
"-captured by the Red Army Fraction, acting in concert with comrades from the jokers for a just Society who have fled persecution in Amerika." It was Comrade Wolf's voice, pouring like liquid amber from the cheap little radio. "The terms of his release are these: release of the Palestinian freedom fighter al-Muezzin. An airliner with sufficient fuel to take al-Muezzin to a country in the liberated Third World. Immunity from prosecution for members of this action team. We demand that the Jetboy memorial be torn down and in its place a facility built to provide shelter and medical attention to joker victims of Amerikan intolerance. And finally, just to poke the capitalist swine where it most hurts them, ten million dollars cash, which will be used to aid victims of Amerikan aggression in Central Amerika."
"If these terms are not met by ten o'clock tonight, Berlin time, Senator Gregg Hartmann will be executed."
"We return you now to regularly scheduled programming."
"We have to do something." Hiram Worchester tangled his fingers in his beard and gazed out the window at the patchy Berlin sky.
Digger Downs turned over a card. Trey of clubs. He grimaced.
Billy Ray paced the carpet of Hiram's suite like a tyrannosaurus with an itch. "If I'd been there, this shit would never have happened," he said, and aimed a green glare at Mordecai Jones.
The Hammer sat on the sofa. It was oak and flowered upholstery, and like many of the hotel's furnishings had survived the war. Fortunately they'd built stout furniture back in the 1890s.
Jones made a dirty-gearbox noise toward the center of him and stared at his big hands, which he was working into tangles between his knees.
The door opened and Peregrine flew into the room. Figuratively, at least, her wings jittering on her back. She wore a loose' velour blouse and jeans that muted the advanced state of her pregnancy.
"I just heard on the radio-isn't it terrible?" Then she stopped and stared at the Hammer. "Mordecai-what on earth are you doing here?"
"Just like you, Ms. Peregrine. Won't let me out."
"But why aren't you in the hospital? The reports said you were terribly injured."
"Just shot a little." He slapped his gut. "Got me a pretty tough hide, kind of like that Kevlar stuff you read about in Popular Science."
Downs turned up a new card. Red eight. "Shit," he muttered.
"But a van fell on you," Peregrine said.
"Yeah, but see, I got these funky heavy metals replacing the calcium in my bones, so they're like stronger and more flexible and all, and my innards and whatnot are a lot sturdier than most folks'. And I heal mighty fast-don't even get sick-since I turned up my ace. I'm a pretty durable sort of dude."
"Then why'd you let them get away?" Bill Ray challenged, almost shouting. "Goddamn, the senator was your responsibility. You could've kicked some ass."
"To tell you the entire truth, Mr. Ray, it hurt like a sonofabitch. I wasn't good for much for a while there." The Mister came out differently than Ms. had. Billy Ray cocked his head and looked hard at him. Jones ignored him. "Lay off him, Billy," said Carnifex's partner, Lady Black, who sat to one side with her