She stared at Paul, put one hand out, took her Taser from her belt. She looked at Marge, raised an eyebrow and nodded in recognition. She chirruped and whistled, and stroked the air as if it were a piglet’s head.
Collingswood smacked her lips. “Fucking fucking fuck me,” she whispered. She smiled an utterly beautiful smile. “It’s true. You really did. Fuck me. Finally. Oh … my … gosh. We could do with a bit of good news tonight.”
“I told you there was stuff going on with me,” Marge said.
“And look,” said Collingswood. “Slap my naughty knuckles for making the wrong call. And it’s you.” She said that to Paul. “Well, I mean not you but you. Fucked if I know what’s the point tonight, but you got to do what you can, right? Come on then.” She motioned the two of them up. They obeyed.
“What is this?” Marge said. She sounded mild, not outraged—curious.
“Give me a minute I’ll come up with a bunch of stuff to charge you with,” Collingswood said. “Basically, the gist of it is, you’re coming with me. Might as well salvage something. You too.” She looked at Paul. He stood meekly enough. He looked side to side as something invisible circled him. “I don’t want any trouble. From you or from, y’know. Your passenger. For fuck’s sake, don’t you want to get out of all this?” she said.
Yes, thought Marge. Really. Collingswood nodded at her. The officer did not need her sensitivities to read that answer. “Come on then,” she said. “Bloody star, you.”
Paul slumped, walked toward the car too, then abruptly raced past Collingswood and her fumbling officers, toward the exit. He knocked her as he went, so she staggered and dropped her cigarette.
“Naughty fucking naughty,” she shouted. “Tase the bastard.” One of the officers missed, but another got Paul in the back, in his unseen Tattoo, with the electricity-spitting wires. Paul shrieked and fell, spasming.
“Stop, stop!” shouted Marge. “Don’t you know who he is, don’t you know what he’s …? He can’t face being locked up anymore, that’s why—”
“Boohoo,” said Collingswood. “Do I look like I give a shit?” She stood over Paul as he strained to breathe. In truth she did look like she gave a little of a shit. She wore an expression not of regret, exactly, but of troubled irritation, as if the paper in the photocopier had run out.
“No one’s out to fuck you up,” she said to him. “Will you stop it?” A swiney scream screamed in dimensions close enough for Marge to hear it, and receded. “Now you scared off Perky,” Collingswood said. “Get him in the car,” she shouted at her men. “If there’s still London in the morning, we’ll see what we do.”
All the cops were as ineffective as keystones, hauling the moaning Paul toward the car. The thought came to Marge that she could run. It was followed by the knowledge that she would not. She walked after them, as she had been told.
The arrest, the invitation, was enticing. After all that work she had done, everything she had faced, police tea, a holding room, someone else making the running. I, Marge thought as she settled into the back, offered her shoulder as a pillow for Paul’s still lolling head, am bloody tired.
“You two are walking home,” Collingswood was saying to her officers. “Only room for one more. I wasn’t expecting arrests. But seeing as Baz took the shot, he gets the gig.” The other two grumbled. “Fuck, you are a wet pair. Look on the bright side: you’ll both be burned out of history by morning, so never mind, eh?” She got in. “Baz. Station. Let’s ensconce our little charges, then see what else is going on.”
I really am, thought Marge, extremely tired. Paul raised his head and opened his mouth, but Collingswood switched her finger at him in the mirror, and nothing came out. Marge wished he had got away.
“WHERE’S WATI?” DANE SHOUTED. “WHAT’S HAPPENED TO HIM?”
“Marge was …” Billy said. “You heard what Wati said just before …” His words ebbed out, and he shook his head and covered his eyes. Dead, or hostage at very least.
“Wati!” Dane shouted and raged. “Again! Another! Kraken!”
They had, contemptuous almost, evaded the police tape without breaking stride, and were back in the kraken church. The last Krakenists queued like obedient children by the huge beak in the temple.
The Londonmancers were in the lorry, winding through suburbs nearby. Fitch and some of his