Aces High Page 0,157

it?"

"Everything hurts," he said roughly and shoved her away from him. She sprawled on the floor near Kafka's machine and started to get up again just as a thick, stained-glass window exploded inward, spraying the room with multicolored shards. She covered her head with both arms, diving for the floor; a long flame roared across the room, scorching wood and stone. She heard someone scream. There was a rustling sound as Kafka crawled across the floor to her and tried to urge her closer to the machine.

"The only thing," he panted. Another howl shook them like an earthquake. ". . . TIAMAT . . . protect . . . need your help for TIAMAT's-"

He was torn away from her; she heard him shriek at the contact. Then someone pulled her to her feet and she saw Kafka fall backward from a kick to the head.

"Nooooo!" she screamed. "Don't hurt him, don't!-" She had seen those russet eyes a thousand times, most recently tonight. Her mouth worked but she couldn't make a sound. The russet eyes crinkled with a quick smile before they thrust her to one side.

"Stand back, honey, I don't want to mix you up with the french fries." He turned and began to point at Kafka and the Shakti device and the boy, who had turned back into a dinosaur, a stegosaurus this time, and was all too obviously in the line of fire. Jane fought for her voice and the right words and came up with possibly the only thing that could have stopped him from making one big cinder of them all.

"J.J., don't!"

Jumpin' Jack Flash turned back to her, his mouth dropping open with surprise.

A moment later, he was even more surprised to see that she was covered with water.

Fortunato had been running in and out of every room and gallery and alcove he could find, searching for aces or anyone else, the faggot from space hot on his heels. So far, they'd only found some clown crawling around on a stone floor with blood running out his ears. The space faggot had wanted to stop and examine him but Fortunato had fixed that. This wasn't the clinic at noon, he'd said, and had dragged the space faggot away by the fancy collar of his faggot coat-faggot, yeah, sure, man, let's talk faggot, call your man Crowley a faggot, and while we're at it, how was it you raised that boy from the dead, speaking of faggots-he shut the flow of thoughts off firmly as he ran down a narrow hall.

"Fortunato-where-what are you-trying to do?" huffed Tachyon.

"I feel him," Fortunato said over his shoulder. "Feel who?"

"He did Eileen. And Balsam. And a lot of others-" he staggered as the Howler gave another one of those long, horrible screams. Tachyon stumbled into him and the two of them nearly fell. "Shit, I wish he'd shut the fuck up," Fortunato muttered. He stopped suddenly and grabbed Tachyon by his faggot coat-front. "Listen, you stand back. He's all mine, understand that?"

Tachyon looked up at Fortunato's swollen forehead, his dark, angry eyes. Then he pried Fortunato's hands off himself. "I've never seen you like this before."

"Yeah, well, you ain't seen shit yet," Fortunato growled, and kept going, with the space faggot tagging after him.

For several long moments, it seemed as though nobody knew what to do. Roman had gotten to his feet and was shielding the exposed computer with his body. Kafka had scuttled over to the Shakti machine; the little stegosaurus was looking from side to side. Even Jumpin' Jack Flash seemed to be frozen, looking from Jane to the strange machine and Kafka, to Roman and back to Jane.

Then he turned away from her and time started again and he was stretching an arm out toward Kafka's machine. "Not him," Jane said desperately, and reached for him just as Demise said, almost too soft to hear, "Hey. You." Before Jumpin' Jack Flash could react, the stegosaurus twinkled to the form of a naked boy and then to a tyrannosaur, and launched himself across the room to bury his teeth in Demise's thigh. Demise screamed and fell backward, wrestling with the tyrannosaur. Kafka started to shout; there was a swirl of light, a glimmering, and the Astronomer was standing in the middle of the room. His head was something out of a nightmare now-he had a strange curved snout, rectangular ears, and slanting eyes, but Jane knew it was the Astronomer. She heard Kafka say "The god Setekh!" with