no dragons left on this side of Mirth.”
“There are more dragons here now—” his heart skipped another beat, “then there have ever been.”
“No way!” I snapped with an unexpected anger. “Not possible.”
DJ tugged at the sleeve of my shirt.
“Yeah, okay. We’re done now,” I said and turned to walk away.
“Magic finds magic,” he said, “and technology finds tech—” Just then the heart rate went from a beep to a long, steady tone and the display screen flat-lined.
“Jazz!” DJ shouted and pointed.
“I see it,” I said. I reached up and pushed a button, blackened from much use, and the regular snaps between the Tesla coils changed to a bright, buzzing, steady arc of electricity. The body in the chair rattled and shook. Then, as I drew my finger away and stepped back, the arc again became a regular snap, the heart rate beeped at steady intervals, and the line on the screen displayed little pup tents. His body slumped forward and hung limp against the straps.
DJ shook her head, but her voice had regained some confidence. “You have a strange family.”
“You have no idea,” I said.
The Caretaker reentered the room. He shuffled over to his charge with a hypodermic needle in his three-fingered hand. “The Proprietor requires rest now. You will have to schedule an appointment for when he’s rested; perhaps next year.”
I gave the crusty corpse’s shoulder a few pats. “Sure thing stinky.” Then I tipped my chin toward the thing in the chair. “See you around, father. Don’t go dying on me,” I said then led DJ out of the room, down the steps, and back out to Gladstone.
We walked in silence for several blocks then DJ asked, “Is that really your father?”
“Yes, no…maybe.” I watched my moccasins padding along the walkway. “He isn’t, not really, but it’s still hard for me to imagine, despite all else I’ve lost, that he isn’t and that my father’s actually dead.”
“Just so you know,” DJ said shooting me a wry grin, “none of that makes any sense at all. So how about some of the succinctness?”
Yeah, she deserved it, but that wasn’t the time. I was still too rattled from my little visit. “I will, I will tell you everything, but it’s a very long story.”
Just then we turned the corner and watched the end of the hover train speeding away from the station.
“Well it looks like we have plenty of time,” DJ said.
I heard something fizzle and the hair on my arms stood up on end. My eyes locked on the shadowed alley. “I don’t think so.”
There came another fizzle, this one grew into a loud sizzle and a burst of wind set DJ’s long hair and both of our skirts fluttering. Thunder clapped above and an intense flash of light had us shielding our eyes with our hands as the wind became a roar.
“What’s happening?” DJ shouted over the din.
“A portal’s opening, come on!” I shouted, grabbed DJ’s hand, and ran.
The wind ended as suddenly as it had begun. Behind us I heard heavy metal somethings banging against street surface at a fast pace. Whatever it was it was gaining on us at an unnerving rate. As one DJ and I came to a stop, spun around, and gasped.
Marching toward us were four large, human shaped figures clad in fully articulated silver armor. The identical suits were close to seven feet tall. They had long snouts that ended in an arch-topped grate and two huge, dark, oval shaped eyes. The silver gleamed bright under Mirth’s conjoined suns. Each warrior carried a large weapon. They looked roughly like assault rifles except they were square edged, ridiculously bulky, and appeared to have four large bore barrels. As one they shouldered their weapons and drew aim on us.
“Tell me you ignored Uncle’s warning and came here heavily armed,” DJ said.
I shook my head but kept my eyes fixed on the approaching soldiers. “Nope; didn’t want to risk the hover train peace detectors.”
“Now?” DJ shouted in a panicked screech. “You picked now to listen to Uncle?”
I shrugged.
“I still have my kinetic force compressor.”
I sighed; DJ always overestimated the power of that popgun. “Please be serious.”
DJ looked the bulking armor up and down and wisely kept her weapon hidden. “I thought you said they wouldn’t find us in Gladstone.”
“That timber troll we passed earlier, he gave us an awfully long look. If we survive this I’m going to ask him why he ratted us out.”
“You’ll ask him?”
“Sure. I’ll ask by shooting him repeatedly with my revolver,” I said sounding more like myself than I had in several weeks.
Four red dots of light appeared dead center on my chest. I gulped.
“You are the person of warrant known publicly as, Jazz,” the leading armor suit said in a loud, amplified voice that carried a metallic ring. “Lay face down, arms overhead on the walkway, you are under confinement.”
“Jazz?” DJ said in a nervous tone set somewhere between a question and an exclamation.
“Right,” I said, squeezing her hand. The armored beings stopped in a line just five meters from where we stood.
“On the ground or we open fire,” the leader said.
I got myself on my knees and pulled DJ down beside me.
“What do we do?” she asked.
“I surrender and you go on, live your life, make it a good one, for me.”
DJ’s shook her head. “No,” she said. “No, you can’t, there’s another way, you always have another way.”
“Not this time, kiddo.” I shrugged. “I’ve got nothing.”
The leader took a step forward. His boots of segmented silver plates cracked the walkway beneath them. “On the ground, last warning,” the amplified voice said and I caught a hiss from the speaker that must lurk behind that ominous grill.
I suddenly became aware of another set of heavy footsteps, these coming up from behind. Me, DJ, and all four of the armor clads looked up. The minotaur was walking by us with a full sheet of wallboard sheeting slung over his shoulder as if it were made of Styrofoam.
“Hey,” DJ whispered in my left ear. “That’s your monster, make him help us.”
“It doesn’t work like that, he has a limited intelligence,” I whispered even softer. “He’s bound by his purpose.”
“Quiet!” the leader said and jabbed me with the barrel of his big gun. It really hurt.
“Move on, deferred species, this does not concern you,” another armored soldier said to the minotaur, who subsequently kept walking as if nothing were happening.
Then I had a thought. “Hey, dumdum!” I yelled. At the sound of my voice the minotaur stopped and turned his head, one of his horns tearing a gash in the fresh piece of wallboard.
“Quiet!” the leader shouted and hit me so hard that I slammed back against the walkway. I only just managed to keep my head from banging down.
“These guys don’t have tickets!” I yelled.
I heard the minotaur snort through his nostrils.
“I warned you,” the leader said. Faster that I could react, he grabbed me by the front of my blouse and lofted me into the air. “You are under confinement,” he said into my face. Two images of my own frightened face reflected back at me from the dark lenses that covered his eyes.
The minotaur snorted again and I heard the wall board drop to the ground.
“I told you to move along,” the armored soldier said with certain authority. “We do not require tickets.”
Uh-oh, shouldn’t have said that, shiny.
My feet were dangling above the walkway. I glanced over the leader’s shoulder. The minotaur reared his head back and set loose a bellow that rattled the fillings in my teeth—and I had the only teeth on all of Mirth that had fillings. Then he dropped his head and charged.
“Look out!” one of the soldiers shouted. I heard what sounded like a high speed collision of three tractor trailers simultaneously slamming into a brick wall. Metal fl
ew in various directions. A gun went off with a roar like thunder, but ended abruptly as I saw an armored being fly across the street and slam through a stone wall.
I was dropped like a hot potato as the leader spun around and shouldered his weapon. Before he could pull the trigger the minotaur bellowed and rammed the leader in the chest.
“Down!” I shouted but DJ was way ahead of me. We dropped face first and covered out heads with our hands.
The leader screeched like Wilhelm filling his pipe.
I leapt up, grabbed DJ’s hand and dragged her to the wall.
The leader screamed and rose into the air. He was stabbed though and stuck to the minotaur’s horns. The leader’s armored arms flailed and he screamed again. The minotaur pushed the leader up and off his horns like he was lifting a barbell; veins bulged on his massive muscles as he drew the leader back and tossed him like a doll across the street. He clattered away, rolling over with a sound like his armor had been made of tin cans.
“Come on,” DJ said and pulled me along the wall.
I dug my heels in, “No, don’t!” I shouted, but too late. With a great bellow and a rake of his head the minotaur charged us.
DJ screamed.
I dug frantically through the pockets of my skirt. My heart raced and a flood of adrenalin had my finger shaking. I could hear his huge feet nearly upon us when my fingers found two stiff pieces of paper. I held them up. “Look, see!”
The minotaur came to an abrupt halt less than a meter away.
“Look here,” I said holding up our cancelled hover train tickets. The minotaur snorted and snatched the tickets from my shaking hand. He gave me a look full of suspicion then held up the