Out of the Black - Lee Doty [161]
"Hi." Ping said as casually as he could, willing the tension out of his muscles. "Could you point us toward an exit?"
A smile spread across the stranger's even features. He pointed to the exit sign directly above his head.
"Oh. Right." Ping tried to recover from the strain in his contrived conversation with a self-conscious smile. "You know, its dangerous here... you should probably get out."
"Yes." The Kaspari suspect said thoughtfully, "Dangerous here."
Ping still couldn't read him at all. Perhaps it was his imagination, but he could feel the power in the air. It seemed to press in on him like wet Alabama sunshine. Where was Alex anyway? Was he blind? Was he already dead? The only thing he knew for sure was that he hadn't run away.
Family. Ping realized that from the heat and pressure of conflict, the diamond of a new family had been born. He trusted Alex and Rae with his life. He trusted Anne with his life, even though he'd met her fifteen minutes ago. Weird.
The psychologist in him wanted to dissect this phenomenon for a second, but then the urge passed. Studying hydrogen and oxygen was far less satisfying than simply drinking fresh water. Here in the third 'last moments' of his life in as many days, he deployed the telescoping wheels beneath the gurney and continued forward. Karl Marx had said that religion is the opiate of the masses. One of his professors at the University had asserted that family was the opiate of little clumps of the masses... but he was a sucker. Granny Yao knew better.
When he was thirteen, he'd gone through this odd phase where he resented the life of the school. Always surrounded by relatives with 'helpful advice', he'd craved a little freedom. Visiting from Hong Kong, Grandma had set him straight. "You're lucky Tian Fu," she'd told him, "Some people move through life without family." Ping had nodded and gave her his 'humoring the idiot' smile. She'd smiled right back. "But being alone ain't bein' free, it's just being empty." She'd poked him in the chest, over his heart... not too softly either. "Family's the framework of your freedom, like the bones in your flesh. Take the bones away and the flesh doesn't get more free."
At the time, Ping had endured her words as he endured so many of her other fortune cookie sermons. But over time her words returned to him. He was lucky.
Part of the reason he'd moved from Criminal Psychology to Marriage and Family Counseling was that misguided professor and old Granny Yao. He'd wanted to make a difference.
Ping was now almost within range of Kaspari. Two more steps. The second gurney was almost through the archway with Rae at the head of it. Ping's left hand directed his gurney, his right hand slipped into his jacket pocket.
Finishing Touches
The fire of the Loom shimmered about him like currents shifting through deep and troubled waters. He checked and rechecked his weave. He made a tweak here, shored up the pattern there. The devil was always in the details.
Eight floors up and five floors above ground, Dek waited, feet swinging over the edge of the exam table, oblivious. Two floors above his adopted son, the Outsider's flesh puppets shuffled aimlessly around each other in some kind of demonic holding pattern. Here, as far as he could get underground, Issak prepared.
He hadn't been alone for months now. The Outsider was his constant companion, seeing all he did, lurking always at the edges of his perception. He hoped it didn't understand the subtleties of the Loom well enough to decipher the true intent of the Cast he currently wove, but he was far from sure this was the case.
His son was bait. There was no other way to look at it. Hard choices- if nothing else, his new pact with the Outsider bought them time. In exchange for his help, the Outsider would leave his family alone for now. Of course, when it got what it wanted, all deals would be off. What it wanted was the only power it lacked-