"No I haven't! And you know me well enough to know that I have sound reasons for what I've done."

"Then tell me what the fuck they are!"

"No." Tach began to cry.

"Shit, you're drunk."

They were skimming the roof tops, spotlights stabbing at windows, and cornices. The curving roof of the Omni Convention Center came into view. In the darkness, thousands of lights flickered at the foot of the sprawling building. Tach, blinking away the moisture that clouded his eyes, realized that a sea of silent jokers, their masks and deformities highlighted by the flames of a thousand candles, stood in mute vigil.

"Look at them. Look at them good. What are you gonna tell them, Tach? Trust me? While the troops come to round them up."

"It will not come to that."

"And if it does?"

"It would not change the decision I have made tonight." Turtle read it as arrogance, and it snapped his control. "JESUS CHRIST, WHO THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?" A number of curious masked faces were lifted toward them.

Tachyon's temper shredded. "I am Tisianne brant Ts'ara sek Halima sek Ragnar sek Omian of House Ilkazam, and when I do a thing it is for a good and sound reason. Do not question me!"

"I'm not your fucking serf!"

"No, but you are my stirps, formally adopted by me. You are blood and bone of my line, you and your heirs forever bound to my house. You forget yourself!" he hissed.

"Oh fuck you! Fuck you to hell! We're just playthings to you. That's all we've ever been. Lab rats in your great experiment."

They were over Piedmont Park now. Turtle dropped like a plummeting stone, and seizing Tachyon with his teke, he deposited him on the steps of a fountain.

"For the last time, Tachyon, answer me."

"I cannot."

The power lashed out. Caught Tachyon across the face. He fell backward down the steps, landing hard on his side.

Groaning, he struggled onto an elbow. He was blinded by the floods as Turtle swooped in low. Gingerly Tach explored his ribs. Decided they were merely cracked not broken. Turtle hovered for an instant then shot straight up, and vanished over the trees of the park.

Tachyon did not miss the message or the symbolism in that single blow. December 1963. The steps of Jetboy's tomb. "You don't give a damn about anybody."

"But I do. I'm doing this to protect you. Because I love you. He has a killer who can walk through walls. And I took a vow. "

But Turtle had raised one terrifying specter-Barnett-as president. Tachyon had kept Hartmann from the presidency; he now had to stop Barnett. And for that he needed Jack.

By the time the ambulance got Jack to the hospital he was feeling okay, though weakened. Assuming he'd had a heart attack, they put him through a battery of tests. He was too tired to resist, but by the time they announced the results were negative and they were going to do a brain scan for sign of a something-something-cerebral-episode, Jack's strength had come flowing back, and he put his foot down. It was an ace power that had hurt him, he said, and he'd lived through it. There was nothing wrong with him physically. The whole thing happened in his head.

The doctors compromised by making Jack stay overnight for observation. Minutes after the nurses left, he was on the phone to Billy Ray, describing the man he'd seen and the nature and extent of his powers.

"He's working for Barnett," Jack said. "He and the other guy, the leather boy."

"I'll pass on your suspicions," Ray said. "The guy who got you, by the way, we figure that was James Spector, a.k.a. Demise. He's got a certain rep. Put on a pair of shades, though, and he can't lock eyes with you."

"Tell the senator, for Christ's Sakes. That's two aces aiming at him."

"The senator's got other things to think about, Jack boy. Tachyon and the jokers have defected to Jesse Jackson." "What?" Jack sat bolt upright in bed.

"The fucking alien bastard."

"When did this happen?"

"About the same time a certain Golden Weenie was getting his ass kicked in the stairwell. Talk to you later, asshole."

Jack hung up the phone and stared for a long moment at the darkened television set propped in the corner.

The screen was the same blank color as James Spector's eyes. A cold flood lurched up Jack's spine.

And then he thought, the secret ace. The secret acehell, Leo Barnett, call the guy by his name-Barnett got Tachyon somehow. Probably through Fleur. Fleur got him alone and Barnett hit him with something.

Jack slid out of bed and found his blood-spattered clothes in the closet. He started drawing them on.

He was alone now. And he knew what he had to do. Tachyon was pounding his fists on the nurses' station. It hurt like hell, but he couldn't seem to stop.

"How could you have let him leave? How could you? I need to see him. I must see him!"

"Doctor," said a slim black nurse gently. "I'm going to call Dr. English from the psych ward-"

"I do not… require… a… psychiatrist. I require… Mr. Braun."

"And he's… not… here," the nurse said with the same careful enunciation Tachyon had used.

A hand closed vise-like about his elbow. "Dancer, come away. "

Tachyon whirled, the violent move pulling a groan from him. Polyakov kept his grip on the Takisian's elbow, fingers tightening painfully on the joint. Meekly, Tachyon allowed himself to be led away.

"We knew from the news reports that you had at last come to your senses," said George quietly as they walked out of the hospital.

"We?"

He waved down a cab. "Sara. I'm caring for her."

"Oh thank the Ideal. Take me to her-"

"What do you think I'm doing?" grunted Polyakov as he swung open the door of the cab.

CHAPTER SIX

Saturday July 23, 1988

They stood before a door at a Motel 6 on the outskirts of Atlanta. Tachyon tried to think what he would say to the woman he had so wronged, but all he could think about was how tired he felt. He tried to figure out when he had last slept. He had a bad feeling it had been Tuesday night.

Polyakov rapped once sharply on the door. "Sara, it's George."

Tachyon tensed for the moment, and then Sara was there, staring strained and white-faced up at him. She wore a crumpled blue-and-white dress. The petticoats crackled as she backed away, arms folded protectively across her breasts. Polyakov was a stolid dark shadow behind him. Tachyon felt his throat work several times as he tried to force out words. Suddenly he advanced on her in a rush. Dropped to one knee, and lifting the hem of her skirt, pressed it to his lips.

"Sara, forgive me."

She was making faint inarticulate mewing sounds. Her fingertips brushed wraith-like across his hair as he knelt with bowed head before her.

"What's he doing?" she finally asked pathetically. "Making an overly dramatic Takisian gesture. In times of stress, he reverts to this sort of extraordinary behavior," grunted the Russian. "I'll leave you two alone." The door closed softly behind him, and they listened to his footsteps retreating down the hall.

She tugged at his shoulder. "Oh, get up, please."

The pain from his cracked ribs drew a grunt from him as Tach pushed to his feet. "Forgive me if I embarrassed you, but words were inadequate. I have wronged you horribly."

"Then… then…"

"Yes, you are not mad," he said answering her greatest fear. "I have confronted the monster." She began to cry. Gently he reached out with a fingertip, and wiped her cheeks. "Oh, Ricky."

Her shoulders were jutting blades as he pulled her into an embrace. "Hush, it is over now."

Throwing back her head she looked up at him. "Really? Truly?"