"Did you ask your father?"

"I hit him up last time."

The woman chuckled.

"Oh, I see, so it's my turn."

Stan laughed nervously. "I guess so."

"Well, my purse is in the kitchen. Don't take too much."

Stan pocketed some bills and rushed from the apartment. He felt like he was sinking, standing there as the elevator made its long slow descent. He always felt like he was holding his breath when he was around his mother.

Stan had seen the Pol-dwa selling guns at the bus stop over on Webster Street. So, before heading in for the night shift, he took a cab over and was pleased to find the dealer seated there on the bench reading a newspaper.

A Hispanic woman with a cattle prod was herding her children across the street and an emaciated dog, the same color as the filth that had spilled when the pollution sucker exploded, was digging in the clumps of debris that the clean-up crews had yet to remove.

Stan sat down beside the Pol-dwa and said, "I need a gun."

The creature turned to him, small green lights like imprisoned fireflies swirling in its bulbous white eyes. "Bullets or plasma? I can get my hands on some ray stuff in a couple of days, if you want to wait."

"Plasma sounds good."

When the Pol-dwa opened its mouth there was heat like a fire and a stench like rotting fruit.

"Groovy. I have a Salem Sixty, twelve-shot automatic. It's ceramic with print-resistant grips and trigger."

"Sounds good," Stan said, reaching for his wallet.

It was just after eleven when Stan picked the girl up in front of her apartment, as promised. She was wearing the same jeans and T-shirt from the night before. He had called in sick and rented a helicar with some of the money from his mother. The girl climbed in and they sped off for Folger Street.

"Fancy. Is this yours?"

"No. I don't have a car; it's a rental."

"Oh. Fancy."

"Hey, kid, my name is Stan."

"I'm Sophie."

"I should've told you last night. Say, what about your aunt and uncle?"

"They're drunk, asleep."

Stan sighed. "Nice. Did you bring the picture?"

Sophie handed him a photograph of her mother. She looked like an older version of her daughter, but the hair was full and clean and golden and her eyes were bright with life.

"She was pretty."

"Yeah."

They pa.s.sed over tenements and streets, a junk yard and a burnt-out library. Other helicraft bobbed and hummed, insect-like, vanishing in the incandescent plume climbing up from a factory's chimney.

Stan slipped the photo into his gray jacket, beneath which hung the Salem Sixty, snug in a holster. "I've heard that there's an insider's place like The Poison Apple, an underground place called Low, where they have the animated bodies of dead toddlers dancing. Geesh, can you believe it? What's the world coming to?"

"I don't care what the world's coming to. I just want my mother back."

The red sign of The Poison Apple glowed beneath them. Stan set the helicar down.

"Now remember, the guns are just for protection. I'm sure I can bargain or work something out with these creeps, all right? I have money..."

"Okay, mister, you don't need to lecture me."

"It's Stan, not mister. Okay?"

"Yeah, okay."

It was deafening and dark inside and there were men at small round tables and about an elevated platform, hunched and lumpy, like strange unhatched eggs. Stan waded into the darkness, moving toward the tables. He had no problem picking out the security; there were two burly Choom men with teeth like bleached dominos, one situated on either side of the purple-drenched stage. Each wore a pistol at the hip.

A dead black woman was jerking about on the platform, her joints modified with small sensor-equipped devices that allowed her movement. An off-stage dance master governed her motions from a control panel. She looked fresh and was, no doubt, treated with preservatives on a regular basis.

Stan slipped into a seat and watched as the cadaver wriggled and wavered, the heavy b.r.e.a.s.t.s jiggling, the open eyes unblinking, the mouth slack. She contorted obscenely and flopped, listless, the garish purple lamps making her dark skin seem like she was one big bruise.

Stan did not realize how long he had been staring until he noticed that he was sporting an erection. He looked away and thought about his plan. He would order a drink, then complain about it to one of the waitresses, then ask to see the manager...

A waitress floated out of the murk. She wore a tiny black skirt, black lipstick and dark makeup around her eyes, like a racc.o.o.n. "I'll have a lava delight," Stan told her.

The waitress nodded, scribbled something and went away.

The black woman's act was coming to a close. The techno-drumming slowed and her body fell to the floor where it bucked in spasms, as if in death throes. The patrons loved that and a man at a nearby table groaned, clutching himself.

A man in an executioner's hood came out and carried the body off the stage and that too seemed to please the onlookers, seeing her limp in death. An announcer in a silvery skull mask came out, made some poor puns, then introduced the next performer, Salvia.

The waitress brought Stan's drink, a tall red-glowing thing, then slinked back into the darkness. On the stage, an upright coffin slid out and gushed a mist of fake fog when the door creaked open. Organ music hummed and a deep drumming seemed to move through the floor.

A blond woman, glistening with oil, stepped out of the coffin, her head lolling, her hair waving down. Her eyes were a dead stare and her painted mouth hung open as she stood gyrating to the music, dizzy and surreal in the mist. It was Sophie's mother.

"She's a beauty, eh?"

Stan had not noticed the tall black-clad man who now stood by his table.

"Yeah," Stan said dryly.

The stranger sat down at Stan's table. "Men love dead women," he said, smiling.

Stan looked at the intruder; he was in his thirties or early forties, handsome, with a trim beard of black, circular-lensed eyegla.s.ses and twin pony tails entwined with ivy and baby's breath.

"It's all about testosterone, my friend. That raging stuff that fires when men act compet.i.tively or, say, watch a fight, or an action movie. h.e.l.l, they've done studies, you know, actual scientific studies, and they say it releases in great amounts just observing a sports team score a goal. It's all very base, very primal really, because we're hunters, we men, and conquering is the key."

"Really?" Stan said, turning back to watch as the woman was tossed about like a bad puppet, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s flopping. He had heard of a scientific study which found that ma.s.sive release of testosterone caused brain damage.

"It's all according to nature's plan, the way I see it. Men are bulls and women are cows. b.i.t.c.hes are receptacles. We like to slap 'em and they like to be slapped. We force and conquer, control, and overpower and the testosterone goes zooming. Whoosh! There's nothing like taking one, of course, but that's illegal, sorry to say, but this is the next best thing. Dead chicks are s.e.xy and legal and all is right with the world. I bet you've got a big raging hard one right now."

Stan felt his heart become the drumming that the corpse was dancing to, and he wanted very badly to empty his pistol's twelve bullets into this b.a.s.t.a.r.d's face. "You seem to know a lot about this subject," he droned.

"I should hope I do. This is my club."

"Ahhh. Of course. Well, mister..."

"Incense. Frank Incense. Call me Frank."

Stan looked to the stage where the corpse of the woman now lay on her back, facing the audience, her legs trembling, spread wide, giving them a good view.

"Well Frank, I hate to tell you this, but that's my sister's body up there."

Incense sat back and sighed, exasperated. "s.h.i.t," he breathed, running a hand over his forehead. "I didn't know she had a brother."

"I've been out of town."

"Oh, my friend, I'm so sorry..." Incense stood up and waved a waitress over. He hissed at her, "Get that one off the stage, now. Get her out back and put some f.u.c.king clothes on her or you'll be up there."

"What clothes?" the girl asked.

"I don't care. Give her yours if you have to! Now, go!"

The waitress clunked off in her heels and Stan felt himself growing more relaxed. This was going better than he'd thought. "Frank, I'm willing to offer you a nice piece of money if I can take my sister out of here."

"Oh no, my friend, I couldn't take money. It's your sister-take her, please, and forgive me. h.e.l.l, I can get half a dozen dead chicks to replace her tomorrow if I need them. Why don't you finish your drink-on the house-and I'll have my boys put her in your car. Do you have a car?"

Stan flinched at the sound of a pistol firing. A man bellowed in pain. Stan spun in his seat and Incense rose up, reaching into his jacket. Both men spotted the young girl in T-shirt and jeans; she was over by the side of the stage, her small black revolver outstretched. The Choom security lout had taken a shot in the gut and was doubled over, shouting native expletives. Sophie jammed the snub nose into the top of his big bald head and fired.

"s.h.i.t!" Stan hissed. He saw a silvery weapon slide out from Incense's jacket, skull rings grinning as the hand came up, training on the girl.

The big Choom flopped down at Sophie's feet. She looked up at the stage where her mother stood, naked, dead, staring. Sophie froze and blubbered, didn't see the other Choom thug yank the magnum out of its holster.

Stan felt the cool weight of his own gun, felt his arm going up, a puppet to adrenalin. Only feet from the side of Incense's head, he fired. The plasma slug bore into the man's cheek and released its quick-spreading magic, eating the b.a.s.t.a.r.d's head from the inside, sickly green glowing, steam hissing. Incense dropped sideways, squeezing off a single pull on his three-pulse's trigger. Three bullets spat into the dark-a beer bottle exploded.

Sophie started up the steps at one side of the platform. The puppet master, realizing something was wrong, cut the dead dancer's performance and the body tumbled face-first onto the stage. Sophie screamed. Stan saw the Choom now, through the steamy air and purple light and the rushing black shapes of panicking patrons. The security man crouched in a combat stance, his magnum clenched in both hands, aimed at Sophie.

Stan squeezed off four quick shots, the plasma slugs streaking. The Choom shrieked, danced as if on fire, the bright green lava devouring his left arm. He fired wildly and Stan saw one of the shadowy thrill-seekers topple back, his blood flying out like wasps.

"Get down, Sophie!" Stan called.

The girl was bent over her mother, the revolver dangling in her hand. She felt the weight of footsteps thumping on the stage behind her. The man in the executioner's hood carrying a baseball bat.

The armless Choom still had a few shots left, but he had slumped behind an overturned table, out of view. Stan rushed toward the stage and now squinted as he unleashed a volley at the executioner. Hot green seeds in the man's bare chest, leaves of burning green unfolding from his flesh, eating him. He looked like a disintegrating jigsaw puzzle. In seconds the man's torso was gone and his lower half flopped down, the baseball bat rolling across the stage.

Sophie stood up and waved her snub nose in the air, tears spilling. "Mother f.u.c.kers! Mother f.u.c.kers!"

The one-armed Choom sprang up from behind his table and fired. The heavy magnum thundered toward the stage and Stan watched as Sophie's mother's body jerked, the bullet smashing into her side leaving a bloodless hole.

Sophie turned to the Choom and emptied her gun. His eyes blew out and the back of his head broke open like a mouth, spitting chunks of skull like teeth.

"f.u.c.kers," the girl sobbed.

Stan stood, looking up at the stage, stunned. He could hear the first sirens through the pulse of music, faint and ghostly. Banshees.

Stan's apartment was small and dark. He kept telling himself that he should get some plants or a pet to liven the place up. Someday. It needed a woman's touch, but that would never happen. Sophie and her mother's corpse were the only females he had ever had in there, other than the occasional wh.o.r.e. But he had never touched any of them.

The dead woman was wrapped in a blanket on the living room floor. Sophie sat holding her hand as Stan described the place where they would bury her come morning.

"It's roughly thirty miles outside of the city," Stan said, staring at the pale feet poking out from under the blanket. "You'll like it; it's nice and quiet and there are trees and a stream. Preservation land, so you don't have to worry about anyone ever digging around there, say to put up a new mall or something."

"Sounds good," Sophie said. She stared at her mother's hand, the nails painted like blood. "She never would have worn this color. She hated red."

Stan had a feeling that he would never view that color the same way again, following the mess at The Poison Apple. Would he ever sleep again?

"Hey, Stan?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry I f.u.c.ked it all up back there."

Stan closed his eyes and nodded. "Yeah," he mumbled.

"And Stan?"

He looked up.

"Thank you. My mom will be able to rest now."

Eventually Sophie gave in to her exhaustion and stumbled off to sleep in Stan's bedroom. He was going to stay on the couch. He sat in his chair, finishing his beer, gazing at the shape on the floor. Strange, he thought, but it had not bothered him to carry the corpse around; the familiar shudder had not come when he had touched her.

Stan knelt by the dead woman and unfolded the blanket shroud. She was pale and bare, blind and still. Her lips were cool under his, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s soft in his hands. He had never touched a woman's b.r.e.a.s.t.s before, never kissed. Stan removed his clothes and lay upon the woman, entering her, and moaned softly into her throat, where there was no pulse.

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