Terror (8 page)

GAIA AND JAKE STROLLED BENEATH the parasol of trees along Washington Square Park north, sharing a dipped vanilla ice-cream cone. It had been Gaia's idea, at the end of dinner. After all that exotic fish, witty conversation, and general fabulousness, what better way to end a date than with a two-dollar cone of artificial swirled goodness from the Mister Softee truck? Of course, it had been Jake's nonsensical idea to share the cone. He'd said he was too stuffed to eat a whole one.

“I hate to say this,” Jake said. “But you're hogging the cone.”

“Unbelievable.” Gaia licked the cone and smiled. “Perhaps you recall that I wasn't in favor of this whole joint-ice-cream-account idea.”

“But you did agree to it, right? So that means you
have to divide the pie equally. Don't you remember all those lessons from kindergarten about sharing?”

“I hated kindergarten,” Gaia said with a giggle. If this was a harbinger of things to come, of how her life would be post-fear, then she wouldn't have much trouble adapting to it. It was oddly exhilarating how, once she had made the decision to surrender herself to Jake, she'd just been carried away like a hot air balloon without a steering mechanism. She'd never felt this way before, and she didn't want to think too hard about it for fear that she might snap back into the old Gaia—all brooding and guarded.

Gaia licked the ice-cream cone again, a more dramatic top-to-bottom swoop this time. Before she could finish, Jake grabbed her around the midsection, pinning her arms to her side. The ice cream smushed against her mouth.

“Corporate takeover,” Jake said. He brought his face toward hers and, his green eyes smiling, took a giant lick of ice cream. Spotting an opportunity, Gaia flicked her wrist and pushed the cone into his face. She looked with satisfaction at the white ring around his lips.

“Heh heh,” Gaia jibed, laughing. “Karmas a bitch.”

“Fair enough,” Jake said. He loosened his grip on her arms but continued to press her backward into the metal fence that surrounded the park. Gaia didn't resist. They stood there, looking at each other and giggling
as Gaia licked a circle around her lips, trying to clear the sticky mess from her mouth.

“You need help with that?” Jake asked. His lips parted slightly and Gaia could see his white teeth peeking through in the postdusk darkness.

“Maybe,” she said.

“Because I have a lot of experience with this type of cleanup job,” Jake said.

“Oh, you do, huh?” Gaia said. “And that's supposed to be attractive?”

Jake didn't answer. His parted lips were moving slowly toward hers. She closed her eyes and braced herself for an otherworldly postdessert kiss. Instead, she felt Jake's tongue lick across the bottom of her chin—lightly and sensuously—then swoop up toward the corner of her mouth. Gaia let her body loosen and be swept up by the sensation of being licked. A surge of pleasurable electrons swept from her mouth down through her neck and into her stomach. The center of pleasure then dispersed outward and upward throughout her body, giving her the sense of hovering above herself slightly.

“Mmm,” Gaia said.

“Okay,” Jake said matter-of-factly, pulling away. “You're clean.”

“What a tease,” Gaia said.

“What?” Jake said. “You wanted a face cleaning, right?”

“I didn't say that. You said that. Actually, your face is still looking a little messy.”

“So,” Jake said. “Return the favor, then.”

Gaia moved forward and rested her forearms on Jake's shoulder. “I don't have much experience at this, so—”

But before she could finish, Gaia was throttled from the side by a full-force slam to the rib cage. The spot that had just been the epicenter of pleasure in her body was now seized by a violent paroxysm of pain. The world moved too fast for Gaia to process. The only way she could gauge reality was through forces of impact, which transferred from her right side to the grind of her left elbow against the pavement. Gaia's body stiffened straight. Her instincts were totally off. At the moment where her kick-ass reflexes would normally have clicked on, she found herself focusing on something utterly irrelevant—a nasty smell. Whatever sort of creature had just hit her, it smelled like a trash heap. Gaia's second instinct was to curl up in the fetal position and wait for this to end. She felt a hand squirming in her front pocket like a crazed snake.

“Gimme all your cash!”

Gaia yanked the hand from her pocket and punched her palm upward, in the general direction of the stench, connecting with what felt like a sternum.

The beast jolted back. Gaia gathered herself and stood up. Jake was on his feet, too, crouched and ready, bouncing on his toes like a boxer at the sound of the first-round bell.
Come on, Gaia. Pull yourself
together. Be energized. Protect yourself.
She looked at her assailant—all she could see was the lit silhouette of his nose poking out from beneath a hooded sweatshirt. It had the body of a guy but moved in a more exact way, like a robot. The faceless thing threw itself at her again. She braced herself for defense, but he dodged her and grabbed a fistful of hair. He yanked. Gaia could hear her hair being ripped from her scalp. It sounded as painful as it felt.

“Ahhhhh!” Gaia yelled. “Bastard!”

Her fight instincts finally jolted, Gaia jabbed her elbow into the place where his head should be. Impact. The point of her elbow sank into softness before hitting bone. Judging from the intensity of the punk's scream, she had made contact with either lips or eyes. Gaia stood up. He was doubled over and holding his face, sort of yelping. Gaia noticed that he held his face with one hand and was careful not to drop something with the other.

This was the point where, Gaia recognized, she would normally go in for the kill. One precisely delivered kick and this thug would be rendered a useless nonthreat. But Gaia couldn't help feeling content at having gotten this far, infinitely relieved that she might not have to fight anymore.
What is wrong with me?
She looked to her left and saw that Jake was in full control of the other assailant, socking the poor guy bloody with a flurry of jabs and roundhouse kicks.

“You bitch!” It was Gaia's guy, walking toward her. He thrust both hands into his sweatshirt pocket. “I'm gonna kill you, you dumb bitch. We've been wanting to finish you off for so long….” He pulled one hand out and raised it above his head. “It will give me so much pleasure to be known as the one who liquidated Gaia.”

Gaia was frozen in her tracks, staring at the shadowy figure stalking slowly toward her. She had heard this kind of banter so many times that she could usually just block it out. But not right now. A part of her had already resigned itself to her grim fate. If that was a gun over his head, she might have less than a minute to live.

“Yo, man!” It was the other guy, stumbling around, punch-drunk but still cognizant enough to talk. “That ain't what we came to do.”

“I don't care. I'm gonna be the one to finish this. I'm sick of playin' around.”

He was less than ten feet away now. His hand was still raised in a menacing way. Was it a gun? A knife? A Taser?

Gaia didn't feel like sticking around to find out. That guy was holding something. He was threatening to
kill
her. And the magic bubble that her fearlessness had always provided was now rendered moot.

Whatever this little confrontation was about, it sure as hell was not worth dying over. Against all her better instincts, Gaia did exactly what she knew she shouldn't.

She bolted left and ran for her life.

JAKE FELT LIKE NEO FROM
THE Matrix,
only instead of the guy in the black suit, he was fighting some smelly punk street kid. From the moment he had been hit in the side, Jake had snapped into “on mode,” alert but relaxed and completely absorbed in the moment. The day before, he had watched a couple of guys in the park doing capoiera, that Brazilian martial art dance form, and he found himself unconsciously imitating the rhythmic bob and weave of their motions. His assailant, on the other hand, was clearly untrained, and though strong as an ox, the idiot's ragtag strategy of plowing into Jake and punching wildly simply wasn't cutting it. Here he came again.

Jake focused all his mental energy on a simple full-force kick to the belly.
Bah!
Having broken a three-inch block of wood a week before with this same kick, he felt convinced of its ability to penetrate. The guy grunted and flew backward like a cartoon character catching a bowling ball. Jake shuffled forward, prepared to finish him off.

A sharp pain stabbed the back of Jake's head. Blindsided. He lurched forward, his brain vibrating against his skull. Where had that come from? Maybe he wasn't Neo after all. Just being focused couldn't save him from being nailed from behind.

Jake retreated, backpedaling away from the skirmish.
He shook his head and forced his eyes wide open. From this perspective he could see who the sneaky bastard was. It was the second guy. So where was Gaia? Had they done something with her? Had they knocked her out? Jake strained his blurry vision, probing the sidewalk, road, and bushes for evidence of her body. Nothing. Was it possible? Had Gaia run from the fight, leaving him alone for a two-on-one?

No time to develop that thought. Assailant number one had somehow recovered from the stomach shot and was slumping toward him, night-of-the-living-dead style. Assailant two walked beside him. Despite their numerical advantage, Jake stood his ground. They walked like a couple of crippled veterans heading to the infirmary.

“Yo, man,” assailant one said to his comrade. “We don't need to jack with this guy no more. We got what we came for.”

Assailant two shrugged. “Yeah, but I kinda feel like slicing up boyfriend here to send that skank a message.”

“Naw, man,” assailant one said. “That ain't the way it was supposed to go down.”

But this argument wasn't persuasive enough. Assailant two had already pulled a long, curved knife from his pocket. He was flashing it back and forth and cackling. He seemed—for the moment—less interested in cutting Jake than amusing himself with the knife. In the process the guy's hood had fallen off his
face. His nose was busted, and his face was painted red with blood.

“You want a little taste of death?” he asked Jake.

“Not particularly,” Jake answered.

“Too bad, smart-ass.” The guy stopped waving the knife for a second. He put it to his side and took a step toward Jake, looking him in the eyes. Jake saw that the blood-splattered face was actually not this guy's most disturbing feature. It was his eyes. They were either jet black or the darkest possible shade of brown, and they stared through Jake in a way that said no one was home. This guy was either on some hard-core drugs or else a messenger from the seventh ring of hell. Whatever he was, he was licking around his mouth, smearing blood into his three-day-old stubble.

“Love that delicious metallic taste.” He started waving the knife again, this time a bit more threatening, dancing around and then thrusting it in Jake's direction. Jake kept dodging him but found that the freak's unpredictability made him hard to contain. If he wasn't careful, this could end up bad. As in emergency-room bad. Dead bad. Maybe it was time to pull a Gaia and get the hell out of Dodge.

The knife suddenly plunged toward Jake's groin. Jake jumped up and backward at once. Uh-uh. That wasn't going to work. Jake felt that rush of adrenaline he always felt when someone had stepped over the line into the realm of injustice. Instead of nipping this
rush of hot anger in the bud, Jake decided to channel his ire into action. If this guy wanted to play ball, he could play, too. In fact, he would be more than willing to finish the game with a grand slam.

Jake lunged forward in a mock punch, hoping to draw the guy in. Worked like a charm. When the guy went to slice Jake with the knife, he opened himself up on the weak side. Jake put all his strength into a right leg roundhouse to the temple. The dude hit the pavement like a fallen statue. Crack!

“See?” assailant two said. “What'd I tell you not to jack with him for?”

Jake took one last look at the poor dumbass to make sure he was breathing. Sure was. The dude's chest was heaving like he was having a heart attack. Danger had been averted, yet he didn't feel the slightest bit of relief. Where was Gaia? Had they knocked her out and discarded her? Jake's body felt hot. Panic was setting in. What had happened to—he could officially say it now—his girlfriend? Jake took off in a slow jog down the middle of the street. He looked left and right.

“Gaia?” he said. “Gaia, are you here?
Gaia!”

There was a rustling sound in the bushes. Jake immediately got into ready position.

“Jake,” a voice said. “It's me.”

A recognizable form emerged from the shadows. “Gaia?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you okay?” He wasn't sure which he dreaded more—Gaia being injured or the prospect of her having abandoned him without a scratch.

“I think so, yeah.” Gaia was slouched over and looking at the ground. “I'm really sorry. I thought he had a gun.”

“Wait a minute….” Jake shook his head, as if trying to shake free some answers. “So what was I supposed to do? I mean, if he had a gun…”

“Oh, I don't know. That's why I waited here in the bushes, watching, just to make sure.”

“Well, thanks,” Jake said, without certainty. He could see that Gaia looked really rattled and distressed. Why? It was so incredibly unlike her. A seed kernel of anger started to well up in him at the thought of her bailing on him, but he suppressed it. She was unpredictable, that was all, even more so than he'd imagined. It was as if there was no fundamental Gaia identity, like she was constantly shape shifting and morphing into something slightly different. It was strange, at times annoying, but never boring. He decided not to push the discussion any further for now. There would be time for that.