Too Small For Tall Page 10

  Besides, and this sounds terrible, I know, but I figured he wouldn’t really register the danger. Not once I told him about the guns Tall was using. At least half his attention has been on theorizing how those things work, ever since.

  “Okay, I’m here,” he reports. “Now where—holy buttermint schnapps!”

  “What? What? What’s going on?” I’m looking all around, but of course all I see is my living room. Ned’s got a hands-free phone, of course. Most people do, these days. Admittedly, most of the ones I know don’t have versions that look like small metallic bees buzzing around your head thinking you’re the world’s biggest daisy and just looking for a place to hunker down, but that’s Ned for you. He likes to tinker. The good news is, I can hear him perfectly, and he can hear me as well—something about a “sound-conducive dome” or something. Plus, that same dome cuts out most other noise, making it easier for an ADD champ like him to concentrate. Of course, it also means nobody who isn’t pressed cheek-to-jowl with him can hear him or me, so it looks like he’s muttering soundlessly to himself, but in most places nobody really notices that, or at least pretends not to. The bad news is, no video. Apparently the dome creates too much static for a clear picture, though Ned says he’s working on something called “distributed image-intake” that might fix the problem. In the meantime, I can hear him but I can’t see him, or what he’s looking at. If only I could—wait! I tap my computer monitor to wake it back up, and sure enough when the image blossoms into view it’s midtown Manhattan. I’m back on Channel Tall!

  Only, some time between when I glanced away and now, it’s turned into a horror movie. Or at least a post-apocalyptic tale.

  Tall’s still moving, and I see a familiar building up ahead. The Flatiron. Its triangular floor plan’s hard to miss—I always thought it looked like a kid had shaped a tall office building out of clay but then it fell over and one side got squished in, or maybe it was supposed to be rectangular but there were budget cuts while they were still under construction, so they just decided to cut in half and call it a day. Anyway, it’s right in his path, maybe two blocks away, which means he’s covered about eight blocks since I left.

  And by the look of things, what he’s covered them in is rubble. And despair.

  The streets around him are almost completely empty, because by this point everyone’s heard about the big, burly guy in the suit whose guns make things disappear, and nobody wants to stick around and see firsthand how that works. A few oddly well-dressed shadows off to the sides mean Tall’s fellow MiBs are nearby but laying low. Flashing lights reflected from around corners and through windows show that the cops are out as well, but they’re hanging back, too. Nobody wants to get close enough to see what those guns’d do to normal flesh and blood. Can’t say I blame them—Tall’s pretty much the best of the best when it comes to a MiB, I think, the stereotypical “worth ten ordinary men” type, and well, even with nine other guys alongside who wants to risk those odds? I guess everyone’s waiting in the hopes somebody else’ll show up with a clear dozen and try their luck.

  Except Ned. “Nice!” he says softly, and I suspect those sensory organs sprouting from his temples right over his ears—the ones I always think look like he’s glued on horns made of broccoli, or at least asparagus—are wriggling with delight. “Full material disintegration! That’s awesome!”

  “How is that awesome?” I demand. “He’s probably singlehandedly wiped out half the food trucks in midtown! He’s set the New York street-cuisine culture back at least a decade, dooming yuppies all over the city to boring lunches of pizza and subs and sushi. And you think that’s cool?” Not to mention that all those cart owners are now out of work, and a ton of people are suddenly no longer car owners, either.

  “Yeah, but think about it,” is Ned’s answer. “These guns he’s using, they can distinguish between living and nonliving matter, probably by gauging the electrical current present and seeing whether it’s constant enough and low-grade enough to qualify as brainwaves. That’s amazingly sophisticated!” Yes, I know, it’s weird—Ned looks like some plumber from Brooklyn, not counting the skin color and the hair and those broccoli horns and the way his face is perfectly flat like it was smashed into an anvil, but sometimes he talks like some hoity-toity college professor. Then he follows up this min-lecture with a deep, sustained burp, the kind you couldn’t do in most states or major cities without clearances for both the noise level and the air pollution. Yep, that’s Ned in a nutshell.

  “I’m thrilled you’re happy,” I tell him. “Can we focus on capturing him for now, and you can geek out over the hardware later?” I figure if this works the MiBs won’t object to parting with a few things, like one of those guns. Seems like a small price to pay to keep the Big Apple from becoming the Big Empty.

  “Sure, sure.” There’s a pause, and I’m guessing Ned’s looking around. “I’m at the corner of Thirty-fourth and Fifth,” he says after a minute.

  “Got it.” I picture midtown in my head, and try to ignore the smell of fresh bagels and hot pizza and cannoli all mixed together. Sometimes having a really strong olfactory memory isn’t the blessing you’d expect. “Okay, just head straight down Fifth,” I tell him. “Tall’s at Twenty-third Street.”

  “Right, nine blocks to go.” And Ned starts walking. And chattering like a squirrel who’s just found that one last acorn he needs to finish his collection. It’s like listening to an audiobook while you drive to work, only he’s the one moving and I’m sitting still. I’m not sure what that makes it—a moving story? A walking soundtrack? Whatever it is, it’s annoying, especially since I’m still looking through Tall’s eyes and trying not to get disoriented from hearing one thing and seeing another.

  “. . . why is it, do ya think, that the signs are set up the way they are?” Ned’s asking me or himself or the air or invisible hovering gods or some such as he crossed from Thirty-fourth to Thirty-third. “I can’t tell which street is which, half the time—is it the one the sign parallels, or the one it faces? Why can’t the signs be shaped like arrows and point the way they mean? That’d make a lot more sense. Another thing . . .”

  It occurs to me that I talk a lot. Okay, an awful lot. And that I’m usually more than happy to speak my mind, even if all my mind’s saying at the moment is “hubba hubba” or “I’m tired. Is there pie?” So is this what I sound like to other people? If so, I may never talk again.

  Or at least not until I get bored.

  Tall’s still rampaging, of course. He’s nothing if not methodical, and that little hairy dude didn’t give him a time limit or anything, and nobody’s dared to get close enough to give him a command to counter that first one. Yet. “Hey, Tall, do you hear me, buddy?” I say into the mic, and I see him slow to a stop and glance around.

  “DuckBob?” he asks. “Where are you?”

  “Costa Rica—the weather’s so good the only umbrellas you’ll ever need are the ones in your drinks,” I answer. “Come on down, we’ll do Mai Tais.”

  “No thank you,” he replies. “I am on a rampage right now.”

  “Yeah, about that. Wanna knock it off? I think it’s always best to leave ’em wanting more, don’t you?”

  The camera wobbles, so he must be shaking his head. “I don’t understand,” he admits, “but that is not unusual with you.” And he shoots a newspaper rack. That’s fine, though—it was just the Post. If it’d been the Onion, then we’d have to have words.

  “Listen, help’s on the way, okay?” I tell him. “Ned just wants to talk to you. Don’t shoot him, all right?”

  “I will do my best not to,” Tall assures me. “But if he is the path of my rampage, I cannot guarantee it.”

  “Understood.” To Ned I say, “slight change of plans. You need to come in from behind him, so cut over to Sixth in a block or two and then just head straight down Twenty-third.” And hope he doesn’t hear you coming and turn around, I add silently. But I figure why burden Ned with constant proof of my negativity?<
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  “Roger that.” Which is immediately followed by: “Why Roger? What about Hank, or Billy, or Ted, or Andrew, or any of the others? Why is it always Roger?”

  That’s actually something I’ve wondered myself, in the past. I’ve never been able to figure it out either. My best guess is it’s an homage to either Mr. Rogers or Roger Daltry or maybe Buck Rogers, but I’m not convinced.

  “I’m at Twenty-fifth,” Ned reports a few blessedly quiet minutes later. “Where is he now?”

  I glance up at the monitor. “Still right by the Flatiron, Twenty-third and fifth.”

  “Okay, cool.” He sounds amazingly calm, considering he’s about to do the same or better than staying someplace that’s now all vegans and others who’ve thrown in together to free the world of its “tyranny of dead flesh” and accidentally wearing your “All meat is good meat” T-shirt to breakfast. Not that I’ve done that, of course. Much. Let’s just say, lack of proper protein? Makes some people really cranky.

  He hits 23rd and turns onto it, then half-walks, half-ambles, half-jogs—yeah, I’m not the only one around here who’s good at creative math—the block from Sixth to Fifth. Now he and Tall are within a block of each other. I used to frequent this area a lot, and it’s really weird seeing it on the monitor. Especially since I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to go back.

  Or, at this rate, if there’ll be a “back” left for me to return to.

  “I see him!” Ned whispers into his phone a couple of minutes later. “He’s not looking at me!”

  “Great! Go for it!” I wonder if this plan could actually work.

  Then Tall turns around.

  I see Ned clearly in the monitor, in all his alien-plumber-mojo glory, so there’s no way Tall misses him, and sure enough a second later both pistols are aimed his way. “Uh, I’d stop there, if I were you,” I warn Ned.

  He skids to a halt in reply, and starts to hide behind a trashcan, changes his mind—which is for the best, because it wasn’t really adequate coverage for him anyway—and just straightens up and faces Tall boldly. That was the other reason I thought Ned might be able to help. He’s got moxy.

  “Hang on, switching phone to loudspeaker mode,” he warns, and I hear a beep. “You might want to cover your ears.” Uh, sure, but how’m I gonna hear anything then? And if the phone is under my hand so I can hear, how is covering them gonna help?

  “Hey, Tall!” he shouts. Yes, Ned and Mary both call him that. What can I say? When I give people nicknames, they stick. Go ask “Crawdad” Fowler if you don’t believe me. “It’s me, Ned!” The sound reverberates through my phone, making me wince, but it’s bearable. Of course, I’m also hearing it echoed through the mic I’ve got on Tall, and there’s a nanosecond delay, so that’s just odd.

  My camera-view bobs. “Hello, Ned. Why are you here? I am on a rampage.” Yes, he seems to have misplaced his contractions. And his ability to string together complex sentences. I swear, talking to cookie-zombie Tall is like dealing with a small child, just one with monstrous destructive capabilities. “Oh, yes he disassembled my Stradivarius and wrote with marker on my first printing of The Hobbit, but he was so polite about it! No, dearest, I’m not going to explain what ‘eviscerate’ means. Go look it up.”

  “Uh, yeah, about that,” Ned says. He moves a little closer. I’d say he’s probably forty feet away. Too far, I’m thinking. “Can we talk?”

  More bobbing, but the guns stay steady. Damn. “Certainly,” Tall replies. “But please don’t interfere with my rampage.” It’s like he’s got this on his to-do calendar now: “Rampage from 1pm to 7pm,” and as long as he’s allowed to continue that, he’s fine. I hate to think what kind of fit he’ll throw if it gets thwarted, though. And as if to prove my point, he takes a few steps forward and obliterates a mailbox. Not the real kind, though—one of those weird green ones that doesn’t have a slot for mail, doesn’t have a Post Office sticker or logo, and nobody seems to use in any way. I’ve always wondered what those’re for, actually, and especially since meeting Tall I’ve been curious as to whether they were MiB devices of some sort. Guess I won’t find out from this one, since it does the whole blue-glowing-spider-web thing and then slumps like its metal turned to putty and it’s been in the sun too long. Which means it must be organic. Gross.

  “I won’t,” Ned promises. “But can I walk with you? I’ll stay out of your way.” Smart man! Especially since Tall nods again, and now as Ned slides around to his side the guns switch to targeting other objects in his path, one of those little electric cars and a chained-up bike in this case. There’s literally nobody else in sight, not counting that creepy unconscious mailbox thing. It’s like the end of the world has come and gone, and all that’s left of humanity is a plumber and a government agent. And the plumber isn’t even human to begin with!

  “Okay, now what?” Ned asks, and after a second I realize from the lowered tone that he’s talking to me, not Tall.

  “You need to get within five feet, just to be safe,” I tell him. “Then tell him to stop the rampage and put down the guns.”

  “Right. And how do I get that close without him deciding I am interfering, and shooting me next?”

  “Oh, come on, you’re doing great!” I assure him. “Just, I don’t know, make polite conversation or something.”

  “Have you ever known Tall to make polite conversation?”

  “Well, no,” I admit. “But this is cookie-zombie Tall. He’s a whole different breed. Try it. Say something nice.”

  “Nice. Right.” But Ned tries. He’s only ten feet from Tall now, maybe less, and off to his side. “So, how’s the rampage going?” he asks, and takes advantage of talking to sidle a little closer. Nine feet.

  “Good, I think,” Tall answers. Another mailbox goes poof—the regular blue one this time, and I feel bad for anybody who had their letters in there. Or their bills. Would any company really take “a crazed-zombie government agent shot the mailbox and disintegrated it and all the mail in it, including my check” as a valid excuse? I have to remember to try that.

  “Yeah? You enjoying yourself?” Eight feet.

  “Oh, yes. I am cutting loose. Wa-hoo.” All of that’s delivered with the same lack of enthusiasm a ninety-year-old wracked with arthritis might offer when told he’s just won free rumba lessons.

  “Cool, cool. So, how long’s the rampage for, anyway?” Seven feet.

  “I have no definite end in sight.” That’s not good—I was really hoping it was on a timer. “Why?” Uh-oh—careful, Ned!

  But he shrugs. “Oh, no reason. Just wondered if maybe you wanted to grab some lunch after.” Six feet. And his question’s completely believable, too. I’ve never seen anyone as perpetually hungry as Ned, not even the goat we stole from a rival college once. He can put away a breakfast fit for three and still claim to be “a bit peckish” an hour later, enough to demolish an entire Super Bowl party’s worth of chips. Trust me, I’ve seen it happen. I’ve learned to stock enough food for an army any time I know he’s stopping by. That usually lasts long enough for me to order more.

  “Lunch sounds nice,” Tall admits, destroying a scooter and a street sign. “But it will have to wait until I am done with my rampage.”

  “Oh, sure, sure.” Five feet. “Know any good places around here? For lunch, I mean.”

  “Get a little closer, just to be safe,” I whisper to Ned. I resist the urge to add “now don’t be shy,” but it ain’t easy. “Then hit him with the orders.”

  “Right,” he whispers back.

  Tall seems to be considering Ned’s last question. “Yes,” he says finally. “I know several good restaurants within easy walking distance. What sort of food would you prefer?”

  Ned scratches his chin and steps a little closer still. Four feet. Definitely within range—if I’m right. I really hope I am—do you have any idea how hard it is to find a good tech guy these days? Especially one who makes house calls? “Oh, you know me,” he answers. “I’ll eat just a
bout anything.” And he grins—if I was there, I’d be worried about him trying to gnaw on my femur right about now. Not that he looks mean or angry. Just hungry.

  “We can discuss it more after my rampage,” Tall offers, shooting that little glass dome above the subway entrance that’s supposed to be green if it’s open and red if it’s closed but is usually so murky and dirty you wouldn’t know if there was a small glowing pixie trapped inside. Which just makes me wonder again.

  “Yeah, about that.” Ned’s only a few feet away from Tall now. Perfect. “Hey, Tall?”

  Tall swivels around to look right at him. “Yes, Ned?”

  Ned takes a deep breath. “Stop the rampage and put down the guns.”

  I hold my breath. So does Ned—I’m not sure how he managed to say that without exhaling, actually.

  “All right.” Tall just lets the guns fall—they clatter on the ground, and I’m just glad neither of them goes off by accident.

  Whew!

  “Whew!” Ned says, letting that breath out in a whoosh now and wiping his forehead. “You had me worried there, big guy!”

  Me too, I think. But that’s not what I say. “Tell him to snap out of it!” I instruct Ned.

  “Oh, right. Snap out of it!” he says. I could get used to this whole give-orders-and-people-carry-them-out thing. I can see why generals love wars, too. It’s kinda fun, having other people do your dirty work. Which also explains why people love to order food for delivery. It’s basically another way of saying, “fetch me my turkey pot-pie, bitch!”