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Part 8
Page 2
Shujuan tried to skateboard the rest of the distance
to her delivery, but her brain seemed too fogged to make sense of directions
now. In the end she tucked the board under her arm and ran. Her feet had
never failed her before, and running would get rid of the buzzing in her
head.
The longer she spent away from Kougaiji's place,
the more distinct the feeling became. It was like a warm numbness through
her extremities, the sort gotten after parts of your body have gone to
sleep, but all at once.
It felt like the dream she'd had this morning. But
even that was wrong. Because she wasn't so sure what that dream was.
Genjo Sanzo.
She was Genjo Sanzo. The legendary priest of the
Xi
You Ji. Not a fairy tale. Real. Happened.
Nothing was going to change that. That's who she
was. Anything else, about her life before, or after, was defined by that.
That life. Where she'd been a savior and a hero and, oh yes, a guntoting
badass who wasn't afraid of anything.
All those years in the video arcade suddenly made
so much sense.
If she'd been a bit more of Sanzo last night, Liang
wouldn't have gotten away with anything. She's have scared him pissless
and kicked his head in herself for even daring to lay a finger on her.
And nothing, ever, not Liang, not Ming Yue, not
the girls in that fucking locker room, could have gained an inch on her
she wasn't willing to give.
Why the hell had it taken her so long to get to
this?
Her feet operated of their own command and led her
up the stairs of an apartment, free hand throwing open the door without
a glance or pause. She found steps and bounded upwards, her watch wailing
about how long overdue she was.
It didn't matter. It so didn't matter. Any setbacks,
any stubborn little snags were all just so much quibbling, unimportant
detail. The business down the shitter, the gang stuff, her whole life,
it wasn't even weight around the ankles unless she wanted it to be. She
didn't need to plan and sort any of it out. It would sort itself
out. She was in the process of it already. All that time spent being scared
was time wasted. Irrevocably.
Shujuan stepped off at the 12th landing, some vague
part of her memory keying in that this was the floor of her destination,
and she thundered down the bare floorboards of the hallway waiting for
her hindbrain to recognize the right room number.
Just finish this up. She didn't even need to provide
an apology or an explanation. If the guy wanted a discount, fine, she'd
give it. Not a problem. Just get this whole mess out of the way so she
could concentrate on something important-- Ah!
Shujuan dug the heels of her boots into the floorboards
and skidded to a halt before door number 337. Neat and on the dime. Bam.
It was a nondescript apartment door. One of the
3s on the tag blinker fritzed out with a bad LCD; residue of the recent
humidity. There was no knob, but a buzzer under the resident name, that
she couldn't read. She pressed the button.
No answer.
She tried it again.
"Xiaolong Express Delivery Service!" Shujuan shouted
at the door, after another break of silence. "Package for you, sir!"
Nothing.
Shu-rin eyed the metal push-panel on the door, and
followed the line down to the foot of the door.
It was open. Just a slight crack, but still ajar.
"Sir?" she called again.
Silence.
Well. She wasn't going to just wander off with these
bags. What was she going to do with them, sell them on a street corner
just to get them off her hands? She'd just leave them and go.
But the lights were on when Shujuan pushed the door
open. And those lights were bright enough to illuminate the body lying
lifeless right before her feet.
His clothes were damp and dark, shredded. And there
was a growing puddle spreading out from under him, almost too black to
be blood.
But it was. Blood.
A lot of blood.
Shujuan's hearing noticed belatedly something close
to a person chuckling, over by the window. She threw her gaze up, saw for
the first time the arm chair by the glass, and the man reclining casually.
Straw-gold hair, and red sunglasses.
The Triad smiled over his steepled fingers.
"You're quite late," he told the girl.
The skateboard clattered to the floorboards.
"Not a sound way to conduct business, is it?" the
man went on. "How do you make your overhead, I wonder?"
Shujuan started to back up. "Y--You--"
"What is it now? Oh, yes. You offer compensation
with interest upon failed deliveries, do you not? One hundred ten percent
guarantee?" The Triad extended a hand, palm up. "Well?"
The pool of blood, the dead man, the blood trickling
toward the door near her boots--
"I do expect you to be a mature businesswoman, if
you can't be anything else, girl."
--Heart pounding in her ears, everything cottoning
out, going gray around the edges. The numbness gone, the coldness seeping
in--
"Oh, come on. Be practical here. You don't want
me to get physical."
--Gun. Gun on the table just at his left. Gunpowder
still stinking in the air. Blood at her boots--
Get--
Get a grip on yourself.
You. You're used to blood. Even if all else fades
to black and leaves you, the blood still stays. Always.
"Atta girl," the Triad said, seeing the girl stop
and calm herself. "Now," he said, beckoning her to meet his gaze across
the room, "leave the groceries. There you go. And we'll leave the debt
at twenty, what do you say?"
Shujuan forced her head into a shallow nod.
The bags dropped to the floor. Her hands went to
her pockets.
First her jeans. Then the front of her hoodie. The
hood itself.
Back pockets. Side pockets. Socks. Undershirt.
"Hm-hm," the man said, watching the display in amusement.
"Not good business, girl. Not at all."
The hand that had extended for his money now moved
to the chair-side table. For the gun.
Relax, Shujuan's brain said. Whatever
he does, you're the faster shooter.
Her hand twitched for a gun in a sleeve that wasn't
there.
Oh.
Well.
Shit.
Shujuan started running. About the same second the
Triad brought the gun up and fired.
The first bullet sailed straight into the wall right
in line with where her head had been about half a second before. The second
whizzed past her shoulder as she ran down the 12th floor hallway.
The third broke the upper left pane of glass of
a window, just before she threw herself headlong into the rest of it, and
started to fall down into the open air amid nothing but the screaming shatter
of glass.
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