Read Wild Cards 15 - Black Trump for Free Online Page B

didn't help any. He hit and bounced, sputtering and spitting unmentionable filth. He was back on his feet almost before he hit the floor, but he stopped, stunned, when he realized whom he was facing.
    It was a shambling mockery of a man and it smelled like it was long dead - which it was. Its stench was awful, its appearance hardly less so. It wore a sagging uniform that once fit tautly across its broad chest and wide shoulders. Now the cloth hung loose on a battered body that was sunken, twisted, broken, and charred. It couldn't possibly look that bad and still be alive - and it wasn't - but the one eye that was exposed by its full hood was open and tracking blearily on Ray as it stood and blocked his path.
    "Bobby Joe?" Ray said unbelievingly. "How the hell are you still getting around?"
    The dead ace called Crypt Kicker wasn't fast in his best moments. The accumulated wear and tear of his previous few adventures, some of which he'd shared with Ray, had taken even more of a toll. When he spoke it was in an agonizingly slow, barely understandable drawl.
    "The Lord isn't ready to receive me yet. There's still more for me to do here on Earth."
    Ray felt like screaming in what was left of Crypt Kicker's face (thankfully hidden by the hood he wore), but restrained himself.
    "Well, Jesus, Bobby Joe, get the hell out of my way and let me do what I'm supposed to do."
    Ray went to step around Crypt Kicker, but the huge ace snaked out a hand and grabbed Ray around the upper arm in a grip that even Rays strength couldn't break. "I can't let you do that, Billy."
    "You fucking moron," Ray blazed. "You're working with the Sharks?"
    Crypt Kicker nodded ponderously. "Yes. They have a serum to cure the wild card. It's the Lord's work, to bring an end to the pain and suffering."
    Jesus, Ray thought. "Let me go, Bobby Joe," he said in a low, tight voice.
    "Can't ..." Bobby Joe Puckett said, and Ray struck him in the forearm hard enough to snap the bones of most men.
    But Crypt Kicker clung on doggedly. Ray swung again and again as the massive ace wound up to retaliate. Puckett's blow came with all the force of a diesel locomotive and all the speed of a sleeping sloth. Ray ducked and Puckett's fist slammed into the wall. The wall buckled, Puckett turned his attention to pulling his fist out of the hole it'd made in the wall and Ray yanked free. He turned, grabbed the back of Puckett's hood, and slammed his head as hard as he could into the wall.
    The wall gave before the onslaught of Puckett's head. Ray took a deep breath of thanks, but before he could get away Puckett bellowed like a wounded elephant and tore out a huge chunk of plasterboard as he pulled himself free of the wall.
    "Shit," Ray said, and Crypt Kicker, flailing around blindly, caught Ray across the chest with a blow powerful enough to knock him off his feet and send him skidding down the hall on his backside. By the time Ray got up Puckett had managed to extricate himself from the piece of wall framing him like an especially ugly Picasso.
    Ray charged and Puckett lifted his hands and let fly with the toxic wastes and poisons that had accumulated in his body. Ray tried to twist away from the streams of venomous chemicals, but some splashed against his side, sizzling through his borrowed fatigues and eating skin and flesh.
    Ray didn't even try to suppress his scream. Yelling like a maniac, he hurled himself at Puckett. The dead ace waited with open arms, wanting, no doubt, to enfold Ray to his massive bosom where he could alternately crush him with his inhuman strength and fry him with the toxicity of his flesh.
    Ray knew that he couldn't out-strength Puckett. He had to out-think and out-quick him.
    At the last second he went down, hitting the floor and kicking out with a leg-whip that smashed Crypt Kicker's knees, Puckett toppled like a falling redwood. Ray leapt to his feet and stomped hard on Puckett's throat. Puckett clutched at his legs, but Ray pulled away. He stomped again,