So the manlike things he created are good and dead, but the Beamer must die too. Belongs to an enemy, someone who wants to take the city away from him. Can’t send the car to the House of Pain, so he must execute it.

He pulls the trigger, shooting wildly, punching hole after hole in the fenders. Aware of screams, only a few, from up and down the street, and fleeing people dart through his peripheral vision, but he keeps yanking on the trigger.

Suddenly a wall of flame erupts from the rear of the car, knocking him off his feet and searing him with a blast of heat, peppering him with flying glass.

Half-dazed, he struggles to his knees, blinking, coughing, then to his feet. Notices that the dark hair on his arms is singed into tight, tiny pale curls and the skin is scorched and blackened. His shirt is torn and he’s bleeding from a couple of spots on his already scarred chest. Shakes his head to clear the buzzing from his ears.

Across the street the Beamer is toast. Dead. Not merely dead, but clearly and sincerely dead, or however that goes. An evil devil witch car burning at the stake.

A weight in his hand. Carrot Top’s gun—some sort of Tokarev clone. Barely remembers how he got it. Stares at the pistol. The slide is back, the empty chamber exposed. Spare clip’s got to be in the car, which means this thing’s no good to him anymore. Tosses it into the burning heap and looks around.

Where is he? Some sort of high-rise apartment building canyon. Oh, yeah. Mid-fifties—near Gia’s. He spots a taxi stopped down the slope from the burning Beamer. Driver is twisted around. Seems to be trying to back up but the cars stacked behind him are preventing it.

Jack starts walking toward the cab. Driver turns and sees him. Eyes widen in his dark face and he tries to wave Jack off.

A cab, in my city, not wanting to give me a ride? What’s happening around here? Has everyone gone crazy?

Keeps walking toward the cab. Driver has stopped waving. Doesn’t appear to be the kind who believes in crosses, but from the look on his face if he had one he’d probably be holding it up to ward off this burnt-up and torn-up guy walking his way. Seems about to put the car in gear—Don’t even think about it—then changes his mind. Jumps out and runs back toward First Avenue.

Jack stops and watches him go. Now doesn’t that beat all. What’s wrong with people today? First furious impulse is to run after the little bastard and teach him some manners, but the cab is before him, engine idling, driver door standing open almost like an invitation.

Looks like I’ll have to drive myself.

But when he gets in he has second thoughts. Front section of the cab looks like a landfill—empty twenty-ounce Diet Pepsi and Mountain Dew bottles roll, Snickers and Dove Bar and peanut butter cracker wrappers flutter, and scattered all across the floor is a good half-inch layer of empty pistachio shells. Radio’s playing some awful song in a foreign language—Farsi?—but at least the radio’s still there. Can’t say the same about the air bag; its compartment in the steering wheel is a gaping toothless mouth—either somebody stole it or it deployed sometime in the dim dark past and the driver never replaced it.