Chapter Two
Tires screeched below us and the sounds of cars colliding reached us from the street. We got up to have a look and saw that the accident had been rather severe. One of the cars looked as if its engine might have been shoved into the driver's lap and the other car was upside down, half onto the sidewalk.
Doris muttered, "How the hell did they do that in bumper-to-bumper traffic? Some people are truly gifted, aren't they?"
Both cars were blocking an Akard Street intersection in the middle of rush hour and traffic was piling up around them. Emergency vehicles would have a hard time getting to them and people were beginning to approach the wrecks.
"That sounds like Doris the Cop talking," I said. "Want to go down there?"
She nodded and moved closer so I could pick her up as she said, "Doris the Cop also says we need to keep people well clear in case there's a fire, but we can handle that while we check out the drivers."
I stepped off the roof and quickly lowered us eighteen floors to the sidewalk. A woman at a bus stop jumped back with a soft screech as we landed.
As soon as Doris's feet touched the ground she was on her way to the nearest of the accident cars while I started urging people near the cars to get clear and stay clear.
The front end of one car had been accordioned into a compacted wad of leaking metal and the driver was slumped over the wheel. Doris reached in to check his pulse and seemed not to find one, because she almost immediately headed for the upside-down car.
I took a turn looking for a pulse, as well. Nope. Nothing.
"Ed!" yelled Doris.
Turning away from herding people, I saw Doris waving at me, so I jogged over there. I could see her problem before I arrived. The roof of the car had crushed inward badly and we'd have to remove the door to get at the driver.
"Door's jammed," she said. "I can yank the door off or hold the car to keep it from sliding, but not both."
"I'll hold the car steady. Go for it."
She got a grip on the door and gave it a heave. It came off in her hands, sending one of the hinge bolts flying at the other car. It spanged off the wreckage and skittered to a stop between two onlookers, one of whom picked it up with awe.
Doris tossed the door aside and leaned into the car. We could see that the driver -- still suspended in his seat by his seat belt -- was unconscious and bleeding profusely, and Doris again asked me to help by supporting his legs as she gently lifted him out.
Tendrils of smoke rose from somewhere in the overturned car. Better to have it burn in the middle of the street instead of on the sidewalk in front of a drugstore. After helping Doris get the man to the sidewalk, I returned to the car.
When I began to lift the car, it sagged groaningly, made popping and snapping noises, and began to come apart in my hands. Doris left the man on the sidewalk and came to help as I began shoving the car into the middle of the street.
With a great deal of noise from the car's dragging roof, we shoved the dead car out to the yellow line some distance from the other wrecked vehicle.
There was a broad puddle of oil and a trail of anti-freeze under the front end of the car and a trickle of gasoline under the rear. Instead of flowing toward the gutter, the gasoline followed the incline of the hill between the yellow lines, spreading itself out some at the intersection, and then continued flowing downhill.
A uniformed cop arrived, saying that he'd had to park his car almost a block away. He checked out the man in the upright wreck and jogged over to the guy on the sidewalk, then radioed a situation report.
Maybe someone downhill just hadn't quite been able to resist the temptation of flowing gasoline. A trail of fire flowed uphill along the gas trail and a woman screamed, "Fire! Fire!"
People cleared the street a helluva lot faster than they had before, but they didn't retreat beyond the sidewalks.
With a great 'whoomp!' the rear of the upside-down car jumped slightly and became a fireball and the cop had to change his radio report as he was giving it.
A second cop showed up with a similar story about parking difficulties. He conferred with the first cop, then applied himself to crowd control as the first cop tried to help the injured man. When a third cop appeared, he and one of the others tried vainly to make a path for an ambulance.
"Doris," I said, "They have a street full of witnesses. Do you want to stay here and fill out paperwork?"
"No. We've done what we can and one of these guys knows me. Let's let the uniforms handle things. Back to the roof?"
"Too many people. We'd be noticed. Let's go through the drugstore and take the elevator to the roof, then hop over to our building."
Just as I said that, a car ignored the cops and tried to slip past the burning wreck. The cops yelled and someone in the crowd tossed a water bottle that bounced off the car's windshield.
"A distraction," said Doris. "Let's go."
We ducked into the drugstore. As we passed the electronics counter, a clerk seemed to be rather frantically messing with a video camera. He didn't look up as we passed. When we got off the elevator on the fifteenth floor, there seemed to be no way to go any further up without ruining a locked door.
"Can't break and exit," said Doris. "That's as bad as breaking and entering."
"So we'll stroll around a bit and look for another way out. Failing that, we can tiptoe out of here later."
A janitor encountered us near the elevator. He peered at us for a moment, then asked if we were looking for a way to the roof.
Doris asked, "The roof? Why would we want to go to the roof?"
The guy grinned and grunted a short laugh.
"Well," he said, "I seen y'all workin' down there in the street and I seen how ya'll jumped down off the roof acrost the way. I figger y'all wouldn't be way up here atall 'cept to get away from all the ruckus downstairs, so that means y'all are prob'ly lookin' for a way to get to the roof."
He jangled his key ring and added, "And I got the keys right here. Y'all wanna go up to the roof or not?"
"Sure do," I said. "Thanks."
He nodded and led the way to the door. We thanked him again and shook his hand as he held the door open for us, then he followed us onto the roof and leaned on the door as I picked up Doris and prepared to jump.
"By the way," he said, "If'n y'all ever need to come in or go out this way agin, you might just gimme a call after four and before midnight. That's my shift."
He recited a pager number. We thanked him again and I hopped us across to our building's rooftop. When I put Doris down and we turned to look back, he gave us a little wave -- we waved back, of course -- and then he turned to go back inside the building as casually as if he'd been taking a smoke break.
The police and fire people seemed to have things under control in the street. The fire had been put out and a small group of paramedics was wheeling a pair of gurneys onto the scene as a news crew from some media office in a nearby building filmed the event.
"Glad we got away before the hounds arrived," I said.
Doris looked at me quizzically. I pointed at a guy with a shoulder-mounted camera on the sidewalk below.
"Oh. Reporters, you mean."
"Yeah, them."
"You don't like the idea of being a news item?"
"No. Famous people can't even take a leak in peace."
She shrugged slightly and said, "Could be we won't have a choice after today. That clerk in the drugstore was aiming a camera out the window before we went in."
"Yeah, I saw him messing with it. Looked as if something wasn't working and he was trying to fix it when we went by."
"I guess we'll find out later."
Find out we did, when we went back to the offices downstairs. The TV by the coffee bar was on and a small crowd had gathered around it. Upon our arrival we were told by one of the other operatives that the Ed and Doris show was on.
Doris groaned and muttered, "Oh, hell."
Channel 9 had been the high bidder, I guess. They had the exclusive tape on the incident, and the other stations who showed the footage left the little "9" logo on the bottom right of the screen as a credit.
The clerk in the drugstore had grabbed one of the video cameras, loaded it, and begun filming through the drugstore window right after the wreck. The camera had been pointing at the upright wreck and had caught our landing at the bus stop, as well as everything else we'd done. We'd even been filmed as we'd boarded the elevators in the drugstore's building.
"Well, damn," I said. "I guess I'll take my phone off the hook for a while."
Doris chuckled at me as the phone in her office rang. Her assistant, Angie, answered it, then yelled to Doris that someone from Channel 9 wanted an interview.
Doris said, "Take a number and say I may call back," then she muttered, "When hell freezes."
She looked less than thrilled, and I grinningly took my turn at chuckling at her.
"Heh. See? Maybe my phone isn't going to be the problem. Someone recognized you, ma'am. I'm still Mister Mystery."
"Not for long, smartass. If they've managed to find me this quickly, they'll find you, too."
"Huh-uh. Nope. I'm not the one with the gorgeous legs and a skirt that rode up when she knelt by the injured man. Guess I'm just not news. See ya."
Angie said, "Uh, no, not quite. Look," and pointed at the TV.
On the screen I was shoving the upside-down car sideways to the middle of the street, then Doris stepped into the scene. As soon as she did, the camera zoomed in on her legs and butt.
"See?" I said. "No sweat. Wow! Look at those legs."
Angie muttered, "He shouldn't have zoomed on your legs like that, Doris."
I said, "Any man would, Angie. We can't help it, y'know. Wow, just look at 'em. Doris, this could be your ticket to show biz."
Doris snapped, "Enough about my legs, both of you."
Grinning, I said, "Doris, if you don't return their call, they'll come looking for you."
She nodded and sighed, "Yeah. I know. Quiet, now. I have to think about what to say."
Angie asked, "You're not really going to give them an interview?"
"If I don't, there's no telling what they'll say."
"Or what they'll ask if you do," said Angie. "I wouldn't do it. What do you think, Ed?"
"You already know what I think. I'm getting the hell out of here before they show up. You're on your own, ladies."
Angie said, "Oh, hey! Someone said you have a new car, Ed. I was absolutely shocked. Stunned, you could almost say."
She grinned at Doris and Doris grinned back. I sighed.
"Yeah, well, don't be," I said, "It's a new old car; an '84 Olds Eighty-Eight that's already given emergency rides to four owners of this year's models. How much are your car payments, Angie?"
"My what?" She rolled her eyes and said, "Oh. Oh, God; way too much. Over $450.00 a month."
"Plus full coverage insurance, I'll bet," I said. "I have a garage-kept, fully loaded, completely operational 1984 luxury car that cost me about two of your car payments. Liability insurance only, with a low deductible. Cars are just money holes and new cars are the worst kinds of money holes. Your first two years of payments go to cover profits and interest."
"Are you sure you aren't just saying that because you can't afford one?"
Doris interjected, "Nah, he can afford one. I think he really believes this stuff."
"Oh, he does, ma'am," I said with a laugh. "See you on Monday. Gee, that accident is still tying up the entrance to our garage, isn't it? Good thing I didn't drive to work today. Oh, wait! Didn't you ladies drive to work? You could be here a while, I bet. Bye!"
Both ladies reflected the shock of realizing the truth of my statement. They went to the windows to see how cleanup efforts below were going.
I retrieved my orange road-crew vest with hyper-reflective strips all over it from the coat rack and tied it to my backpack, then went to the roof. Lifting into the sky in the direction of Mesquite, I dodged a few of the taller buildings until I was clear of downtown Dallas, then I then stayed low, only a few hundred feet up.
A near-miss at night by a small plane had made me realize that I could be hard to see in the air. Funny how things like that don't always occur to you until something brings them to your attention. I'd heard the plane, then seen its oncoming lights and descended a bit. The plane had seemed to follow me down and had missed me by inches.
Flight is still new to me in some ways. Although I can reach speeds barely in excess of Mach 4 in a flat-out dash, I discovered quickly that clothes don't handle such speeds well. Also, without expandable energy storage "tanks" like April and Sara had, both my speed and strength are rather limited.
Full speed for thirty minutes leaves me feeling washed out and dead tired for the thirty minutes or so it takes to recharge enough to function in hard Texas sunlight with my shirt off.
It doesn't seem to matter where the energy comes from. I can bask in the sun for a while or soak up electricity or stick my hands in a fire. As I said, I can't store as much energy as the ladies, but as long as there's a source of raw energy of some sort, I can recharge pretty quickly.
Doris linked with me and said in a softly accusing tone, "Ed, you hit the road without even asking if I wanted some company this evening. I'm feeling rather slighted at the moment."
"Well, do you want some company? I can turn around."
Her laugh came through our link. "Nah. I just wanted to beat you over the head with it. Something's come up here at the office and I can't get away just yet, anyway. Ever hear of Dennis Malloy?"
"Nope. What's up?"
"Not Malloy. He's dead. They found him in a dumpster while we were out of the office. Somebody knifed him."
"Uh, huh. Who was Malloy and how should I respond to this, um... grave... news, Doris?"
"Very funny. Malloy was an informant, Ed. A good one who seemed to be trying to buy back a level of decency. He used to deal in hot jewelry, but when he got out of prison, he tried to go straight."
"Well, that's unusual. Good for him, of course. Again..."
"Yeah, yeah. Respond by being available this evening, okay? I may have a job for you."
"When am I not available for you, Doris? I'm at your beck and call night and day, you know. Sometimes I sit by the phone for hours, hoping in vain that you'll call and..."
Her bark of mental laughter was followed by, "Oh, Jesus, enough, please! I just wanted to let you know that you may be called back in."
"Okay. I won't make any plans that I can't break."
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