NO SHARP THING By Barry Hollander 
LITTLE Jamie drew the short stick, so I wiped dirt from his face, slicked down his hair. He looked at me with eyes that belonged on some stuffed animal and whispered low enough the others wouldn't hear.
"Gant. I'm scared."
It was bad enough being so hungry we had to mug a perv, but the worst was playing the bait. The little ones all took a turn, all except Dirty Red. Nothing would help that scar on his face. "Don't worry. We've all done this. Just don't get near the cars, okay? Later we'll eat."
That got his attention. We hadn't had much of anything except what we scrounged from dumpsters. The kids scooped up bricks and rocks, then made like ghosts in the alley. Pervs trolled all night on Claiborne, cruising along in shiny cars in hopes of spotting a loner, some kid so desperate he'd do almost anything for a bite to eat. Dumpster diving was one thing, and so was rolling a perv when things got bad enough, but none of our kids sold themselves. Susie and I made sure of that.
"Remember," I told him. "Lure the guy into the alley. We'll be waiting."
He nodded. Scared, but nodded. If it worked, we'd whack the guy until he fell and then a little more to be sure, take whatever we could find and run like hell. Later we'd get some food from one of the all-nighters, decent stuff rather than the thin soup and preaching they made you listen to down at the kitchen. Mugging a perv wasn't something we tried every day, otherwise the cops got interested, but some of the little ones were looking at dirt like it was edible. They expected Susie and me to do something about it, even though we weren't much older than them.
In this part of Claiborne the electricity didn't work all that well and it was mostly gray buildings and gray streets, a few people pushing grocery carts and hoping for a handout. The big kid gangs didn't like it much, the dark. Nothing worth stealing from people who had to start fires to push back the night.
Jamie walked out toward the street.
Headlights bounced off the buildings. Some of those cars were rolling tanks that rich people used to get from point A to point B and taking no chances between the two, arms with guns that could spray a street with rubber bullets. We never messed with them.
Jamie hesitated and I knew why. Last time he drew the short stick, a guy almost snagged him. Lucky that Susie ran up at the last second, smacked the perv in the head right there on the street in front of the passing cars, then dragged him to safety.
Headlights painted him with light, then moved on. A car slowed, dark glass sliding down so the driver could get a better peek. He must not have liked what he saw, cause the car never stopped. Another rolled by, stopped. The glass opened, a hand beckoned from the window. Jamie stood his ground. Good boy, I whispered to myself. Bring him to you. Back into the alley.
The guy drove away.
From behind I heard a stomach grumble.
Things went his way for a while until an old car squeaked to a stop. Instead of a hand motioning for Jamie to come closer, a flashlight beam stabbed out at his face. Jamie put a hand up to shield his eyes, but kept looking into the light.
"Daddy?"
Smart move. Pervs, they gobble that up.
The driver leaned out his window, said something I couldn't make out. Jamie inched back, froze again. It's like fishing, I told them. You toss out the bait, wait for a nibble, set the hook and reel them in. They all gave me funny looks I couldn't figure out until Susie told me none of them knew what fishing was. Jamie backed another step, moving stiff like an old dog getting up from a long nap. One of the kids behind me shuffled, trying to get a comfortable spot. Or maybe it was just a rat. The car door opened and a hand motioned Jamie to come closer, but he stood there, body shaking.
Hold on, I told him in my mind. Bring the guy to us.
Like a fish on a hook, the man stepped out of his car.
Not your usual perv. A young guy in jeans and a dark shirt, tall and fit. The fat ones moved slower and even if they were strong you could usually nail them. This guy might be trouble. I had a whistle for times when things went wrong and we were to scatter. I had fingers to my mouth ready to blow when Jamie stumbled back another step.
The man edged closer, then stopped.
"A nice try," he said loud enough for us to hear. "I may be a fool, but I'm not fool enough to walk into that alley."
Damn. Dirty Red stiffened next to me. "Let's go," he whispered. I heard more shuffling, something heavy scrape over the pavement. Susie, probably. She was always protective of the little ones, the first to jump in if trouble brewed. She hadn't taken any crap off anyone since the time one of the big boy gangs grabbed her for a while, until she finally got free and made it back to us. Never said what happened, just came back with her clothes ripped, bruises on her face and other places. Since then she always had something hard or sharp in her hands.
The man put his arms out. No weapon.
"I am not here to hurt anyone," he said. "Not this child, not any of you. I want to talk."
Little Jamie stood like a zombie. I felt Susie ease up next to me and tug at my shirt.
"Get him out of there," she whispered. In her hand was a hunk of metal with a corner to it like a hook. Lord knows where she found it.
The perv just stood there, waiting.
"I want to talk," he said again. "I am willing to pay. Money or food. Both."
Susie gave me a look, then rolled her eyes.
"Jamie," she said, loud enough for the perv to hear. "Come back."
The kid just stood, his body shaking. Frozen stiff. The perv must have heard her, because he took another step and a passing car lit up the smile on his face. Nobody around here ever smiled, or if they did it was right before they stuck you, or just after they stole from you. Either way, a smile meant trouble.
If everyone scattered, Jamie would be dead meat. The guy would have him, or Susie would run out and try to take his head off and end up getting hurt as well. A cop would be good about now, but the odds of seeing a cop were about the same as seeing a nun.
"Stay," I said to Susie, then stood.
"Talk about what?" I held my club next to my body so he couldn't see it in the dark.
"Your young friend won't move," he said. "Not until I allow it. The spell I used is quite effective."
"Right," I said. "Not allow it." Great, a nutcase, as if they weren't all nutcases, but now we had one who claimed he did magic. Susie stood next to me, not even trying to hide what was in her hand. The perv could be the bogeyman and she wouldn't care. The guy looked at us, put his hands out again.
"I am unarmed. I need your help. I want to talk to you about finding someone." He hesitated. "Someone like me."
Susie snorted. "Another creepy perv? Look out there and take your pick."
He shook his head. "No girl," he said. "Someone like me. Someone who uses magic."
* * * *
BRYCE, he called himself. We met later at Jim's, an all-nighter with steel mesh over the windows, one narrow door, and this awful music he pumped out of two cheap speakers to keep customers from hanging around too long. People walked in with money or stuff they had stolen, walked out again with food or booze or smokes. Nobody robbed Jim, not since the time he nearly cut two guys in half with his shotgun. He didn't keep the thing under the counter like any sane person, just held it in one hand while making change with the other.
The kids sat off to the side eating microwave burritos. Susie made sure everyone had a fair share.
Bryce hadn't said much, just sipped a cup of coffee and watched as we organized the food and drink and spent his twenty bucks as fast as we could before he changed his mind. He made a face at the coffee and set it aside.
"You do a nice job, the two of you, keeping them together. Almost like a family."
Susie sat down. "Yeah, he's Ozzie and I'm Harriet." Next to her was a rock. In her pocket I knew there was a small knife, and in her sock she kept a can of pepper spray. Probably she had other stuff even I didn't know about.
Bryce was maybe in his 30s, dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, a tanned face. Not the beach baby kind of tan, but the look of a guy who had worked a lot in the sun. Soft gray eyes. He had laughed when Susie positioned herself between him and Jamie like a bitch watching a pup, then his eyes showed something else; hurt, maybe, that someone would think he would prey on a little kid.
Well, looks don't mean much. Soft eyes could still watch you bleed to death.
"I need help," he finally said. "Someone who knows the streets in the part of town where the electricity hardly works."
Susie picked at something in her burrito and flicked it away. "That narrows it down a lot."
"It does." He picked up his coffee again, made a face as he took a swallow. "I've looked around, checked the city records, spent some time accessing the right information. There's a woman I'm looking for, one who will live as close as she can to people but as far away from electricity as she can manage."
Susie stopped halfway into a bite of her burrito. I put up my hand to keep her quiet.
"Mister, how'd you keep Jamie from running away? He says he couldn't move, like his feet were stuck in glue."
Bryce crumpled the cup, looked as if he wanted a trash can. Like anyone ever used a can. Our bench was an island in a sea of plastic wrappers, cups, bags, the refuse of life this side of Canal Street. Bugs flew in thick clouds around the one big floodlight Jim kept trained on the lot. Bryce glanced around, shrugged and dropped the cup.
"I did it exactly as I said. Magic."
Susie eased from her seat. She had one hand in her pocket, the other near her mouth like she wanted to barf back the burrito.
Magic.
Years ago, a bunch of LA fruitcakes figured it all out, probably by accident after too many drugs. Magic, spells, the whole thing. They promised to solve the world's problems, to cure disease, to take care of us all. Even the smallest of my kids knew what happened next, how they started churning out magic stuff, how the governments and churches freaked. Wizards, they called themselves, and they started training a few people. Did some good things, or so my old man told me before he died, then good turned to bad to just plain weird. Jobs disappeared, businesses closed, the economy crumbled. People blamed the wizards and things got real ugly. The magic people went into hiding.
He looked at me, at Susie. The kids were still caught up in their food and not paying any attention.
"I believe you," I said.
He seemed surprised. "Really? Why?"
"Simple. Nobody would admit to something like that unless it was true." Plus I had spoken to Jamie. Sure, he'd been scared, but not so scared he couldn't move if he had to. Magic made as much sense as anything else, though I never thought I'd meet anyone who used it. I figured them for all being dead.
He nodded at my words. "Good point. Listen, it's like this. A wizard is hiding here, a woman with black hair, about my age, pale skin and pretty. Real pretty. I need to find her."
"Why?"
He sighed and his gray eyes had the same look in them as when Susie thought he was a perv.
"Simple," he said. "I have to kill her."
* * * *
HE explained it all, some of which I knew, some of it I didn't, especially that magic didn't work near electricity.
"Magic doesn't work in a vacuum," he said. "You have to be around people because it steals the one thing humanity can't afford to lose, but people can't resist doing it, can't resist having what it offers, the power, the rush. It's an addiction."
Big words, said Susie, but why ask us? Big kid gangs had more muscle, cops had more guns. Even the winos saw more than we did. He smiled like he'd seen her for the first time.
"You're smart. You get around. And I'm in a hurry."
"To kill someone," Susie said. "You mentioned that."
The kids were nearly finished eating. I motioned for Susie to check them one last time. She frowned at me, then shrugged.
She took the rock with her.
We cut a deal, the magic guy and me. First off, he'd pay us for what we already knew. He figured we might have seen the woman before, and he was right. Probably she kept to one building or had someone else run errands, buying food and gear. I'd tell him what we knew already for cash, then he'd pay us again if I found the exact place she lived. A sweet setup, with fifty bucks now, a hundred if we found her place, more money than we'd see in ten years.
"Gant," he said. "This is important and dangerous. You're older than the rest, smart too. That little hellcat might be tough, but it's clear you're the leader here. Don't take any chances with your kids, but it's like this: I've got to know where she's hiding."
I didn't like him using my name like he knew me, and I didn't like him thinking I'd risk one of my kids for his lousy money. Something had been bugging me through this whole mess. Well, a lot of things bugged me, like sitting and talking to some self-proclaimed wizard with an urge to kill somebody, but one thing bothered me more than most. How did he know to look here?
He grinned. "Professional secret. Let's just say your city demonstrates a deplorable lack of wit, even when compared to its peers."
"Huh?"
"Never mind. Plus, sections of the city being without electricity makes it a prime candidate. And something else." He leaned close. "Sometimes one wizard can smell another one, like a dog sniffing a tree. She's here, and close."
I spilled what I knew for his fifty bucks and we arranged to meet in two nights back at Jim's. He seemed okay with that, said he had something else to take care of before dealing with the woman. By then Susie had returned, hefting the rock for effect.
The next morning I split us into two groups. Susie headed out with her crew, me with mine. Moving around in daytime was dangerous. Night was dangerous too, but in a different way. Sure enough, after a few questions to the right winos, a little peeking in dirty corners and a little luck, we nailed the place by that night. There was this line of buildings full of broken windows and no electricity, except one building still had some glass and later, when it got dark, you could see yellow light sneaking out behind some curtains. Had to be the one.
Bryce showed up in the same clothes but his face tired, like he'd skipped a night or two of sleep. He drank coffee, gulped it. His hand shook and some of it spilled.
"Sorry," he said. "Been busy."
"Yeah? Us too. Found your gal."
His shoulders sagged.
"What's wrong? Thought you wanted us to find her."
"Not so soon," he said. "I lost someone last night, the guy who normally helps me. This woman, she wasn't the only one in your fair city."
Susie shrugged. "Then wait. She's not going anywhere, not with her building and the guy out front keeping an eye on her front door. We still get paid." She didn't have a rock this time. Instead, she was picking at her nails with that knife of hers. He seemed to be thinking about it. You could see it in his eyes, that he'd rather be somewhere else, doing something else. The kids were giggling and munching on hotdogs. Two days in a row they had laughed. That was something.
He looked over and gave a little smile, like he'd noticed them for the first time. Or maybe he just didn't see kids much.
"Listen, mister," I said. "We tell you where she is, you pay us for our trouble. That's the deal. What you do after or when you do it, that's your business."
He acted like he hadn't listened.
"A guard? Damned trusting of her. I wouldn't have thought it."
He looked hard at me. "I have to move fast. She'll figure out I dealt with another wizard. I don't have time to find a shooter I can trust, someone to keep her preoccupied. You kids are all I have."
He sighed. "I'll pay you more, a lot more, if you two help me finish this job."
* * * *
NO electricity makes for one dark piece of downtown. A fire burned halfway down the street in a trash can, a couple of shapes sticking close for warmth. They weren't our problem. A guy sat in a shadow, but when he lit a cigarette, we had him pegged. Bryce said he couldn't use magic, otherwise it would tell the woman we were coming. That left it to us. He didn't like the plan, but we'd used it before.
She strolled from one direction and did a little of her lost-little-girl routine. I had a tire iron in my hand. She'd get him to look one way, I'd come from the other. Worked like a charm, except that I missed his head and gave him a glancing blow on his shoulder instead.
"What the--"
He spun around, yanked out a knife. I was about to swing again when his eyes got all big and some spit came out of his mouth before he fell. Behind him stood Susie with something long and sharp in her hand.
Bryce ran up. He stared at the dark lump on the sidewalk.
"My God," he said, shuddering. He looked at Susie, but she just shrugged back at him.
"Okay," he said. "Let me look at the front door."
I figured he must know something about locks. Instead, he peered above the door, lips moving like some of the old guys you see wandering the streets. We watched the guys hugging that fire.
"I see it," he said, then waved his hands. Above the door, some writing turned blue, then faded, and I felt my stomach get heavy. Sure, he had said he was one of those magic guys, had frozen Jamie, but it hadn't seemed true until now.
"Didn't you just announce yourself?" I asked.
"No. It's one thing to attack someone with a spell, it's another to dismantle a trap. Or pick a lock." He put his hand against the door knob and it flashed blue. Then he opened it.
Inside, Bryce mumbled some words and a faint ball of blue formed in the air, revealing a stairway. Susie reached it first, but as her foot came to the step Bryce jerked her back. That long sharp thing came up to his chest. It was metal and she had filed it sharp. Some blood still stained the metal. With a finger, Bryce touched the point and pushed it aside.
"Watch," he whispered.
The ball painted the steps blue until it reached the third step, where red flashed. Another trap. He did something to the step and sent the ball climbing higher. Right then I almost grabbed Susie and ran, but a deal is a deal.
We reached the second story and from a door that had to overlook the street, a yellow glow showed from underneath. Bryce pulled us close.
"When I blow the door, we go in. Fast, like we planned."
Susie and me bunched up. She had that long metal thing while I had dropped the tire iron and pulled the crappy old gun we kept hidden for emergencies. He waved his hands and all the air left the room, like it had been sucked out by a giant vacuum cleaner. He pointed at the door and, out of nowhere, came this flash of light and the door exploded.
Susie and I charged in, found a room plenty big but little furniture except a table with a bunch of papers spread across, a cot over to one side, a table against one wall with what looked to be a small cooking stove and some other stuff. Of course, Susie invented her own plan. She ran right at the woman inside who, for a second, seemed surprised but then stuck a hand out and sent all of Susie's arms and legs crazy, like a doll being yanked in different directions.
"Susie!"
I had to sidestep her to get off a shot. The woman's eyes widened and she pointed at me, said some words, and my body turned numb. For a second, one sick second, I thought Bryce had left us, then in he came all aglow. A bolt of blue shot out and enveloped the woman without touching her, a red light keeping it away. The sticky, numb feeling went away. Susie stumbled back into me and we both fell.
Bryce had his hands out like he was cupping something, trying to squeeze it closed, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn't do it. He was sweating. The woman seemed over the surprise, a calm expression on her face.
"You really should let me go Bryce," she said. "Before you hurt yourself."
He swallowed, kept trying to squeeze, so she smiled and put out her own hands, made the blue fade.
"Here you are, using the very thing you say we shouldn't use. Hypocrite. Am I the last one in the city? Was it really you who killed the others? I can't believe that, Bryce. You seem so weak. I taught you better than this." The red grew brighter, pushing the blue back.
I looked at Susie. Our side wasn't doing too well. The red had shoved the blue back a few feet, toward Bryce. His eyes looked as if they were about to pop and he swallowed, pushed, gained a little ground, but it seemed to have cost him something.
Susie crawled over to me. "Stick a fork in him," she said. "He's done."
"Head for the door," I whispered. "I'll watch our back."
We kept low, working our way out of the room. I felt the woman's eyes on us, but she didn't seem that interested now that we clearly had decided to retreat. We had to go around Bryce, but his focus was all on the woman. As Susie passed, she stopped.
"Sorry."
Surprised the hell out of me, her saying that. Whatever it did, she got Bryce's attention.
"Help me." The red light inched closer, like blood about to touch him.
I put my mouth to her ear. "Get out. I'm going to hang back for a second, see if they cream each other. Might get us something out of it. Wait in the street."
She was all eyes, like she can get sometimes when she looks at me funny. She put a hand on my shoulder.
"Careful."
"Always."
She disappeared out the door.
I counted to ten, watched the red gain ground. I checked the load in the gun.
Then I stood and fired at the woman.
The bang sounded more like a whimper, as if a pillow had been stuffed into the room and made everything sound less than it was. The stupid bullet hung in the air about three feet from the woman, inching along like it was in some bad martial arts movie, so I shifted to a different angle and fired. The slugs hung there.
The red faded, the blue inched closer to her body. He was winning. Another angle, another shot, same result.
"Boy!"
It was the woman. Her eyes were cold and black. Bryce had been right, she was pretty, but in a pale and cold sort of way. If she was mumbling some special kill-a-boy spell, I couldn't see it, but I sure as hell could feel it in the air. I ran to the table and squeezed off another round. The slug got closer than the others, but still hung in the air.
"Again," said Bryce, his blue light pushing closer to her.
I had two lousy shots left. I put the gun out in front of me, saw her complete attention swivel my direction. The red light faded, the blue stabbed at her like a knife but never quite made it through her shield. I aimed right at her face, her pretty face.
Was she sweating?
No. She was smiling.
"Oh crap," I said.
She smiled. "What a wonderful idea." I felt my gut lurch as if someone hit me in the stomach, felt everything inside go to water. It was as if I'd swallowed fire and was trying to crap it all out at the same time. I rolled, stuck the gun in the air and squeezed a wild shot that missed, saw the blue almost reach her, then saw how she began to push it away.
Bryce was going to lose.
A shape leaped over me. Susie.
She stabbed with that piece of sharpened black metal, right at where the red shield seemed the thinnest. Sparks flew and Susie was blown back into the table, scattering papers with diagrams and formulas and who knows what else. She whacked her head and fell into a heap. A ribbon of the blue magic slipped in where she had stabbed the shield, got the woman. I tried to sit up and get to Susie, but I slipped on my own puke that somehow I'd missed doing in all my other bowel explosions. Blue light licked at the woman's skin and she screamed once, high like a cat does when it gets in a fight. Bryce's hands were almost together. The woman pushed again, forced the blue back.
I still had a bullet.
I stood, stumbled close and pointed the gun right at her face. She blinked like she had never seen me or a gun before, like I'd become a magic guy myself and conjured the thing from thin air. Words formed on her lips, and it sure wasn't a magic spell she was saying.
"What a wonderful idea," I said. Then I lowered the gun to her gut and fired.
It was like in one of those movies where the bullet travels in slow motion. It kept moving, though slow, closer and closer to her body. She had plenty of time to dodge, but maybe inside that shell of hers she had to play by different rules. Who knows? The slug inched toward her stomach and she stared down at it, unable to do much more than watch. I turned away when she started screaming, then there was a flash of bright light, and the room smelled like burned meat.
* * * *
BRYCE, he paid up with extra cash, enough that we were able to snag a room for a few months over near the soup kitchen, one that even had a bathroom that worked, though I had to explain how to use it to some of the kids. A lady who ran the place talked to Bryce. Maybe he paid her extra to keep an eye on us.
Susie and me met up with him at Jim's one last time. He was drinking juice and looked rested.
"She was the last one in the city," he said. "This city at least. Things should get a lot better around here now. Progress. Some life and energy." He looked around.
"Well, as much as can be expected given the circumstance."
Susie sat next to me. She smiled.
For once, she didn't have something sharp in her hand.