Plenty accumulated during his day-to-day life. And every day it seemed to get a little worse.
He knew now the origin of that blackness, where it hid in his cells. But that didn't make it go away or any easier to handle. So when one of these knuckle draggers got within reach, like this doughy lump of dung, he wanted to stomp him into the earth, leaving nothing but a wet stain.
A thin wire here, one he Wallenda'd along, trying not to fall off on the wrong side. Spend too much time there and you became like this jerk.
He did a ten count and willed that blackness back down to wherever it lived. Let out his breath and looked down.
"Hey, man," Polio fan whined. "Can't you take a joke? I was only—"
"Drop the knife."
"Sure, sure."
The bare fingers opened, the big blade's handle slipped from the gloved palm and clattered to the earth.
"Okay? I dropped it, okay? Now lemme up."
Jack released the arm but kept a foot on his back.
"Empty your pockets."
"Hey, what—?"
Jack increased the pressure of his foot. "Empty them."
"Okay! Okay!"
He reached back and pulled a ragged cloth wallet from his hip pocket, then slid it across the dirt.
"Keep going," Jack said. "Everything."
The guy pulled a couple of crumpled wads of bills from his front pockets, and dumped them by the wallet.
"You a cop?"
"You should be so lucky."
Jack squatted beside him and went through the small pile. About a hundred in cash, a half dozen credit cards, a gold high school ring. The wallet held a couple of twenties, three singles, and no ID.
"I see you've been busy tonight."
"Early bird catches the worm."
"Yeah? Consider yourself a nightcrawler. This all you got?"
"Aw, you ain't gonna jack me, are ya?"
"Interesting choice of words."
"Hey, I need that scratch."
"Your jones needs that scratch."
Actually, the Little League needed that scratch.
Every year about this time the kids from the local teams that played here in the park would come knocking, looking for donations toward uniforms and equipment. Jack had made it a tradition to help them out by taking up nocturnal collections in the park.
The Annual Repairman Jack Park-a-thon.
Seemed only fair that the oxygen wasters who prowled the place at night should make donations to the kids who used it during the day. At least Jack thought so.
"Let me see those hands." He'd noticed an increasingly lower class of mugger over the past few years. Like this guy. Nothing on his fingers but a cheap pewter skull-faced pinky ring with red glass eyes. "How come no gold?" Jack pulled down the back of his collar. "No chains? You're pathetic, you know that? Where's your sense of style?"
The previous donor had been better heeled.
"I'm a working man," the guy said, rolling a little and looking up at Jack. "No frills."
"Yeah. What do you work at?"
"This!"
The guy lunged for his knife, grabbed the handle, and stabbed up at Jack's groin—maybe thinking he'd find a uterus there? Jack rolled away to his left and kicked him in the face as he lunged again. The guy went down and Jack was on him once more with the knife arm yanked high and his sneaker back in its former spot on his back.
"We've already played this scene once," he said through his teeth as the blackness rose again.
"Hey, listen!" the guy said into the dirt. "You can have the dough!"
"No kidding."
Jack yanked off the glove and looked at the hand within. No surprise at the tattoo in the thumb web.
These guys were starting to pollute the city.
"So you're a Kicker, eh."
"Yeah, man. Totally dissimilated. You too? You seem like—"
He screamed as Jack shifted his foot into the rear of his shoulder and kicked down while giving the arm a sharp twist. The shoulder dislocated with a muffled pop, nearly drowned out by the high-pitched wail.
He hadn't wanted him to finish that sentence.
The Rambo knife dropped from suddenly limp fingers. Jack kicked it away and released the arm.
"Don't know about the rest of you, but that arm is definitely dissimilated."
As the guy retched and writhed in the dirt, Jack scooped up the cash and rings. He emptied the wallet and dropped it onto the guy's back, then headed for the lights.