Blood Lines

working on a gut feeling, circumstantial evidence, and I don't know what the fuck to do."
    At least he didn't sound tentative anymore. "Talk to Trembley."
    He blinked. "What?"
    Vicki grinned and got to her feet. "Talk to Trembley," she repeated. "Go down to 52 Division and see if she actually saw a mummy. If she did, then you've got yourself a case. Although," she added after a moment's thought, "God only knows where you're going to go with it." She tucked her hand in the crook of his elbow, less for togetherness than because she needed a guide out of the dimly lit restaurant.
    'Talk to Trembley." Shaking his head, he steered her around a Peking duck and toward the door. "I can't believe I didn't think of that."
    'And if she says she didn't see a mummy, check her occurrence reports. Even if this thing of yours is playing nine ball with memories, it probably knows bugger all about police and procedure."
    'And if the report's negative?" he asked as they went out onto Dundas Street.
    'Mike." Vicki dragged him to a stop, the perpetual Chinatown crowds breaking and swirling around them. "You sound like yon want to believe there's a mummy loose in the city." She slapped him gently on the face with her free hand.
    "Now we both know better than to deny the possibility but sometimes, Sigmund, a cigar is just a cigar."
    'What the hell are you talking about?"
    'Maybe it's a mummy, maybe it's a slight Oedipal complex."
    He caught her hand and dragged her back into motion. "I don't know why I even brought it up…"
    'I don't know why you didn't think of talking to PC Trembley."
    'You're going to be smug about that for a while, aren't you?"

    She smiled up at him. "You bet your ass I am."
    Chapter Six
    'Did you have the dream?"
    Henry nodded, his expression bleak. "A yellow sun blazing in a bright blue sky. No change." He leaned back against the window, hands shoved deep into the front pockets of his jeans.
    'Still no voice-over?"
    'No what?"
    'Voice-over." Vicki dropped her purse and a bulging shopping bag on the floor and then flopped down onto the couch.
    "You know, some kind of narrative that explains what's going on."
    'I don't think it works that way."
    Vicki snorted. "I don't see why it shouldn't." She could tell from his tone that he wasn't amused and she sighed. So much for easing stress with humor. "Well, it still seems essentially harmless. I mean, it's not actually compelling you to do anything."
    She didn't see him move. One moment he was at the window, the next leaning on the arm of the couch, his face inches from hers.
    'For over four hundred and fifty years I have not seen the sun. Now I see it in my mind every night when I wake."
    She didn't exactly meet his eyes; she knew better than to hand him that much power when he was in a mood to use it.
    "Look, I sympathize. It's like a recovering alcoholic waking every morning with the knowledge that there'll be an open bottle of booze on the doorstep that evening and having to live all day wondering if he'll be strong enough not to end the day with a drink. I think you're strong enough."
    'And if I'm not?"
    'Well, you can stop with the fucking defeatist attitude for starters." She heard the arm of the couch creak under his grip, and kept going before he could speak. "You told me you didn't want to die. Fine, you're not going to."
    Slowly, he straightened.
    'I wasn't here for you this morning and I'm sorry about that, but I spent most of the day thinking about this whole thing." Celluci's phone call had given her confidence a boost when it had needed it most. She'd always managed to keep up her half of that relationship and she'd be damned if this one would defeat her. And in return for your trust, Henry, I'm going to give you your life . She pulled her purse up onto her lap and dug a hammer and a handful of u-shaped nails out of its depths. "I've got a blackout curtain in here." She prodded the shopping bag with the toe of her shoe. "I bought it this afternoon from a theatrical supply house. We'll hang it over the door to the bedroom. After you go out, I leave. The curtain will block the sunlight coming in from the hall. From now on, until your personal little sun sets, I tuck you in every morning and if the time comes when you can't stop yourself from heading for the pyre, I stop you."
    'How?"
    Vicki reached into the shopping bag. "If you go for the window," she said, "I figure I've got about a minute, maybe two, before you get through the barrier. You proved rather