Dark Rivers of the Heart

kindergarten playgrounds-and nobody does anything about it.
        The enlightened are too busy worrying that you're going to eat a food additive that'll shave three and a half days off your lifespan.
        Did you read about the FBI agents up in Idaho, where they shot an unarmed woman while she was holding her baby, and shot her fourteen-year-old son in the back when he tried to run from them.
        Killed them both. You see that in the papers, Mikey? And now men like Roy here hold very responsible positions in government. Why, I could be a fabulously successful politician these days. I've got everything it takes. I'm not insane, Mikey. Daddy's not insane and never was.
        Evil, yes. I embrace that. From earliest childhood, I had it all in that regard.
        I've always liked to have fun. But I'm not crazy, baby boy. Roy here, guardian of public safety, protector of the republic-why, Mikey, he's a raving lunatic."
        Roy smiled at Steven, wondering what joke he was setting up. The artist was endlessly amusing. But Steven had moved so far into the room that Roy couldn't see his face, only the back of his head.
        "Mikey, you should hear Roy rant on about compassion, about the poor quality of life that so many people live and shouldn't have to, about reducing population by ninety percent to save the environment.
        He loves everybody. He understands their suffering. He weeps for them.
        And when he has a chance, he'll blow them to kingdom come to make society a little nicer. It's a hoot, Mikey. And they give him helicopters and limousines and all the cash he needs and flunkies with big guns in shoulder holsters.
        They let him run around making a better world. And this man, Mikey, I'm telling you, he's got worms in his brain."
        Playing along with it, Roy said, "Worms in my brain, big old slimy worms in my brain."
        "See," Steven said. "He's a funny guy, Roy is. Only wants to be liked.
        Most people do like him too. Don't they, Roy?" we're coming to the punch line. "Well, now, Steven, I don't want to be bragging about myself-"
        "See!" Steven said. "He's a modest man too. Modest and kind and compassionate. Doesn't everybody like you, Roy? Come on. Don't be so bashful."
        "Well, yeah, most people like me," Roy admitted, "but that's because I treat everyone with respect."
        "That's right!" Steven said. He laughed. "Roy treats everyone with the same solemn respect. Why, he's an equal-opportunity killer.
        Evenhanded treatment for everyone from a presidential aide wasted in a Washington park and then made to look like a suicide… to an ordinary paraplegic I understand that he shot down to spare him the daily struggle.
        Roy doesn't understand these things have to be done for fun. Only for fun.
        Otherwise, it's insane, it really is, to do it for some noble purpose.
        He's so solemn about it, thinks of himself as a dreamer, a man of Ideals. But he does uphold his idealsI'll give him that much. He plays no favorites. He's the least prejudiced, most egalitarian, foaming-at-the-mouth lunatic who ever lived. Don't you agree, Mr.
        Rink?"
        Rink? Roy didn't want Rink or Fordyce hearing any of this, for God's sake, seeing any of this. They were muscle, not true insiders.
        He turned to the door, wondering why he hadn't heard it open-and saw that no one was there. Then he heard the scrape of the Micro Uzi against concrete as Steven Ackblom plucked it off the floor, and he knew what was happening.
        Too late.
        The Uzi chattered in Steven's hands. Bullets tore into Roy. He fell, rolled, and tried to fire back. Though he was still holding the gun, he couldn't make his finger squeeze the trigger. Paralyzed. He was paralyzed.
        Over the zinging-whining ricochets, something snarled viciously: asound out of a horror movie, echoing off the black walls with more bloodcurdling effect than the bullets. For a second Roy couldn't understand what it was, where it was coming from. He almost thought that it was Grant because of the fury in the scarred man's face, but then he saw the beast exploding through the air toward Steven. The artist tried to swing around, away from Roy, and cut down the attack dog. But the hellish thing was already on him, driving him backwards into the wall. It tore at his hands. He dropped the Uzi. Then it was climbing him, snapping at his face, at his