The Bride Wore Black Leather

had them, it was the easiest thing in the world to find all their weak spots. The stitches broke, the duct tape ruptured, and rusting staples flew out of him like tiny shrapnel.
    It was an old weakness of Dead Boy’s. I’d seen someone else do it to him before. And I never forget a weakness I might need to make use of someday.
    Dead Boy cried out as he fell helplessly to his knees, clutching at his opening wounds to stop his internal organs from falling out. The car was almost on top of us, slamming on its brakes as it worked out what was happening . . . too late, too late. I rolled casually to one side, and the car ran right over Dead Boy as he lay broken and helpless on the ground. When the futuristic car finally lurched to a halt, it had run over Dead Boy, its back wheels resting right on top of him, pinning him firmly to the ground. And before it could decide whether to move on or back away, I sauntered over and placed one heavy foot on the back bumper.
    “Back off now, and you’ll tear him apart,” I said to the car. I was pretty sure it could understand me. “And if you try to go forward, I’ll do something even more unpleasant to him. And you.” The car didn’t move, so I looked down at Dead Boy’s strained face, glaring up at me. “You can treat a mule with kindness,” I said. “But first you have to hit it over the head with a two-by-four, to get its attention. I am not guilty of murdering Julien Advent, you idiot. And to prove it, I’m not going to kill you.”
    “You can’t kill me,” Dead Boy said craftily. “The clue’s in the name.”
    “All right then, I won’t damage or destroy your body, or shove it in the furnace and dance around singing Hallelujah.”
    Dead Boy considered this for a while, looking up at me thoughtfully. “You could find a way to get rid of me, couldn’t you? Typical John bloody Taylor. All right, let’s talk. If we must. I got a call to go to the Hospice. Anonymous, but you get used to those, in the Nightside. It told me Julien Advent was dead. I didn’t want to believe it, so of course I had to go. When I got there, he was lying there, stretched out on the floor. I didn’t see any blood, so for a moment I hoped, but . . . Some doctor was weeping over him. Nurses and patients, too. I knelt and looked Julien over, but he was definitely gone. The dead know death when they see it. The doctor said you’d killed him, for no reason. I always knew you’d go rogue someday.”
    “I find my friends’ lack of faith in me disturbing,” I said.
    “Go on! Kill me, if you can! Find a way to destroy my body! But you’d better make a really good job of it; because it’s the only way you’ll stop me from avenging Julien Advent!”
    “Why is everyone so keen to avenge him?” I said. “None of you ever had much time for him when he was alive.”
    “I couldn’t help him, then,” said Dead Boy. “What could someone like me do for someone like him? But I can do this!”
    “I’m not going to kill, destroy, or disassemble you,” I said patiently.
    “Why not?”
    “Because you’re my friend.”
    “All right,” said Dead Boy, slowly. “One of us has definitely mellowed; and it sure as hell isn’t me. Something is very wrong here. You never killed anyone that you weren’t prepared to boast about afterwards; and you never showed mercy to anyone who threatened your life. Are you sure you didn’t kill Julien Advent? Because . . . as much as I want to believe you, something is yelling in my head that you did it.”
    “I only ever killed people who needed killing,” I said.
    “Good point,” said Dead Boy. “I’ll think about it. But you’d better run, John, while you can. Because once I get out from under this car, if I’ve thought about it and made up my mind that you are guilty . . . I will come after you. Because I can’t let Julien Advent’s murderer get away with it.”
    “Of course,” I said. “I wouldn’t expect anything less from you.”
    I walked away. Behind me I could hear the futuristic car reversing very slowly off Dead Boy, while he yelled
Careful, dammit!
and
Don’t worry, baby; it wasn’t your fault.
    •  •  •
    I found a short cut that took me straight to the H. P. Lovecraft Memorial Library, only to find it wasn’t there. It was only then that I remembered hearing that the Library had recently vanished and been replaced by a doppelganger from some alternate dimension. The Linda Lovecraft Library of