The Midnight Circus, стр. 11
Trees!sang out her monkey mind.
However,she would not wade through the water. Finding a series of rocks, shejumped eagerly stone-to-stone-to-stone. When she got to the otherside, she shook her hands and feet vigorously, then gave her tail ashake as well. She did not like the feel of the water. When she was dryenough, she headed for the trees.
Atthe foot of one tree was a body, human, but crumpled as if it were apile of old clothes. Green face paint mixed with blood. She touched theleg, then the shoulder, and whimpered. A name came to her. Marnie? Thenit faded. She touched the unfamiliar face. It was still warm, bloodstill flowing. Somewhere in the back part of her mind, the human part,she knew she should be doing something. But what seemedmuddled and far away. She sat by the side of the body, shiveringuncontrollably, will-less.
Suddenlythere was a deep, low growl behind her and she leaped up, allunthinking, and headed toward the tree. Something caught her tail andpulled. She screamed, high, piercing. And then knifing through hermind, sharp and keen, was a human thought. Flight. She turnedand kicked out at whatever had hold of her.
Allshe could see was a dark face with a wide hole for a mouth, and staringblue eyes. Then the creature was on top of her and all her kicking didnot seem to be able to stop it at all.
Theblack face was so close she could smell its breath, hot and carnal.With one final human effort, she reached up to scratch the face and wasstartled because it did not feel at all like flesh. Mask, herhuman mind said, and then all her human senses flooded back. The parkwas suddenly less close, less alive. Sounds once so clear were muddied.Smells faded. But she knew what to do about her attacker. She rippedthe mask from his face.
Heblinked his blue eyes in surprise, his pale face splotchy with anger.For a moment he was stunned, watching her change beneath him, nolonger a monkey, now astrong girl. A strong, screaming girl. She kicked again, straight up.
Thistime he was the one to scream.
Itwas all the screaming, not her kicking, that saved her. Suddenly therewere a half-dozen men in camouflage around her. Men—not animals. Shecould scarcely understand where they’d come from. But they grabbedher attacker and carried him off. Only two of them stayed with heruntil the ambulance arrived.
“Idon’t get it,” Zena said when at last she could sit up in the hospitalbed. She ached everywhere, but she was alive.
“Without your collar,”the man by her bedside said, “it’s almost impossible to flash back tobeing human. You’dnormally have had to wait out the entire five hours of Wilding. Noshortcuts back.”
“Iknow that,” Zena said. It came out sharper than she meant, so sheadded, “I know you, too. You were one of my . . . rescuers.”
Henodded. “You were lucky. Usually only the dead flash back that fast.”
“Sothat’s what happened to that . . .”
“Her name was Sandra Maharish.”
“Oh,”
“She’dbeen foolish enough to leave off her collar, too. Only she hadn’t thewill you have, the will to flash and fight. It’s what saved you.”
Zena’smind went, Will/won’t. Will/won’t.
“What?”the man asked. Evidently she had said it aloud.
“Will,” Zena whispered.“Only I didn’t save me. You did.”
“No,Zena, we could never have gotten to you in time if you hadn’t screamed.Without the collar, Wild Wood Central can’t track you. He counted onthat.”
“Trackme?” Zena, unthinking, put a hand to her neck, found a bandage there.
“Wetry to keep a careful accounting of everything that goes on in thepark,” the man said. He looked, Zena thought, pretty coolish in hiscamouflage. Interesting looking, too, his face all planes and angles,with a wild, brushy orange mustache. Almost like one of those oldpirates.
“Why?”she asked.
“Nowthat the city is safe everywhere else, people go Wilding just to feelthat little shiver of fear. Just to get in touch with their primalselves.”
“‘Mimethe prime,’” Zena said, remembering one of the old commercials.
“Exactly.”He smiled. It was a very coolish smile. “And it’s our job to make thatfear safe. Control the chaos. Keep prime time clean.”
“Thenthat guy . . .” Zena began, shuddering as she recalled the blackmask, the hands around her neck.
“He’dactually killed three other girls, the Maharish girl being his latest.All girls without their collars who didn’t have the human fight-backknowhow. He’d gotten in unchanged through one of the old tunnels thatwe should have had blocked. ‘Those wild girls,’ he called his victims.Thanks to you, we caught him.”
“Areyou a cop?” Zena wrinkled her nose a bit.
“Nope.I’m a Max,” he said, giving her a long, slow wink.
“AMax?”
“Wecontrol the Wild Things!” When she looked blank, he said, “It’s an oldstory.” He handed her a card. “In case you want to know more.”
Zenalooked at the card. It was embellished with holograms, front andback, of extinct animals. His name, Carl Barkham, was emblazoned in redacross the elephant.
Justthen her mother came in. Barkham greeted her with a mock salute andleft. He walked down the hall with a deliberate, rangy stride that madehim look, Zena thought, a lot like a powerful animal. A lion. Or atiger.
“Princess!”her mother cried. “I came as soon as I heard.”
“I’m fine, Mom,” Zenasaid, not even wincing at the old nickname.
Behindher were Marnie, Lazlo, and Nick. They stood silently by the bed. Atlast Nick whispered, “You okay?” Somehow he seemed small, young,boneless. He was glancing nervously at Zena, at her mother, then backagain. It was very uncoolish.
“I’mfine,” Zena said. “Just a little achy.” If Barkham was a tiger, thenNick was just a cub. “But I realize now that going collarless wasreally dumb. I was plain lucky.”
“Coolish,”Nick said.
Butit wasn’t. The Max was coolish. Nick was just . . . just . . . foolish.
“I’mready to go home, Mom,” Zena said. “I’ve got a lot of homework.”
“Homework?”The word fell out of Nick’s slack mouth.
Shesmiled pityingly at him, put her feet over the side of the bed,