GLOBAL WARNING
Though I drink more than I should, I'm not much of a drinker, so that isn't what drove me to take shelter in this particular bar on a rainy, North Carolina night. It was my unfinished business with Smith, and maybe, just maybe, it was a compulsion to be near my old home.
I grinned at that thought. Once that had involved a very real compulsion.
I walked in, casually flicked the rain from my claws, and headed for the bar, secure in the knowledge that no one would notice me. Just like the hero of the old radio program, The Shadow, I had the power to cloud men's minds.
If you know where to look, you can find a bar like this near any large military base. They're always off the beaten track. Sometimes they're in a warehouse district, sometimes down a back alley, occasionally on a dead end street. There may not even be a sign outside--but then they are not looking for the walk-in trade.
In France the bars are for the Legion, in England, for the Royal Marines. The Russians have gathering spots sfor their Spetsnaz, and the Americans have theirs for the Special Forces.
And in all of them, civilians are never welcome.
The Legion throws them out, the British insist they leave, the Americans pretend they don't exise, and the Russians stick them with the bar bill.
Of course my kind stop by any damn time we want.
This was a Rangers' watering hole and normally crowded, but not tonight; only one of the four pool tables was in use. The Rangers had returned from the Gulf last week and most of them were home trying to remember how to reconnect with their families.
The place was a typical elite troop hideaway. Willie Nelson was on the jukebox, a picture of John Wayne was tacked beside the cash register, and over the door hung crossed American and unit flags.
I took a seat at the far end of the chipped mahogany bar next to a large man with chevrons on his sleeves. As I expected, the owner of the place, my old friend, Keith C. Smith, was a bartender. A short man with a clean white shirt the color of his thinning hair, KC moved with the relaxed grace of a martial arts expert. The rolled-up sleeves showed firm muscles. And he was sober. That was a change from the last time I'd seen him. He must have taken my money and retired from the service. From the looks of it, retirement suited him.
But I'd fix that.
I grinned, showing sharp teeth. Naturally, KC didn't really see them, and he didn't question my right to be here. To him I looked like someone he had once met, but whose name he had forgotten. KC nodded politely and started to set down a frosty stein of beer. Suddently, f rom the far end of the room came the sound of glasses crashing to the floor. Grinning wider, I watched KC wince and almost spilled my beer.
"Bob, you butterfingered idiot, " KC muttered. "I wish to hell I'd shot you years ago.
I didn't say a word. Somehow Bob's subconscious had warned him that I had entered the bar. I have that effect on the poor man. I glanced at the b roken bottle with a long neck and etched with the Seal of Solomon, sitting on the shelf above the cash register. More of Bob's work--and in my opinion--his very best.
Someone had painstakingly glued most of it back together, but, naturally, there was still a small piece missing from the two-foot tall, amber bottle.
"Don't be so hard on the boy," the sergeant next to me told KC. I nodded my agreement, but KC didn't notice.
Instead, he glared at the soldier as if trying to make up his mind about something. Then he turned, reached under the cash register, and poured himself a straight shot from the bottle on the bottom shelf. He downed it in one gulp and poured himself another.
"Phil," he said to the sergeaqnt, "I wasn't kidding. I should have shot Bob two days before we hit the sand in Iraq."
I wouldn't have like that, but maybe I could have worked around it.
KC took another sip of whiskey, rolled it around in his mouth, swallowed and sighed. "For a long time I've wanted to tell someone my story, but if I had tried while I was in the service, they'd have had me out the gate and on the street with a section eight discharge. Hell, you won't believe me anymore than they woul. Just chalk up the weirdness to the whiskey."
"And mighty fine shiskey it looks to be, " Phil said, staring at the bottle.
KC took the pointed hint and poured the sergeant a glass. He looked at me, but I shook my head. Like I said, I'm not much of a drinker.
"We were on R and R in Kuwait City, " KC said. "It was the day before the curtain went up. We didn't know anything official, but the captain told us to stay sober.
TUNE IN TOMORROW FOR THE NEXT EPISODE
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