Too Wylde Read Free

forever mute because of a knife in his voice box during an
epic brawl that at first killed his business, then brought it back
to life like a zombie doing the lindy hop, as all the Lake City
wannabes wanted to hang out in the club that had been the scene of
a major shoot out between Lake City PD's one and only female
man-killer cop, the Russian Mob and the Cambodian gangsters. He
ended up making bank, and even kept the bullet holes in the wall,
put a frame around them so the wannabes could get their pictures
taken next to them.
    There was a long line of pictures; all his
girls, the dancers that put dollars in his pocket every day, a few
of them slipping him an extra envelope from time to time with a
percentage -- not too much, don't want to kill the Golden Goose --
of their earnings on the side, or their belly, or their backs, up
to them, he didn't care, as long as he got his cut and they didn't
bring heat down on the club. Vice took their pay offs in various
ways: pussy, free drinks and food, the occasional tip, some
information the girls pulled out of the low-lifes that came through
here and the occasional dark side high roller, the use of a room,
looking the other way when Internal Affairs or Professional
Standards came sniffing around.
    That was bidness here in Lake City. Everybody
gets a taste of the good. That's what it takes to keep the good
coming.
    Lance surveyed his kingdom.
    The Trojan Horse was good.
     
    Nina Capushek
    Nina stuck her thumb in his eye, gripped his
head between her hands, leaned forward and bit the face mask over
his nose.
    Growled.
    Her opponent, padded from head to toe, fell
backwards and shrieked like a little girl.
    Nina slid into the mount, slammed palm heels
into the face place, leaned into her elbow strikes and screamed,
"C'mon bitch! Think you're bad? Fuck you, motherfucker!"
    The padded man tried to get a punch into her,
couldn't, tried to buck her off, couldn't.
    Nina started to pull his helmet off.
    "Stop! Break! Somebody get this crazy bitch
off me!" the padded man shouted.
    The coach ran up, grabbed Nina, got
backhanded.
    "Don't touch me!" Nina shouted.
    Two other coaches grabbed her, pulled her off
her opponent. She took a deep breath, then another. Relaxed. Let
them hold her arms.
    The first coach helped the padded man up.
    The padded man took his helmet off, threw it
down. "Hey, fuck this," he said. "I'm not working with that crazy
bitch." He stomped away.
    "Come back anytime, sweet meat!" Nina jeered.
"You only got a hundred pounds and a suit on me!"
    "Nina," the defensive tactics coach said.
"You're gonna hurt somebody."
    Nina shook the hands off her and glared at
him. "That's the whole point of this silly bullshit, isn't it?
Padded Bitch wouldn't last with me for a short minute on the
street. Why the fuck don't you try some of this shit out there?
Huh?"
    "Cool --"
    "-- down? Fuck you."
    Nina stalked off out of the gym.
    The coaches looked after her, and then at
each other.
    "What you gonna say to her?" one said.
    The lead coach shrugged. "What *can* I say to
her? Gee, Nina, you've kicked more ass and killed more men than all
of us, but I can't pass you because you kicked our padded man's ass
so bad he won't work with you?"
    "I get your point.
    "Fuck you."
     
    Lizzy Caprica
    Lizzy Caprica sat cross legged on her yoga
mat on the polished pine floor. She inhaled a four count through
her nostrils, circled the breath round her spine down to her root
chakra, from there deep into the earth, held it for a four count,
then exhaled, drew in another breath, drawing energy up from Mother
Earth to suffuse her body.
    A tone from the Tibetan bowl the teacher
stroked. The tone rippled through her, a wave, a breath of air on
still waters, movement without and within. And then they began, the
entire class in unison, the Gayatri Mantra:
    Om bhur bhuvaha, suvaha
    Tat savitur varenyam
    Bhargo devasya dhimahi
    Dhiyo yonaha prachodyath...
    Three slow soulful repetitions. Infusing
herself with the light