Impossible Places by Alan Dean Foster Page B

trio was the most terrifying. A clawed hand reached for him.
    “Please,” he whispered through snow-benumbed lips, “no more. Just kill me and get it over with.”
    The powerful fingers clutched his jacket front and lifted him as easily as if he were a blank arrest report, setting him gently on his feet. Another huge hand, dark and even-toned as the play clay his little girl made mud pies with, helped keep him upright. Trembling in spite of himself, he looked from one fearsome face to the next.
    “I don’t get it. What is this? What are you setting me up for?”
    “We need . . . your help,” the Monster mumbled, like a reluctant clog in a main city sewer line.
    Stillman hesitated. “
You
need
my
help? That’s a switch.” He brushed dirty snow from his waist and thighs. “What kind of help? To be your punching bag?” He blinked at the Monster. “Uh, sorry about shooting you. You startled me. Heck, you still startle me.”
    “I . . . forgive,” the Monster declaimed, sounding exactly like Arnold Schwarzenegger on a bad day.
    “Yeah . . . okay, then. Well . . . what did you . . . boys . . . have in mind?”
    The Afreet’s eyes burned brightly. “In this time, praise be, is it still among men a crime to set another to commit murder?”
    Stillman stiffened slightly. “Damn straight it is. Why do you ask?”
    The Afreet glanced at its companions. “We know of several who have done this thing. Should they not, by your mortal laws, be punished for this?”
    “You bet they should. You know where these guys are?” All three creatures nodded. Stillman hesitated. “You have proof?”
    The Golem dug a fist the size and consistency of a small boulder into its open palm.
    “You shouldn’t vorry, policeman. I promise each one a full confession vill sign.”
    “If you’re sure . . .” Stillman eyed the stony figure warily. “You’re not talking about obtaining a confession under duress, are you?”
    “Vhat,
me
?” The Golem spread treelike arms wide. “My friends and I vill chust a little friendly visit pay them. Each of them.”
    Stillman delivered the three badly shaken men to the station by himself. There was no need to call for backup. Not after his hefty acquaintances warned the three outraged but nonetheless compliant tamperers-with-the-laws-of-nature that if any of them so much as ventured an indecent suggestion in the officer’s direction, the improvident speaker would sooner or later find himself on the receiving end of a midnight visit from all three of the . . . visitants. In the face of that monumentally understated threat, the would-be masters of the world proved themselves only too eager to cooperate with the police.
    Stillman presented the thoroughly disgruntled experimenters to the duty officer, together with their signed confessions attesting to their respective intentions to murder one another, a collar that was sure to gain him a commendation at the least, and possibly even a promotion. It was worth the aches and pains to see the look on the lieutenant’s face when each prisoner meekly handed over his confession. It further developed that all three men were additionally wanted on various minor charges, from theft of scientific equipment and art supplies to failing to return a six-year-overdue book from the university’s Special Collections Library.
    The members of the unnatural trio who had propitiated this notable sequence of events were waiting behind the station to congratulate Stillman when he clocked off duty. He winced as he stretched, studying each of them in turn.
    “So . . . what’re you guys gonna do now?” he asked curiously. “If you’d like to hang around the city, I know for a fact you could probably each get a tryout with the Bears.”
    “Bears?” the Monster rumbled. “I like to eat bear.”
    “No, no. It’s a professional sports team. You know? Pro football? No,” he reflected quietly, “maybe you don’t know.”
    “If it be His will, we shall each of us make