Free Mad Lizard Mambo by Rhys Ford Page B

done down here, let’s get some noodles. I could eat some beef chow fun dry style from Golden Chicken Panda Dragon.”
    “It’s Golden City,” I corrected. “And yeah, I could eat. Considering I’m going to be on rations and whatever we can hunt up for the next couple of weeks, chow fun sounds great.”
    The streets slowly turned saffron as we moved deeper into the lower level. San Diego’s wedge-like below structure was great on the outer rim, but farther in, the city sloped and the upper level closed in, cutting off all natural light. There’d been some half-assed attempt to bring sunlight to the lower regions, but mostly that meant dinner-plate-sized UV lights mounted to the underside of the roadways making up the undercity’s ceiling.
    With the dampness underground, the lights went screwy, flashing on and off when their wiring corroded, usually in the dead of night. If the bulbs were easy to get to, they were either stolen or broken. It was hard to deal drugs or whore under eight hours of artificial daylight, and fake sun bulbs went a long way in helping grow illegal crops.
    I had one in my garage, because the bright white glow made it easier to see dropped screws and parts if I was working on the Mustang at night. The guy I bought it off of made no effort to tell me where he’d gotten it, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to ask.
    An earthen barrier cut into the undercity, the sidhe compound at Balboa slicing into the pie, and farther down, enormous half pipes allowed traffic to flow under the raging waters of the diverted San Diego River, its turbulent waters pounding into the sides of the cement tunnels. The river bisected Balboa, flowing out of an opening on a mesa just past the old eight freeway and down toward Tijuana. Its waters were arctic cold, fed by the snowmelt from the jutting mountains to the north of San Diego.
    I’d been in those waters. The river practically froze the skin off me once, and I didn’t care to repeat that experience. Unfortunately, ice chunks carried down through the underground caverns meant Lower San Diego was constantly cold, a tomb of cement and steel carrying its frigid chill through the streets.
    “So this thing you bought from Sparky doesn’t have any guns on it?” Jonas cocked his head. “That’s not like her. She usually has to be talked out of mounting a machine gun on a tricycle.”
    “Yeah, it was off. But could be there’s no hard points for any real firepower. Ports are there, though. So I’m hoping to get a good deal on some heavy weapons and call it a night. We’re leaving in the morning.” I hitched my leg up, resting my foot on the Rover’s dashboard. “You sure Jimmy knows we’re coming? I don’t want to get my ass handed to me because we didn’t knock first.”
    “He knows you’re coming.” Jonas’s chuckle boomed in the cab’s broad space. “I’ll take care of you, son. Have no fear. Pity you’re doing this job for him. I’d like to see you shake him off like a piece of wet shit from your shoe. Say the word and I’ll crack his head for you.”
    Despite the width of the vehicle, Jonas’s wide shoulders were nearly brushing mine, and I knew from experience he could easily reach across the Rover from where he was sitting and slap the door lock down with his right hand. Practically seven feet tall and built like a minotaur, he was a good person to cover me while I bought weapons from an illegal arms dealer. He was a man I’d trust with my life, and seeing as I seemed to stick my face into a hornet’s nest every time I walked out of my front door, Jonas seemed like a good bet. He’d been one of the Stalkers who had a hand in raising me, an enormous black man with more than a few wives, a couple of husbands, and so many children I gave up trying to remember all of their names.
    I’d also tried to gnaw his nuts off when Dempsey first brought me home, but he’d forgiven me that.
    He turned the other cheek and became the first person to