Killjay's guide to waking up at least one sea away from your destination.

Something I learned today: a redheaded twenty-four-year-old girl wearing a spaghetti-strap top, sky-blue short shorts, and flip flops does not fit in when it comes to the streets of Jerusalem.

I had the exact location of the place Tiger was conducting her...activities, too. I was all set to break Dodgy out when the two-story scaffolding I had taken so long to get to the top of for the express purpose of spying went snap. I didn't think it was anything; I was concentrating on the fifth-floor window of the building across the street. I figured some guy on the ground had broken a plank or smacked a stick on something, or maybe, I dunno, a bird broke its neck. I really wasn't concerned. But then the next support pole over went snap, and another, and another, until the whole thing creaked like an ancient castle's drawbridge pulling up after six hundred years of disuse.

It really only got worse from there. You know, as you can imagine.

If there had been anything to grab onto, believe me, I would have. But it all happened so fast that I barely had time to say "What the shit" before I crashed into the ground, hard, amid a cloud of dust and fluttering papers. Two huge-looking dark blobs whose forms vaguely resembled those of human beings came out of the clouded air and stood over me. One of them crouched down and flicked a cigarette butt to the ground, grinding it out with his boot. The other one started to look like Batman, but that was probably just me trying to sift through the mental haze resulting from a possible concussion. Probably. I mean, whoever it was had a cape and really big ears.

"This the hopper?" asked Cancer Wannabe.

"That's her," said Batman Wannabe.

Both of them sounded like they were talking through Darth Vader voice modifiers, but Cancer Wannabe's voice was a lot raspier than Batman Wannabe's. Cancer Wannabe started laughing, which quickly turned into a cough, but Batman Wannabe picked it up for his/her/its buddy, making a big deal out of it and going "Bwa ha ha ha ha" like a Saturday morning cartoon villain.

Not that I would know anything about that. Long story short, I blacked out and woke up with a very professional-looking man bustling about a small room, cooking up something in a pot on one of those camping gas stoves. He was wearing a pinstripe suit and pink tie, and probably still is, with a rather squarish face and short-cut, dark brown hair. If it wasn't for the dust all over his nice leather shoes and the lack of a superficial lying smirk on his face he'd fit in perfectly on Wall Street.

Oh, God, political jokes on a blog. Or economical jokes. I never cared much for it myself, being too busy with, I don't know, not dying, and sometimes drinking a beer.

The professional man's name is Jeremy. I feel like I know him, but I'm not sure. Turns out that he was boiling up some hot water to make a poultice, which I had no idea people still made by hand. But I'm grateful to him, and for lending me some new clothes.

I would...switch my way out of this situation, but I'm scared. I can't do it as much as I used to. It's not getting harder or anything, but I have this bad feeling that the Hunger will find me faster.

And those two wannabe bastards took my coin.

I know a guy who knows a guy who knows THE guy.

I fucking hate this reconnaissance shit. It's officially my most boring and risky pastime.

Which is why I'm glad it's over. Now, granted, I still have to get all the way across the country and then I've got some very fine-grained searching to do, but the hard part is over. Even the rescue itself shouldn't be too hard. I can get in easily, and I should be able to get out easily, if I keep in touch with whoever I find to help me. Maybe I'll call up a favor.

And I really don't care that Tiger can see quite clearly what I'm planning to do. It'll just make it all the more satisfying if I pull it off.

The eye is closed...but I don't really like this, anyway.

The age-old story

Guy meets girl. Guy devours girl's soul and takes over her body. Guy in girl's body gets tied up and kidnapped by other guy. Other guy brings first guy to new girl. New girl wants to brainwash first guy.

I don't want that to happen. Dodgy can help me. Or if he can't help me, he can show me a few tricks, maybe, or exchange tips about some great bodies to snatch - I don't know. I've never met anyone else who can do what I can do. Or has any of the same kind of...problem. Sure, it's probably a long ways away, but I'm good at getting around, no? And it's not like someone's going to mug me along the way. Not successfully, anyway.

And even if he wouldn't help me normally, I think breaking him out of a brainwashing camp is a pretty good excuse to tell me what he can do.

Well, doesn't seem to have helped much.

I don't do anything for nothing, of course. No, in return for saving her life (though I'm not sure it's going to be all that useful) she gave me a few of her hairs, ones that had fallen out already. With that I can ward off my own Wasting for a while, and in that time maybe I can get some answers. I won't have to...switch for another month at least, although I can't stop the Hunger from getting to me. I'll just have to go with the flow and hope I don't get too damaged.

I can barely remember why I'm doing this in the first place. Ah, well. Arrivederci, uh, amici. Nah, probably can't call you that.

The thing about this thing is that...

See, Cheshire does something called the Wasting. At least, that's what he's done to Emma. Or...Kathleen. Whatever. The Wasting isn't really anything special in and of itself, or it wouldn't be, if it wasn't for the Hunger. The Wasting usually doesn't kill, unless its creator wills it to. The Wasting turns you into, yeah, basically a living corpse. Not quite a zombie, but you look like one. It starts with your hair. Then teeth. Your skin starts to sag and become gray and clammy, and in the final stage boils erupt on your body, which burn, hurt at touch, and are actually maggots. In your skin. Yeah, it's not fun. If you can still walk after that, it won't kill you. Otherwise, you're probably going to die, unless someone stops or removes the Wasting completely.

The Wasting is something the Hunger does. Or at least, that's what it did to me, and that's why I have to...become other people. It chases me around, and anyone I...become ends up the same way, unless I change again, and fast. That's why I don't like using living people. They don't deserve this shit. Well, maybe they do, but fuck if I know, and fuck more if I care.

It's not hard to see if the Wasting is going to kill its victim or not, as long as the one looking isn't the victim. So I dunno about myself. But Emma's is going to kill her if something isn't done about it. Sort of a failsafe Cheshire snuck in there so she'd end up dying if he wasn't around to finish the job personally. But luckily, I can fix it. I can't remove it, so by the end of August she'll have progressed to the...final stage, and that won't be pretty, but she won't die from it afterwards. I can't...I can't guarantee she'll be in perfect condition, but the important thing is to stop it from killing her. The details are both uninteresting and not something I need to tell you; anyway, I don't want to jinx it. It's possible that Cheshire will show up and try to interrupt what I'm doing, but it won't take more than, what, five minutes? And Sir Thighpiece left a certain something that I can't talk about because I don't know anything about it except how to operate it with Emma when he left after rescuing her from Cheshire. As far as I can tell it's a smoke alarm, but he promises it's more than what it appears. All I have to do is bolt it up over the front doorway.

The eye is closed. Let's get down to business.

Oh, God, not this again.

The one thing I think that hasn't changed in all my life is that I've been damn paranoid. Have I said that before? It's really fun being paranoid. You get to wear tinfoil hats and when you're - like me, that can get real interesting, real fast. But there's only so many freaks at this circus.

I'm not even bothered with looking for hoodies or threatening graffiti or masks or anything anymore. The dangerous ones are smart enough not to do anything of the sort. The dangerous ones are the ones I hate, because the dangerous ones are the ones that know just how to get you to relax your guard before they try to get at you.

They say it's a sin to kill a mockingbird, and we all know where sinners go when they die. I watched one of the little feathered guys bash its head into a glass sliding door over and over and over again. It wasn't just that it couldn't understand that there was a wall there. The thing was trying to commit suicide. You know, just like a depressed suicidal teenager. It wouldn't die, either. The bird damn near killed itself, sure, but it just fell to the ground, eventually, too beat up to remember how to fly. I nursed it back to health. OK, OK - I brought it to a vet and the vet nursed it back to health, but I paid for its care. Took a while, but it grew healthy enough to survive outside of the vet's office. I took it home, and I let it fly around, and then it got eaten by the neighbor's cat. The Hunger set in again that night, and I buried the cat in the neighbor's garden out back of the building.

Keeping it together. More or less.

It's helpful to have a totem. A lifeline. Inception got one thing right. When I'm sitting there battling the Hunger, shooting off nukes in my brain, that's when I can pull out my coin and I can get over it. On one side is a feather, and on the other is a cat's eye, or a dragon's eye, or a demon's eye. A demon's eye. Probably that. When that demon eye is closed I'm safe. When it opens, I'm fucked. That feather is all that keeps me sane. The coin is my token and the feather is my totem. My lifeline. My life.

And I want to get rid of the Hunger. Maybe it'll stop me from switching bodies. Maybe it'll kill me. Or maybe I'll have broken the contract and be signed away to ten thousand years of punishment - hello, Sisyphus! How are you, Tantalus? Lookin' good, Adolf. Brosama! What's up?

Or maybe it'll give me peace, and I can go about my life lives happily.

I'm always Killjay, true. But right now I'm also a poor sap named Gary.

Lessons, plural.

Number one: no more roaming. It is too expensive and doesn't keep attackers away.

Number two: proudly announce current location at all times, or at least a general area. (Boston, Massachusetts.) This will deter attackers by confirming their suspicions that you could be insanely prepared for an attack.

Number three: keep a loaded gun close and a knife even closer. This will be the best confirmation for attackers that you were prepared for an attack.

Number four: stealing ten dollars from ten people is much safer than stealing one hundred dollars from one person. Money is necessary to buy preparations for attacks, and if you're in jail you can't do that.

Number five: make sure your mind isn't being fucked with. Daily checks. Which I've done.

I'm sorry about...before. Not about my attitude. But about most of the things I said. Here, anyway. It was the Hunger. It got to me. It seriously screwed me up. But I've got it under control for now.

Anyway. Back to bitching.

Lesson: learned. Now, where were we?

Hm. Yes. Yes, I see. Okay. Hey! You! Yeah, you from before. You're doing it wrong.