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  Both belong to S.H.I.E.L.D.

  If you don’t know S.H.I.E.L.D., part of me wants to threaten you with bodily harm. But hey, sometimes I can’t even remember the names of all the voices in my head, so I’ll let it go.

  We have names?

  Shh.

  Once upon a time, S.H.I.E.L.D. stood for Supreme Headquarters International Espionage Law-Enforcement Division. In the ’90s, they changed it to Strategic Hazard Intervention Espionage Logistics Directorate before settling on Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division. But as Gertrude Stein said, A rose is a rose is a rose is a rose.

  To me, they’ve always been Supercharged Housekeepers Into Employing Lackeys for Dirty Jobs. As long as they keep their groovy slogan (Don’t Yield, Back S.H.I.E.L.D.!) and pay me in cash, I don’t care what they call themselves.

  Lift fans idle, hatches shoosh open, and the competent team leader hops out to assess the sitch. She’s a good-lookin’ African American; wife, mother, and ass-kicker. She’s a robot, too. Some might say her synthetic body could stand to lose a few, but she likes it that way, because that’s how she rolls. She’s perfect—a textbook picture of efficiency and cool leadership—until she makes a face like she’s staring at her kid’s messy bedroom.

  After rolling her eyes more than once, she gets all official into her comm. “I want a perimeter around that…that…goop, stat. Other than first responders handling the wounded, no one in, no one out until every drop of that stuff is secure.”

  A gender- and ethnically balanced group of fit agents wearing dark, Kevlar-enhanced bodysuits leap from the fliers, fan out, and work the scene.

  After a few more whacks to my head and a little plop, I finally have one Goom-free ear. I give the lead agent a thumbs-up. “Hey, Preston! I didn’t yield, ’cause I was backing S.H.I.E.L.D.!”

  She rolls her eyes yet again. “Hello, Wade.”

  She gets to call me that because it’s my name, Wade Wilson, and Agent Emily Preston and I are buds. Haven’t got many. Buds, not names.

  Speaking of names, to be honest, there is some question about whether Wade Wilson is my real name. My mental circumstances make it tough to remember my life before Weapon X—or during. Or after. Met this guy once who said he was the real Wade Wilson. Then again, I might have imagined that, or been staring in a mirror getting ready for a big date with Sophie, or something.

  But hey, as far as you know, I’m making everything up, anyway. How could you possibly tell, especially without pictures? Pictures never lie. It’s the word balloons you have to watch out for.

  I had a balloon once. I think. Big yellow thing. I was so excited I was shaking, clutching it in my little hand, until my dad said, “Wade”—he called me Wade, since he was my dad, which I guess implies I really am Wade. “Why don’t you see what happens when you let go of the string?”

  And I…

  Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God.

  Was it a balloon on a string?

  Or a puppy on a leash?

  No. Never had a dog. Never. Far as I know. Only reason I’d want one as a kid would be to impress Sophie. Girls dig that cuddly stuff.

  Anyway, Preston’s one of maybe…three friends, I think? Hard to keep track. They keep dying or betraying me, or it turns out they don’t exist and I’ve been palling around with myself the whole time. Come to think of it, Preston died for a while, which explains why she’s got the robot bod now. Technically, it’s a Life Model Decoy: a S.H.I.E.L.D.-designed re-creation of a living person. LMD for short. It looks totally human, which is more than a lot of people say about me.

  Aside from Em, there’s Blind Al, but she was sort of my prisoner. And Bob, Agent of Hydra. He was a big fan, but I tried to have him killed, he tried to kill me, and things got messy. Past that…look, if you really want to know all this crap, you can read all about it in my comic, unless you’re all like, “Oh, I only read books, I’m so smart, la-la-la, look how smart I am!”

  In which case, next time I break the fourth wall, it’ll be on your head. Don’t think I can’t crawl out of these pages for a little chat about exercising your brain’s capacity for conceptualizing spatial relations.

  That’s right, pal, I’m talking to you.

  “Wade, who are you talking to?”

  No one! Uh, why?

  Damn. Forgot the quote marks.

  “No one, Em! Uh, why?”

  She heads toward me, brow mushed. “Never mind. Don’t need to know, don’t want to.”

  “Careful you don’t step in that Goom.”

  She looks down, wrinkles her nose, and waves over two agents. They trot up, carrying what looks like a high-tech vacuum-cleaner hose with a white metal snout mounted at the business end. All I’m-in-chargey, she snaps her finger at the ooze, and they aim the sucker (get it?) where she’s pointing.

  With the press of a touchscreen, diodes blink, air shushes, and what Jimmy Durante would’ve called the thing’s schnozzola starts sucking up Goom-gore like it’s cherry syrup with extra HFCS. The gunk gurgles along the hose and gets plopped into a big tank mounted on one of the hover-fliers. It’s the size of that thing Homer Simpson used to store Spider-Pig’s poops in the movie. Speaking of words that begin with “p,” the thing’s pretty picky for a power-vac. Slime goes in, everything else stays out.

  Once the ground between us is clear enough to keep her boots clean, Agent Preston approaches. “You hurt?”

  “Define your terms.”

  “More than usual?”

  “Be up and at ’em in a few, not yielding ’cause I’m backing S.H.I.E.L.D.…ing!”

  “Would you please stop saying that? No one’s used that slogan since the sixties.”

  I’m having a little trouble hearing her, so I slam my head to try to clear the other ear. It doesn’t work. Now my good ear’s ringing because I just hit myself really hard. I can barely hear myself talk, let alone anyone else. So I shout:

  “CAN’T BE AS EMBARRASSING AS HIRING ME TO KIDNAP PUPPIES BECAUSE THEY MIGHT TURN INTO GIANT MONSTERS!”

  Em hisses like I farted in church. “Quiet down! As far as the public’s concerned, S.H.I.E.L.D.’s only here to clean up your mess. That’s the whole reason you were hired for this job.”

  I whack my head again. “WHAT’S THAT, EM? TIMMY’S TRAPPED IN A CAVE, AND I HAVE TO GO SAVE HIM?”

  She narrows her eyes and nods at the agents. “Clean him.”

  They shove their nozzle my way—prodding this, poking that with a nudge-nudge here and a wink-wink there.

  “OW! HEY, WATCH THE FAMILY JEWELS!”

  “Every drop.” “Yes, ma’am.”

  “HA-HA! IT TICKLES! OKAY, PRESTON! I’LL STOP! I’LL STOP!”

  I grab the nozzle and shove it against my ear. With a loud thup, a little bit of something-something shoots out of my favorite Eustachian tube, rattles along the twisty hose, and lands in the tank with a clink.

  “He shoots, he scores!” I exhale a cheering-crowd sound, but it’s a little sad without Sophie or the middle-school gym here. “Agent Preston, I have to report that, unfortunately, I may have had a piece of my brain sucked out. Warning: If it was the right temporoparietal junction, my moral compass may be compromised. Do not use me if you may be pregnant or wish to be.”

  She crosses her arms. “You don’t have a moral compass. Besides, the Gale Max 9000 only takes in biomaterial that’s been compromised by the nano-catalyst.”

  I hold up my neat-o aerosol thingy. “My compliments to the chef for the most totally rad water gun I’ve ever had.” I point it and make some laser-blast sounds. “Pew! Pew! Pew!”

  Preston ducks. The other agents, who I’m really just not going to bother describing to you in any detail, scatter. “Deadpool! That stuff can liquefy any living thing, including you.”

  I twirl it a few times and plop it back in my belt. “Kidding. I know. I’m not stupid. I read the label. Most of it. Last resort only.”

  She looks around at the gaping holes in the street,
the buildings, and the previously moving vehicles. “In this case, it looks like you could’ve resorted to it a little sooner.”

  “Had to make sure Kip was a threat, didn’t I?” Healing factor’s been chugging along, so I can pick myself up and stretch. “I tell you, Pres, it’s the kind of story I see all too often on these mean streets. Goom lived, Goom hungered, Goom ate Bernardo, Goom lived some more, Goom got peckish and went after an elementary school. You’d think they’d have learned by now to store our most precious resource—children—underground.”

  Her brow does that mooshy thing again. “Did you say Goom? From Planet X?”

  “Yeah, five times in once sentence. Why? You know him?” I arch my back. Something bony along my spine goes krch, meaning it’s either back in place or it shouldn’t have been there in the first place. “Did you date? Does hubby Shane know? Spill, girlfriend.”

  “It just sounds…familiar.” Her groovy LMD eyes, which look otherwise normal, start projecting data out into the air. It’s freaky, but I don’t mention it because I’m polite.

  She scans the info and scowls. The file she wants is locked. “Well, we knew whoever was working at that abandoned Weapon X lab was developing an apex predator with a canine larval stage. But we weren’t sure what the pups would turn into. The real mystery’s why they were shipped out to be adopted as pets.”

  I raise an eyebrow, but as I mentioned earlier, it can’t be seen under the mask. “That’s the real mystery? Have we grown so jaded we no longer take a minute to ask why someone would breed a cannibalistic monster with a larval stage that looks like a puppy in the first place?”

  “Okay, maybe it’s more the immediate mystery. But with more of them out there, there’s plenty to keep us both busy.” The data projection disappears. “I’ll let you know if I learn anything else.”

  “You beep like that while you’re sleeping? Shane is one patient dude.”

  “Yeah, but Jeff loves it when I read him holographic bedtime stories.”

  The suck-up crew finished, she waves them back to the hover-fliers. “One puppy down, but it’s a long list, Wade. If any more of them transform, a lot of lives will be at risk. You’d better get on it.”

  “No problemo, kemosabe.” I pull out my pad and scan the list.

  That’s a lot longer than I remember.

  Even with the top one scratched off.

  And we’re gonna get beat up by all of them?

  “Uh…Preston? Going with that whole acting-sooner idea, wouldn’t it be easier if I didn’t wait for them to do some damage? Y’know, even give ’em a little spritz before they change? Save time and money?”

  Boy, do I get a look.

  “No, it would not. I already told you, we pulled that list from a legit distribution center. The monster-larvae were mixed in with their regular shipments. We have no idea which of those are bio-engineered freaks, and which are real puppies.”

  “Point being…?”

  Her eyes go wide. “Wade! I thought you liked dogs.”

  “Do not. I only said that for the book-jacket flap. Gives readers a reason to identify with me. I’m a detached professional. Never owned one, wouldn’t want to. Besides, in some countries, dogs are considered a delicacy.”

  Her eyes go wider. Didn’t know they could do that. Wonder if it’s an LMD thing.

  Before she breaks an eye-widening servo, I get my foot up on a concrete shard, put my elbow to my knee, and stare off into the distance for a quick monologue. “Sure, I had a thing for Snoopy when I was a kid, but if I bonded with a mutt these days, we’d both get hurt in the end. It’d start innocently enough: game of catch, cold nose nuzzling my neck, some sandy tongue-licking. Next thing you know it’s sleeping at my feet, warming my toes, and providing 24/7 unconditional love. Where would that leave me?”

  She smirks. “Uh…happier? Quit the BS. I know you. You wouldn’t hurt a real puppy in a million years. Would you?”

  I put my hands behind my back, look down, and kick at the ground. “No. I guess not.”

  She smiles. “Didn’t think so.”

  “But it would be more efficient.”

  She gives me the wide eyes again. “What did you say?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You want the money for this job, don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  Her hands shoot to her hips. “Look at me. Look at me right now. Do you want me to fire your ass?”

  “No. But I thought you liked it when I kill bad guys.”

  “I do not like it when you kill anyone. And talk like an adult, will you? Or whatever it is you are.”

  I clear my throat. “What about when I shot that Hydra assassin who was trying to hurt your family?”

  “That was different—you saved our lives. Unless those puppies transform into an immediate threat, you are not saving lives. And will you quit talking to me like I’m your mother? It’s hard enough being your friend.”

  “Fine. Can I be excused?”

  She waves me away like I’m a big red-and-black fly. “Go on. Get out of here before what’s left of my sanity returns and I take that aerosol can back. Remember, you’ve only got this job because I said you’re not as totally crazy as you seem. Don’t prove me wrong.”

  I trudge off, thoughts ping-ponging in my skull.

  You wouldn’t hurt a dog.

  Would you?

  Some folks were worried how this whole inner-dialogue thing would work in a book. Jury’s still out, but I’m starting to wonder how much I need it.

  Wait.

  What?

  Well, what do you guys do, really? It was fun in the comic, but even there you do, like, three things:

  1) Provide juxtaposition between fantasy and objective (or at least consensus) reality. But I just did that with the basketball-game hallucination—no voices needed.

  Yeah, but…

  2) Distinguish between what I say to myself and what I say aloud. But since I’m narrating this mess, we know that only the stuff appearing in quotes is out loud—like in my chat with Preston.

  Still…

  3) Express multiple personalities, like Good Wade/Bad Wade, Crazy Wade/Less-Crazy Wade

  That’s it! That one.

  That one you can’t do without us.

  Wrong. I don’t actually have separate personalities. I know you’re me. Besides, multiple personality disorder was rejected as a legit diagnosis years ago—so screw you, Sybil fans. These days, psychologists think it’s more like role-playing, only you lose track.

  Don’t we keep it real for you on the inside?

  Please. If a tree fell in a forest and no one was there to hear it, would it make a sound?

  Yes.

  Oh? How do you know, smart-ass?

  Same way you know a tree fell in a forest with no one there, dimwit.

  Hmm. Oh, I can’t stay mad at you guys! Okay, you can stick around!

  CHAPTER 4

  PRESTON’S got nothing to worry about, puppy-wise. Not for the touchy-feely reasons, but I’ve got limits. I do like me some killing, and I’m good at it, but I only whack proven murderous scum that totally deserve it. Sure, I think about it plenty, talk tough to keep up my image. But when it comes down to it, I wouldn’t hurt a Komodo dragon with a sneaker dangling from its venomous maw without proof there’d been a foot inside that sneaker. Couldn’t look at myself in the mirror otherwise.

  Not that I do anyway, what with all those pus-oozing cancer lesions. Some people wear masks to conceal their true identities, others to protect loved ones. I do it to keep my face from sloughing off.

  Second place on the list is Playful Pete’s Pet Potpourri up in Yonkers. The pet store’s unwittingly received an Alsatian that might be a kaiju (that’s Japanese for strange creature, genre fans) in disguise. Knowing the breed doesn’t do me a lot of good. I have no idea what an Alsatian looks like, and I’m too lazy to look it up on my phone. Is it the one that looks like a puffy German shepherd, or the one with the wrinkly face?

>   Eh, I’ll work it out when I get there.

  And I won’t be driving or taking public transportation, either. S.H.I.E.L.D.’s got hover-fliers, Michael Knight has KITT, Roy Rogers has Trigger (who he stuffed after death, by the way—talk about creepy). Me, I’ve got a teleporter built in to that thin and stylish weapons belt of mine. So with a song in my heart, a cool wind bracing my face, and my spandex riding up my crotch, I click my heels, slap my buckle, and say, “Bamf!”

  I only say bamf ’cause I hate the buzz the ’porter makes. It’s like an annoying alarm clock. It never makes any sound on my arrival, which makes it great for sneaking up on people. This time, though, there’s this unexpected, gaudy flash of light—and it doesn’t go away.

  Maybe the ’porter was damaged in the fall back in Chapter 1? Nope, it’s working fine. Reality, as usual, is the problem. All that trashy flash is coming from Playful Pete’s lit plastic sign right above me.

  This is no mom-and-pop shop—it’s one of those big-box stores. Instead of the usual collection of inanimate goods meant for conspicuous consumption, Pete’s supplies a wide variety of life forms that are bred, packaged, and sold for the emotional support and amusement of our planet’s currently dominant species.

  It’s big even for a big box, taking up most of a strip mall right across from Yonkers Raceway and a stone’s throw from the Hillview Reservoir.

  Not that this is foreshadowing or anything, but boy, wouldn’t it be dramatic if that water supply was endangered at some point? I mean, Hillview supplies millions of Manhattanites with potable hydration. Can you imagine?

  Russian playwright Anton Chekhov once said, “Remove everything that has no relevance to the story. If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. If it’s not going to be fired, it shouldn’t be hanging there.”

  But he’s dead, I’m here, and I’m telling you not to make anything out of the fact I’m packing a nano-catalyst that can reduce any living thing to gloop, and I happen to be near a reservoir.

  And the raceway? Nothing to do with anything.

  To review: no horses and nothing going on with that reservoir, capisci? This chapter is all about the potential danger lurking within Pete’s—and me, Deadpool, the right man for the right job, in the right place, not in my right mind.