A fist the size of my head pulled me by my shirt into the alley. An atavist whose ugliness shone through the near-total darkness slammed me against the wall. With his meat-breath he said, “I’m your worst nightmare.”

“Yeah?” I said. “Which one?”

“What?”

“Well, I have a few. I think the worst is where I’m a scorpion, and I get captured by a child who forgets to poke me any airholes and I suffocate while this bratty kid is all fisheye against the bottle shouting at me to sting some poor beetle he’s stuck in with me.”

“Shut it!” He bounced my head off the wall. “I’m the nightmare where you get pounded into ground beef in a dark alley for sticking your nose where it don’t belong!”

“Nah,” I said. “That’s not a nightmare.” He sneered. It looked natural on him, but I could tell he’d practiced it. “That’s a good dream, the one where I tell the villain about my real nightmares until he gets confused and gives up.” The brute shook back and forth a bit and fell down. “Or until I reach the taser in my pocket. Now lie there while I call the cops.”