Weaver looked taken aback.
“That's the going rate,” Mab said.
Weaver reached in her pocket and pulled out a wallet and found a ten. “Okay,” she said, sliding it across the table. “Here.”
Mab nodded. “If you don't think the reading is real, you get to take it back.” She put her soup bowl to one side. “What's your question?”
“Question?”
“What did you come to find out? Matters of the head or heart?”
“Head,” Weaver said firmly.
“Right hand, please.”
Weaver stuck out her right hand, and Mab took it. “Nice long life line. Clearly the military isn't going to kill you any time soon.”
“I'm not in the military.”
“Really? 'Cause that black helicopter looked very Ethan to me. Never mind.” Mab took a deep breath. “You have a specific question in mind?”
"No, I just wanted.
“Wanted to see if Oliver was right and I was the real deal,” Mab finished for her. “God knows.” She put her palm flat on Weaver's and closed her eyes.
Images raced by, thoughts even faster: demons, Ethan, guns, Oliver, training, Ursula, guns, Ethan... Weaver was evidently on overdrive 24/7.
“You're going to have to slow things down,” Mab told her. “I'm getting bombarded here.”
“With what?” Weaver said.
“Ursula's being a pain in the ass, but she scares you; Oliver wants you to stop shooting demons; you're wondering if you can adapt the demon gun to the Untouchables; you think Ethan can probably help you, whoa -” Mab dropped her hand.
“What?” Weaver said again, this time wide-eyed.
“I did not need that memory of you and Ethan naked,” Mab said, scowling at her. “Concentrate on business, please.”
“Oh.” Weaver cleared her throat. “You can read my wind?”
“No,” Mab said. “That would be too easy. I get pieces of things unless the person is concentrating on one question. Then I can see what he or she is thinking and extrapolate from that. You won't ask a question.”
“Okay,” Weaver said, holding out her hand again. “Can I be of help to the Guardia?”
“Good question.” Mab put her hand on Weaver's and concentrated, and the flood of images slowed down, Weaver seeing herself as a guard to the Guardia, Weaver seeing herself defeating something that looked like the Devil statue, Weaver standing with the team Well, you certainly think you can.“ She shifted in her seat, which moved her hand on Weaver's palm. “And -”
A new image, this one of Weaver smacking a chalice lid down and yelling, “Servo!” and the chalice sealing -
“Oh, god.”
“What?” Weaver said. “What's wrong?”
“You're going to be Guardia.” Mab pressed down on her palm, but there was nothing there. She took her hand back. “You're going to be the Keeper.” She met Weaver's eyes. “You'll be here forever. It doesn't matter that Ursula is a pain in the ass and Oliver is cramping your style, because you'll be quitting to join us. Let's just hope that Gus will be retiring, not dying, to let you in.”
“No,” Weaver said firmly. “I won't be joining the Guardia. I'll be the Keeper, if that's what happens, but I won't quit my -”
“What happens when you tell Ursula that the demons are real and the five worst ones are imprisoned here?” Mab said. “What's she going to do to the park? Blow it up? Or come in and shut down the place, make it a new Area 52?”
“Well,” Weaver said. “That would make sense. And it's Department 51.”
“No,” Mab said. “That would be very, very bad. You're going to have to choose. You're either with us or them. You can't be both.” She frowned. “Have you told anyone at work about the Untouchables?”
“Oliver,” Weaver said.
“Oh,” Mab said. “So does he want Dreamland to be Department 51?”
“He thinks it needs to be researched. You mean has he told Ursula? No. He's thinking about it. Oliver spends most of his time thinking.”
“And you spend most of your time acting.” Mab nodded. “Good team. You're going to have to choose between him and us.”
Weaver got that mule-stubborn look on her face. “No.”
“Well, then, we're going to have to keep Gus alive. I'd vote for that plan anyway.”
Weaver took her hand back and stood up. “You know you could have made all of this up.”
“You're right.” Mab slid the ten back across the table. “Here you go.”
Weaver looked down on it. “Keep it. You worked for it.” She turned for the door.
“That was what you really came here for,” Mab said, knowing suddenly that it was true. “You wanted to find our that the whole powers thing was a crock.”
“Easy guess,” Weaver said.
“And now you owe Ethan twenty bucks because he bet you it was real,” Mab said. “You were so sure I was faking it.”
“I'm not sure you aren't.”
“Is Weaver your first name or your last?”
“Last,” Weaver said. “Why?”
“What's your first name?”
“None of your business,” Weaver said sharply.
“Oh, my god,” Mab said. “Bathsheba? Jesus wept, that's child abuse.”
"How did you. Weaver pressed her lips together.
“You ask somebody a question, they think the answer,” Man said. “I read your mind. And I was not expecting that.”
Weaver stayed silent for a moment. Then she said, “Don't tell anybody.”
“Absolutely,” Mab said. “Your secret is safe with me.” She pulled her soup bowl back in front of her. “You have a nice -” Her cell phone rang, and she picked it up. “Yeah?”
“We have Fun,” Cindy said. “Come to the Keep so we can put him back in the chalice.”
“Oh,” Mab said. “We can try to do it without you -” “I'm coming,” Mab said, and clicked off the phone. “Trouble?” Weaver said. “No,” Mab said, feeling a little bereft again. “Trouble's over.” Then she got up and went to the Keep to imprison her ex-lover.
You sure you're ready to do this?" Ethan said to Mab when she reached the top foot of the Keep.
“Yeah,” Mab said, but she looked torn.
“Let's do it,” Ethan said, and patted Fun's cheek none too gently until he started to come around.
Then Young Fred said, “Sorry, dude, but frustro,” and Fun shot up out of Jerry Ferris Wheel and stood before them, curly-haired and goat-horned in a blaze of sunshine yellow. He said, “Wait!” and Mab stepped forward and said, “Specto, ”and Ethan said, “Capio!” and took him.
He braced himself for the pain in his heart, but instead he was filled with sunshine, all that light warming him, no squeezing or death, just a lift in his chest like happi -
“Redimio!” Cindy said, and the sunshine left him and leapt into the chalice, and Gus clapped the lid on and said, “Servo,” and Fun was back in his box.
Gus put the chalice beside the other three and closed the doors on the armoire.
“Okay, then,” Mab said, looking not okay. "So that was good. And once we practice
Jerry Ferris Wheel stirred on the floor, and Ethan helped him up.
“Uh, you passed out,” Ethan said, hoping somebody there could explain to Jerry what he was doing at the top of the Keep.
“Damn demon,” the kid said, sounding surly as he rubbed his jaw. “Did you get him?”
“Uh, yeah,” Ethan said.
“Good,” the kid said, and headed for the stairs.
“We've got them all but Kharos,” Mab said, eyeing the armoire uneasily. “You know, I'm just not sure -”
“I am,” Ethan said. “Thirty-six hours from now this will all be over. We're right on track.”
Mab hesitated and then said, “Okay,” and Ethan felt himself relax as his cell phone vibrated. He flipped it open. “Yeah?”
“Ethan, it's Ray. I want to make a deal.”
“Why?”
“To save my
ass,” Ray said, which Ethan found somewhat believable. “I'll give you the trident. You give me half your ownership of the park.”
“That's not saving your ass, Ray.”
“Come on,” Ray said. “I'm trying to be reasonable.”
“You don't know what reasonable means.”
“Look, you -” There was a pause; then Ray spoke again, his voice friendly again. “How about I give you the trident, you get those feds off my ass. You tell that - You tell Weaver to have her boss back off.”
“Might be doable,” Ethan said, not really giving a shit what Ray wanted. “All right. Meet me, alone, at the OK Corral in ten minutes."
“You gotta be shitting me.”
“What?”
“Nothing. I'll see you there. Make it fifteen minutes. Something I have to do first.”
“Who was that?” Mab said as he hung up.
“Ray.”
“You're making a deal with Ray? So not a good idea.”
“You stay on the research,” Ethan told her as he headed for the door. “I'll handle Ray.”
“Okay,” Mab called after him. “But if I never see you again, remember I told you so.”
Back at his trailer, Ethan checked his Mark 23, making sure it had a round in the chamber and was off safe. He wished Weaver were around as backup - Ursula had called her in to work - since he couldn't call any of the other Guardia on this: Gus was too old, and Mab and Cindywell, the OK Corral wasn't their thing. Young Fred wasn't even on the reliable radar. He needed Doc Holliday.
Ethan walked past the Devil's Drop, glaring at the Devil statue in front, sensing Kharos's evil, then up to the three booths that made up the OK Corral games. He went to the gunslingers booth and stood to one side as he flipped down the plywood covering the front.
No shots rang out, so he peered around the corner, muzzle of the Mark 23 leading. Ray was standing there beyond the counter, among the statues of two Clanton brothers, the two McLaury brothers, and Billy Claiborne. At least Dreamland had some aspect of history correct, Ethan thought as he watched Ray raise his empty hands.
“You alone?” Ray called out.
'Yeah. You?"
“Nah, I'm not that stupid.”
Ethan spun about. A man standing twenty feet away fired a Taser, the metal barb striking Ethan in the leg.
Electricity coursed through his body, causing his muscles to contract, and Ethan fell to the ground as Ray laughed. Then a second man came up and whipped a black hood over his head, and through the pain Ethan felt the pinprick of a needle jabbed into his arm and then there was nothing.
Ethan woke to darkness.
He was bound horizontally by straps across his body. The air was damp, and Ethan picked up an odor of evil permeating whatever enclosure he was in. He'd sensed this before, in Kandahar, when he'd dropped off a high-profile prisoner his team had captured to the CIA at their special facility near the airfield. He'd gotten the hell away from the place as quickly as possible.
He knew he wasn't getting away from here anytime soon.
He lifted his head and saw a small red light, indicating he was being watched by an infrared camera. A shaft of light cut into the room as a door opened. Ethan blinked, trying to get his eyes to adjust. It got harder to do that as a floodlight hanging five feet above him came on, bathing him in its glow.
“Master Sergeant Ethan John Wayne,” a woman's voice came out of the darkness surrounding the cone of light.
Ethan closed his eyes and remained silent.
“Actually, you're not a master sergeant anymore. You never served in the Army. Never were awarded the Silver Star. You were never born. You don't exist. If you never make it out of this room alive, no one will know."
“Hey, Ursula,” Ethan said. He could see the silhouettes of two figures behind her in the doorway.
“In fact, we believe there is a distinct possibility you're not even human, based on your blood work. Did you know that there's estimated to be less than one ounce of francium on the entire crust of the planet? And that it's radioactive and should decay rapidly? Yet you have it in your blood.”
Ursula stepped forward into the light. Two guys came up on either side of her, sandwiching her small frame, one tall and skinny, the other short and fat, a stick and a blob.
“I don't believe in demons,” she said, “despite Agent Weaver's outlandish after-action reports from the Dreamland Amusement Park. But something very odd is going on in this park. So why don't you tell me what that is? I asked nicely the other night, and you ignored me.”
“You didn't ask nicely.”
“It was nicely for me,” she said with all sincerity. “This is a matter of national security. Don't you feel a sense of duty to your country?”
Ethan blinked. “You just told me I don't exist. What sense of duty to what?”
Ursula tapped a finger against her upper lip, as if trying to decipher what he'd just said. Ethan could see the nail was chewed down. “I need to know if I can use this park. You'll talk.”
“You can make anyone talk,” Ethan said to Ursula. “The question is, can you believe them?”
“Are there demons in this park?” Ursula said. “Can they be used in combat? As forces on their own or weaponized?”
Ursula weaponizing demons. Erhan closed his eyes. The fallout from that would be catastrophic, especially since the supply of minion demons seemed endless. Their name is Legion, Weaver had said, and Erhan could see legions of minions, swarming the battlefield, feeding on pain and despair, growing stronger, out of control -
“No,” he said.
Ursula turned to the skinny guy. “He's yours.”
“Now we got some options here, ma'am,” he said. “Like your pliers to the teeth. Or fingernails. Ice pick in the eye is gruesome but effective, especially when the remaining eye sees it coming. Then you got your teeth drilling, aka Marathon Man, but the equipment is a pain to haul around. Electricity works well.”
The porky one indicated the damp walls.
“Right, not here,” Skinny said. “Now me, I'll take a good old phone book beating any day, nothing fancy, nothing that's more about the guy doing the torture than it is about the guy getting the torture, if you know what I mean. Plus it don't leave no marks.” He looked over Ursula at his partner. “You know what I think, Quentin? I think you gotta focus on results, not drama. That's what I think. I say phone book.”
“Waterboarding,” Quentin said.
“Okay,” Skinny said.
“Just do it,” Ursula snapped.
They went out the open door and came back in. One carried a bucket, the other a wad of cloth.
Ethan tensed, losing his sense of humor.
“No one lasts more than twenty seconds,” Ursula said. She looked at her watch. “I've got the time.”
“The record at SERE is fifty-two seconds,” Ethan said.
“SERE?” Ursula asked.
“Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape school at Fort Bragg,” Ethan said, trying to buy time.
“Really? Who holds it?”
“I do.” And he finally knew why he held it. And why he'd survived Afghanistan. He was Guardia.
“Impressive.” She smiled coldly. “I think I can spare a minute.”
She nodded to the men and left, and Skinny cranked something under the wooden slab Ethan was tied to and it tilted, his head going about a foot lower than his feet. Quenrin placed the cloth over Ethans face, covering it completely.
“You know this is illegal now,” Ethan said, his voice muffled by the cloth. “New administration and all.”
He realized he was hyperventilating and tried to relax. He found a calm spot deep inside, a place he'd never experienced before. His breathing slowed, even as he sensed Quentin lifting the bucket. Ethan closed his eyes and shut his mouth under the cloth. Closed all off.
Water poured into the cloth, into his nose, flowing upward.
And stopped. He wasn't breathing but he felt no lack of air. Everything wa
s still except for the sound of the water being slowly poured onto the cloth and his face. It sounded gentle to Ethan, like a summer drizzle. His mind floated away to memories of his childhood in Dreamland.
Ethan blinked away water as light blasted into his eyes as the cloth was pulled away from his face.
“What the hell are you?” Ursula demanded.
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