The car pulled away from the curb, but the driver said nothing. Keppler shrugged. Maybe he didn’t speak English, Keppler thought. He figured there had to be a shop at the airport where he could buy a decent suit and get rid of this disaster.
About a mile outside town, on a flat, empty stretch of road the car pulled over. Keppler shook himself out of a daydream and watched the driver, hands clenching into fists. I wish I had a weapon, he thought. Why didn’t I bring something with me?
The driver put his arm over the seat and leaned back to face him. Keppler stifled a scream.
Please let that be a mask, he thought. But then the creature in the driver’s seat began to speak, and he knew he’d escaped one nightmare only to enter another.
The driver’s head was shaped like an octopus, round with large, gleaming eyes set widely. Tentacles writhed like a beard below the empty space where a nose should be. These twisted and danced when it spoke, though the voice felt far more as though it came from within his head than out of a mouth beneath those wriggling appendages.
“You’ve been doing excellent work, Mr. Keppler,” the driver said. “I’ve come to let you know that your efforts have not gone unnoticed by what remains of the advisory board.”
“The board is gone,” Keppler said.
“The board of directors is gone,” the driver said. “But there have always been those who lurked just beyond, acting as advisors rather than leaders. We were disappointed in the direction the previous management, too. We thought King Tears had promise, though his means were unconventional.”
“Unconventional?” Keppler said.
“It’s better to work with magicians, not for them,” the creature said. “Magicians are very useful, but they don’t make very good executive decisions. They always either never see the big picture, blinded by their desires, or they only see the big picture, and don’t have the time to make sure all the cogs are in place. He tried to skip ahead. It’s a very common mistake among wizards.”
“Yeah, okay,” Keppler said, suddenly wondering if he had ever returned from the alternate dimension or if this was just part of an extended hallucination. “You said I was doing good work?”
“You are,” the driver said. “Much was asked of you, but you somehow had the good sense to keep company assets protected from a manager who was headed toward ruin.”
Keppler raised an eyebrow.
“I always did pride myself on forethought,” he said.
“Well,” the driver said. “We may have further use for you yet.”
“I would like that very much,” Keppler said.
“Then let’s get you a new suit,” the driver said. “Your new office will be ready for you when you arrive in New York.”
Keppler couldn’t resist smiling as the octopus-headed creature started the car again and pulled back on the highway.
I wonder if it’s a corner office, he thought, watching the world drift by outside his window.
Chapter 61: Home
Titus sat cross-legged in front of a crystal ball back in the Tower. The old base, despite still being stuck inert in the desert, was starting to almost feel like home again. The work Henry, Neal, and even Emily had been doing made it feel livable, comfortable, and much of the technology they’d relied on for so long was back online.
This made the decision to camp out at the Tower for a week after the incident with Alice’s pocket dimension a little easier. Although no one really seemed to want to leave. Not even Kate or, Titus had to admit, even himself. Something about facing their own fears so viscerally had brought the team closer than before. They wanted to be nearby. He often found himself walking the halls just to make sure he knew where the others were, and that they were okay.
Alice had remained behind with her parents, of course, which was the reason for the crystal ball. Doc had set up a scrying spell to monitor her in case her powers acted up, and they’d all volunteered to take turns watching the house for signs of danger. So far, it had remained quiet, and everyone was relieved about that.
Doc sometimes hung out while Titus took his shifts. They’d talk magic theory a bit. But more than that, Doc asked Titus his goals for spellcasting.
“A magician needs to know what he wants,” Doc had said. “It’s not something you keep in your pocket just in case. You need to always be aware of it, once you’ve started down that path. And it’s okay if you decide to leave that path, Titus. Just make that decision soon, before you get too deep into the woods.”
And so Titus thought about those goals. He kept coming back to something Leto and old Finn had said to him over and over again: that the Whisperings, Titus’ ancestors, had not just been monsters to keep worse monsters at bay; they’d always been shamans on the hill, protecting the tribe from the dark.
If I’m going to be a shaman on the hill, Titus thought, then I need to do it right.
“Hey,” Kate said, shaking him from his reverie.
“Hi,” Titus said.
“Bring the ball,” she said. “Team meeting.”
Titus scooped up the crystal ball and followed her down a quiet, familiar hallway.
“You haven’t gone back to the City in a week,” Titus said.
“I’m reassessing how I handle protecting it,” she said. “Every time something like this happens, I wonder why I bother. There’s some vast, horrible thing waiting to destroy the world around every turn, and I can’t punch or kick that into submission.”
“So you do what you can,” Titus said. “You change one life at a time.”
Kate stopped walking.
“Did I say something wrong?” Titus said.
“No,” Kate said. “It’s just that… that’s why I started doing this in the first place.”
“Then go back to that,” Titus said. “Be the thing you need to be in the world, Kate, not the thing you think you have to be.”
“You’re practicing that shaman thing, aren’t you,” Kate said.
“I am spending a painful amount of time alone with my own thoughts,” Titus said.
“Let’s fix that a bit,” Kate said.
“I’d appreciate it,” Titus said.
Jane, in a moment of boredom, had rearranged an area that had once been a rec room into a sort of communal meeting space. Kate and Titus entered to find her already there, along with Doc and Lady Dreamless. One of the demon dogs, still in its Great Dane disguise, had curled up on Doc’s lap like a Lhasa Apso. Doc didn’t seem to mind, though.
Titus was not pleased to see that Natasha Grey had joined them today. Unlike Lady Dreamless, who had nowhere else to go, Natasha had disappeared immediately after the battle. This was the first they’d seen of her in days.
Billy and Bedlam walked in next. Walked, Titus thought proudly. Bedlam’s right arm needed extensive repairs, and Henry Winter had arranged for her to meet with a cybernetics specialist in a few days, but he’d been able to get her up and moving again for the most part. His fixes were temporary, but it was enough to get her on her feet. Billy was hilariously, and even charmingly, doting, which Titus had never expected his friend to be. Although it occurred to him that Billy had never had to take care of anyone before.
“Hey, lovebirds,” Emily said, sliding into the room dramatically. Henry limped in behind her.
“Doc, I know you have a reason for calling everyone in here, but I think Emily and I have something you’ll all want to see,” Henry said. He stepped aside to make room in the entranceway. Behind him, one of his old Coldwall armored suits walked in. It had been stripped down to scale back on some of the bulky armor, but otherwise, it was still impressive, a blue and silvery-white, human shaped weapon.
“Who’s in there?” Billy asked.
“I am, Designation: Straylight,” Neal said.
“You’re not a trash bin anymore!” Billy said. “I’m so happy for you!”
“That really you, old buddy?” Titus said.
“I am, Designation: Whispering,” Neal said. “I am also still
interfacing wirelessly with the Tower, but I am no longer unable to make use of stairs. I am quite pleased.”
“We’re pleased for you,” Jane said. “Is this a permanent switch?”
“Only until I get him an upgrade,” Henry said. “We tested it on one of my older suits of armor, but Neal deserves top-shelf treatment.”
Titus stole a glance at Kate, who said nothing. He knew Kate always considered it her fault Neal had to abandon being part of the Tower. She’d never admit it, but seeing him trapped in a small, bucket-sized robot weighed on her. He could see she was biting back a smile.
“Well, come join us, Neal,” Doc said. “Everyone should be part of this conversation.”
“And that conversation is?” Jane said.
Doc gently nudged the demon hound off his lap and stood up. He took the scrying crystal from Titus.
“We need to decide what to do about Alice,” he said.
“I assume letting the kid grow up in peace is not an option,” Bedlam said.
“I wish it were,” Doc said. “But she’s a generationally powerful magical talent. She’s on the radar, so to speak. She has begun using her powers at a young age, and, like it or not, received some inadvertent instruction from the Vizier, which means she knows just enough to be a danger to herself.”
“There’s always us,” Jane said. “You’re here, Doc. We could take her in.”
“Send her an owl. Hogwarts this situation,” Emily said.
“It’s an option,” Doc said. “But she’s not ready to be a part of what we do, either.”
“I wasn’t ready, and I turned out fine,” Emily said.
“Debatable,” Billy said.
“I’ll debate your face, Billy,” Emily said.
“I can take her,” Lady Dreamless said.
“That’s not a bad idea,” Natasha said.
“Didn’t she almost destroy an entire town because of dream magic?” Titus said.
Titus didn’t like the idea, but Lady Dreamless had, they found, been more of a benign spirit than any of them had previously expected. When they disposed of the zombies, they also found that some of King Tears’ abominations had not immediately become lifeless in his absence. Some, they discovered to their absolute horror, were still human enough to survive despite their transformation—like Kevin, the poor homeless boy who had attacked Titus. They’d found Kevin’s lifeless body in Westwick, but there were several others like him.
Lady Dreamless offered them sanctuary in the Dreamless Lands while her people tried to reverse the damage King Tears had done. Such large-scale metamorphosis would be easier in a place with a lighter grip on normal physics like the Dreamless Lands, Doc explained, and so they planned on sending those victims back with Dreamless when she went home. They were currently being held, comfortably, in the Labyrinth, the defunct superhuman prison Sam’s Department of What now used as a base.
Still, sending innocent victims warped by flesh magic was one thing. Sending a very confused kid with the misfortune of having magic in her veins she didn’t know how to use felt less humanitarian.
“Great, we’re taking advice from a super-villain,” Emily said.
“Why is Natasha here, anyway,” Kate asked.
Doc cleared his throat.
“She is here,” he said, giving Natasha a very pointed look. “Because she is, whether we like it, one of the most skilled magicians alive today, and what happens to the most powerful natural magician of the next generation is something she should have some say in.”
“Thank you,” Natasha said.
“Also I don’t trust you entirely, and if you know where she’s going, then I know you know where she’s going, and I don’t have to worry about you sneaking around trying to find out where she’s gone,” Doc said. “I’ll know what you know, and I’ll sleep better because of it.”
“That is less flattering,” Natasha said. “But also, the precise level of paranoia I did try to instill in you. So bravo.”
“But in all seriousness, hiding her in the Dreamless Lands is not a bad idea,” Doc said. “She’s already been heavily exposed to dream magic. Which means she’s inclined toward using it. Possibly the only place she can’t cause widespread destruction with dream magic is in the Dreamless Lands.”
“And the reason she was exposed to dream magic is because of my negligence,” Lady Dreamless said. “I owe her proper instruction. That is my duty. And her creations will be safe there as well. Her surviving figments. She can bring her guardians there without worry.”
“And no one goes to the Dreamless Lands on purpose,” Natasha said. Doc started to protest, but she cut him off. “Except you. You are the only lunatic who has ever gone to that madhouse intentionally. So she’ll be well hidden.”
“I don’t like it, but I see the logic,” Jane said. “But does this mean we’ll be taking her from her parents?”
“There are ways she can move back and forth. With guidance,” Lady Dreamless said. Because she’ll have allies on both sides.”
“Great,” Billy said. “So, who is going to tell the twelve-year-old she has to run away to fairy land?”
Chapter 62: Ever and always through the looking glass
Doc watched Alice say goodbye to her parents and thought about how many times he’d taken children from their homes for their own safety.
It wasn’t so long ago he pulled a feral Titus from a forest, and Emily from the middle of the street. It felt like yesterday when Jane’s powers manifested and she had to leave the Hawkins’ farm, and Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins were used to super-powered children. It was for everyone’s safety she had to leave the place she’d come to call home.
I do this to keep them safe, and so they can keep the world safe, Doc thought. And yet I always and forever feel like a villain myself when it happens.
Alice’s parents were not agreeable, per se, but they understood. They’d seen the empty space where Westwick disappeared. Their daughter came home changed, transformed, older, and stranger. They didn’t want her to leave, but they understood.
Doc invited Jane and Emily along for the goodbyes. Emily, with her exuberance, seemed to set everyone at ease, as though she were living proof that one could get caught up in the world of the strange and terrifying and still come out joyful and full of life.
And Jane, well, Jane was who everyone hoped they could be like some day. He could already see Alice taking to her like an older sister.
Lady Dreamless, on the other hand, was more unsettling, but it didn’t take a magician to tell there was something more than human about her. As Alice and her parents were saying their tearful goodbyes, Doc found Dreamless staring out in the distance, patting one of the hounds absently.
“I’ll miss this world,” she said. “I enjoyed it while I was here. It’s so vulgar and raw and confused and beautiful.”
“It’s a little less unpredictable than your world,” Doc said.
“No,” Lady Dreamless said. “My world is mutable, but yours is… it’s feral, Doctor. It fights like hell, in all ways, at all times. It is a dark place, and full of awful things, but there is such will to be better, such drive to make something of every short life that passes through here. You lose that in a plane of whimsy. Whimsy makes you think you have forever, and mutability makes you think nothing cannot be undone. I like the rawness of this place.”
“Maybe you’ll come back some day,” Doc said. “More carefully next time.”
“Maybe I will,” Dreamless said, taking Doc’s hand. “You could come with us. My kingdom could use a great magician.”
“This world needs me a little longer,” Doc said. “Someone has to mind the store.”
He excused himself and approached Alice and her family. Becca Lapine wiped at her eye.
“None of this feels real, you know,” she said.
“I understand,” Doc said.
“How will we know if she’s okay?” Tony Lapine said. He looked as though he were taking his daughter’s departure even
worse than Becca.
“That’s what I’m here to talk about,” Doc said. He withdrew the two mirrors he and Jane had used to communicate before and handed one to Tony. He gave the other to Alice.
“What’s this?” she asked.
“Both of you, open the mirror and look inside,” Doc said.
The father swore. Alice laughed.
“You can talk through those,” Doc said. “There’s no battery life to them, you can’t wear them out. Use them as often as you need to.”
“Magic,” Becca said.
“Exactly,” Doc said. “And if you need to visit, or anything at all, you know how to call me. I’ll help you.”
“This feels like a very complicated boarding school,” Tony said.
“Or Hogwarts,” Alice said. “Only I’ll be the only student.”
“Homeschooling Hogwarts,” Emily chimed in. “Which means you’ll probably graduate early.”
Alice smiled at Emily, who winked back conspiratorially.
“I’m sorry all this happened,” Alice said, looking at each of them in turn. “I didn’t mean any of it.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” Jane said. “And now it won’t happen again, because you’ll be ready.”
“It feels like my fault,” Alice said.
“Trust me, in this life, everything feels like your fault,” Jane said. “That doesn’t mean you stop trying to do the right thing.”
Doc heard a clanking noise as Sir Teddy walked out of the Lapines’ home carrying the last of Alice’s bags. He was accompanied by a banged up, but still living, unicorn, who in turn had a small fairy perched on her head.
“Someday, I’ll be able to express how weird it’s been to have a talking teddy bear, a unicorn, and a fairy living in our house this week,” Tony said.
“You get used to it,” Doc said.
“Hey,” Emily said, throwing an arm around Alice’s shoulder. “At least you get to bring your friends with you.”
Alice dropped her eyes to the ground.
The Indestructibles (Book 5): The Crimson Child Page 29