Trick of the Light

by Megan Derr

  "Getting you out of here," the man replied, looking up to wink at him. "We've got a mutual friend who wants sorely to see you right now and is mighty pissed you been arrested for giving that bastard exactly what he deserves."

  "Mutual…" Karl sucked in a sharp breath. It was too much coincidence, the way he'd seen this man after that first attack. The description of Turncoat filled his mind: Black, American, six foot something, two hundred plus pounds. Holy smoke. He shook his head, tried to make his brain work. "What about the cop?"

  "He's taking himself a catnap. Here." The man bent and lifted a dufflebag Karl hadn't noticed before, thrust it at him. "Get dressed, quick now. We ain't got long."

  Karl stood, swaying a bit as dizziness washed over him. He gripped the bed until he steadied, then unzipped the bag and pulled out boxers, jeans, a t-shirt, and a hoody. Amusement flared briefly because he barely wore casual clothes—he didn't even own a hoody.

  He pulled the clothes on as quickly as he could, then looked around for his glasses, shoving them on his face. He sat on the bed and pulled on socks and the heavy black boots that had been in the bag. The last thing in the bag was a ballcap with some logo he didn't know. Karl put it on, feeling weird in the unfamiliar clothes but infinitely better than he had in hospital gown and handcuffs. "Wallet?"

  "You ain't gonna need it," the man replied. "Your days as Karl are pretty much over, darling. I'm sorry for that, and I'll explain more later, but right now we got to go or we're gonna be worse off than drunk butterflies in a hurricane."

  The strange phrase provoked a brief smile, but it faded all too quickly as Karl followed the man out of the room, a short distance down the hallway and through a fire escape door, down a stairwell that smelled like bleach, and finally out onto the streets.

  A black Lexus was parked at the curb. "Get in." The man slid behind the wheel and tore away from the curb the second Karl's door was closed. He touched something on the center console, which was a strange array of buttons and screens that Karl was pretty sure weren't standard. A weird, low hum filled the car, made his ears buzz for a few seconds. "Bet you got some questions."

  "Is Trick okay?" Karl asked.

  The man shot him a startled look, then his mouth curved in a crooked smile. "Yes and no, darling. He's safe for the moment, but… Well, it'll be easier to explain once you've seen him. But he wants to see you, and I can't deny him at this point. Was coming to get you at your office when everything went to hell in a handbasket. Took me a bit to track you to the hospital."

  "And now I'm an escaped criminal," Karl said with a tearful laugh. "Oh, god. How did this happen? I barely even remember—" He broke off as a memory returned, vivid and sharp and still completely unbelievable. "I know who Sunrise is."

  The car jerked, swerved a bit, and the man swore loudly as he righted it. He braked hard at a light. "What in the hell are you going on about?"

  Karl licked his lips, swallowed a hysterical laugh. "I'm pretty sure I know the identity of Sunrise, oh, god. Did he realize? Is that why they arrested me?"

  "They arrested you because you're a little too aware of reality and you punched Sunrise. You know why there ain't more people rising up against G.O.D.? 'Cause they tend to go smiting rebels, that's why. You're a rebel in need of smiting, darling. And if you figured out who Sunrise is, you got yourself an extra special death warrant. Wait until we're with Trick. You can tell us both the story at once. I ain't sure I should be hearing it while I'm driving anyway."

  They lapsed into silence after that, and Karl was happy to doze off, resting his overheated forehead against the cool glass.

  They drove for two hours, finally pulling into an abandoned building—literally all the way into it. Karl gaped as the floor rose up to reveal a secret ramp. It closed with a rattling bang behind them, and lights flared as they drove down a long, narrow tunnel.

  It eventually opened up into a massive, warehouse-like room of concrete, metal, and fluorescent lighting. Off to one side was a makeshift bedroom sort of area with two narrow beds and a pair of beat-up dressers. A man lay on one of the beds… fritzing in and out like bad TV reception. Karl drew a breath but couldn't make his lungs work to get it back out again. His eyes stung. "Is that…"

  "Ayah," the man replied. He removed his Stetson, offered a hand. "Name is Dixie Mountebank, and I'd wager good money you already figured out what name I'm better known by."

  "You're Turncoat."

  Dixie flashed a grim smile. "That's the one. You might have noticed them Dogs don't like people thinking for themselves."

  "I noticed. If you really did work for them at one point, I doubt you wanted to."

  "Nope. I hate them more than most I'd wager. But it's a long story, and right now, Trick is more important. Come on." He led the way across the enormous warehouse to the beds.

  Karl's jaw dropped as he got a good look at the man. "You're—you're the cute computer tech!" What had his name been? "Matt, right?" He couldn't—holy smoke—"I can't believe you did that!" Holy wow, his villain lover and the hot tech were the same guy. He'd known what he looked like all this time… "I kind of want to kiss you and punch you."

  Matt laughed, though it was weak and thin sounding. "I probably deserve to be punched. I shouldn't have done it, but I wanted you to see me, selfish and stupid as that is. Even if you never knew, even though I'm not quite so glamorous or interesting once the trick is gone."

  "I don't care about glamorous," Karl said, sitting on the edge of the bed, tears falling again as he curled his hand around Matt's. He flickered in and out, like his invisibility had gone haywire or something. "I care about you. What's wrong? Why is this happening?"

  "Lots to explain," Matt whispered. "Dixie can do it. I'm about to…" He slipped into unconsciousness, hand going heavy in Karl's.

  "Matt—"

  "He'll be okay," Dixie said, tugging Karl away. "For now, anyway. I've got him as stabilized as he's gonna get, but it ain't gonna work for much longer. He wanted to see you in case we can't fix him."

  "Fix him!" Karl bellowed, balling his hands into fists to keep them from trembling, failing completely. "You have to fix him. We have to fix him. What's wrong with him?"

  "Come sit down. You need to eat and drink even if you probably don't much feel like it," Dixie replied, guiding him to a beat up folding table and a fridge that looked about fifty years old. He set out juice, sandwiches, fruit, and chips, then plopped into the seat across from Karl. "There's a lot of story to tell, but the somewhat short version is this: ten years ago, I ran away from the facility where the G.O.D. kept me running their special computer systems. It's more advanced than anything available to even the military. And I'm the only one that can do certain things even now. That's more than enough to piss them right the fuck off. But when I ran, I took something else with me—a young man they'd been using as a guinea pig for experiments that involved bits of that damned meteorite, nanotech, and shit I'll never comprehend."

  "Matt," Karl whispered.

  Dixie nodded. "He was completely normal, not a trace of meteor anywhere in his genes. Perfect testing ground for the shit they had in mind. Right now, perfect invisibility can only be done on objects. No one has ever perfected the technology on living creatures. Matt's the closest they've ever come, and when we left, we destroyed the ever living shit out of all their records. Matt killed most of the scientists who had been torturing him, though he ain't proud that he did. I wiped all digital trails. So far as we know, they ain't yet been able to recreate it. They sorely need Matt back if they hope to get anywhere with it again. And they have something we need if we hope to keep Matt alive."

  "What?"

  "It's a special serum that replenishes some of the chemicals and shit they put in him, that gets his body and the nanomachines or whatall to play nice. To be honest, I only understand one word in twenty. We've been trying to make do, create our own serum, but we ain't good enough. We need the one the G.O.D. created, and we know they've got it if they want him back
. It's here in the city, in one of their secret labs, we figured out that much. But every time we try to go for it, the G.O.D. comes down hard on us. They nearly got him that night you saved him."

  Karl set down his sandwich, stomach too knotted to eat. "So we need to get that serum. How long do we have?"

  Dixie nodded. "A few days."

  "So it's housed here… the same place DeVine HQ is located… and those DeVine helicopters show up whenever there's a dust up between you and the G.O.D. Am I crazy in thinking that the G.O.D. and DeVine are more involved with each other than they're supposed to be?"

  "Not crazy at all," Dixie said. "But people who figure that out and try to go public get smited with all the other rebels."

  Karl's mouth flattened. "That must make things easy for The Magnificent Sunrise, who is Tanner DeVine, son of the DeVine CEO."

  Dixie choked on the swallow of soda he'd just taken. "What in the hell—how did you come by that knowledge? All you did was punch him."

  "His watch," Karl replied and drained his own glass before continuing. "He was slamming me around, but I still noticed his stupid watch. I could never forget that watch—I really wanted it. I've been after it for years. I was ecstatic when it showed up at that auction. I would have had it, but Tanner wanted it as well and he's got a hundred times the wealth I do. Still, I fought for it as long as I could, ticked him right off. Rolexes are all he collects." His lip curled slightly. "I seriously doubt he and someone else in the city both happen to own a 1956 Rolex Submariner 6538. But I don't know how to use that knowledge to make him give us the serum."

  "Scones," came a soft, whispery voice from the bedroom. They both whipped around, saw Matt sitting up, flickering in and out, skin pale but his mouth set in a stubborn line. "Tell him to give us the serum, or you'll give his identity to Scones."

  Karl's eyes widened. "You don't mean…"

  "I do," Matt said. "Need to piss."

  Dixie motioned for Karl to stay seated, went over and helped Matt over to the curtained off area a short distance from the beds.

  Karl waited, staring hard at his food, the few bites he'd eaten threatening to come right back up. What in the heck was he doing? He sold insurance. He was boring. He had cats— "Oh, god, my cats."

  "They're fine," Dixie called out. He and Matt came slowly back, and he fussed with getting Matt settled again.

  Karl joined them, sat on the bed and held Matt's hand again until he'd once more passed out. Slowly letting go, he leaned over and kissed Matt's forehead, then followed Dixie back to the table. "My cats are okay?"

  "Ayah. After I realized what had happened to you, I hustled to your condo and got your cats, broke into that safe in your top drawer, got anything that seemed important out of there. I'm sorry I couldn't save more, and I didn't bring your clothes or anything like that."

  Karl closed his eyes, covered them with the heels of his hands. This was really happening. He was a criminal. A runaway. A fugitive. He had no home, no safety… nothing except a dying lover he barely knew and hadn't seen for three weeks.

  But he could still see all those dead bodies, could vividly recall Sunrise's callousness. Could remember steel around his wrist, an apathetic police officer telling him he was under arrest for punching a mass murderer.

  A cold, still calm fell over him, and he dropped his hands, looked up. "Scones is the one who kills super heroes, right?"

  Dixie nodded.

  "That's our best bet, Matt's right. Threatening to reveal his identity is empty; he can deny it, rig proof, and we'll all wind up dead or worse. But Scones… They're all scared of him. They try to hide it, but I've discussed it with people while we watched TV and read the papers. They're all scared of him because they don't know how he does it, how he finds them out, how he gets away with it over and over. And it's not like we have to know how to get in touch—"

  "Matt can," Dixie interjected. "He doesn't believe in idle threats. If he said use Scones, then he has a way to reach the man." He hesitated, gave Karl a long, sad look. "You ain't gotta get tangled in this. You've told me what I need to know; we can get you somewhere safe, somewhere Matt can visit when he's able."

  Karl closed his eyes, saw Sunrise stepping over bodies like they were nothing more than rubble. Felt the hand squeezing his throat, the amusement and contempt that had flashed in Sunrise's eyes. The news had said the body count was in the thousands. It wasn't the two men here who'd killed those people.

  And he was tired of standing by and bitching and doing nothing. He opened his eyes. "I need watches. Two of them, perfectly identical. Digital."

  Dixie's brows rose, but he didn't say anything, merely stood and strode across the warehouse to a work area comprised of tables, industrial shelves, all sorts of power tools, and boxes and crates of miscellany. There was also some impressive-looking computer equipment, and even more in a nearby workstation that looked like something out of a sci-fi novella.

  Karl followed. "This is probably a stupid question, given it doesn't really matter, but what is your super ability?"

  Chuckling, Dixie rubbed the back of his neck as he knelt to rifle through a crate, then turned back to Karl. "I don't have super abilities, per se, but I got a few tricks. I'm also a genius, according to the charts I blew out of the water. So was Pa. He's the one that invented the computer system the G.O.D. runs on." He pulled out a small, beat-up looking white cardboard box. "Only problem is, you need a system operator to make certain changes, perform certain functions. Used to be only two SysOp in the world for the G.O.D.'s system. Me and Pa, and Pa's dead now 'cause they murdered him. I put up with them for years after that to keep Ma alive, but then they killed her too. Didn't know until too late just how much power Pa and I had given ourselves over the years. Hard as they try to lock me out and find me, they can't do neither. And they can't kill me 'cause they need me."

  "How come you can't just hack in there and destroy the whole thing or something?" Karl asked.

  Dixie's left eye seemed to shimmer a moment. "Ain't that easy, even for me. Would take more time and resources than we have right now. Pantheon is a bunch of fools, but they ain't completely stupid. Here you go, will these work?"

  Karl whistled at the watches nestled inside the box. He didn't know the make or model—there didn't seem to be one, though they reminded him of Hamilton—but they were top of the line. Digital read, voice control, self-adjusting band. None of the charm and whimsy of vintage and antique watches, but definitely handsome modern pieces. "Who made these?"

  "I did," Dixie said. "I get bored, and this kind of thing is distracting and fun. Cobbled from various bits and pieces, and the casing is stripped from a Hamilton line, I think. So they'll suffice for what you got in mind?"

  "Yeah, these are perfect. How long would it take someone with a lot of sway in the G.O.D. and DeVine to get the serum and bring it to us?"

  Dixie pursed his lips, folded his arms across his chest. "Assuming they'll want to try and booby-trap it first, and set up stings and traps and all that other rigamarole? Twelve hours, give or take a couple. It's booby-trapping the serum with ways to control or knock out Matt, or adding tracers to it, that'll eat time. I mean it's possible they've already rigged one in case of events unknown, but I doubt it. That takes humility, knowing you ain't always gonna be the victor, and I ain't never known that group to admit to anything but perfection."

  "Twelve hours, okay," Karl said. "Can you—or do you know someone who can—I don't know, hack into the TV stations or something?"

  Dixie stared at him a moment, then give a slow, wicked little grin. "You're a little hidden treasure chest of trouble, ain't ya, insurance man? Hell yeah, I can muck with TV stations. That's easier than catching a drunk butterfly."

  "I have never in my life heard someone talk about drunk butterflies."

  "Something mama used to say. It kinda sticks with ya," Dixie replied with a bittersweet smile. "So what's the plan, insurance man?"

  Karl took a deep breath, let it out slowly. "
It could be completely stupid—you'll have to tell me. Hijack the TV stations, tell The Magnificent Sunrise that he has twelve hours to get us the serum. I don't know where he should deliver it or how, though."

  "That's easy, and we both know he won't do it anyway. You're just using that as a setup by which to force him to deliver it later."

  Nodding, Karl said, "When the twelve hours are up—and I mean exactly when they're up—we deliver one of the watches to his office in DeVine Tower, with a note that he has one hour to deliver it. The watch will count it down for him, perfectly in sync with its mate, which I'll keep." He stared pensively at the watches, thoughts turning over and over. "The Pantheon isn't stupid, like you said. They'll know the first demand is a bluff as easily as you did—but they'll use that time to rig the serum, won't they?"

  "Yeah."

  "So he won't need more than that last hour to deliver it, and he'll be shaken, desperate to do it alone instead of with a whole sneaky team because if one thing goes wrong—even one tiny, little, normally negligible thing—he knows we'll hand his identity over to Scones."

  "Why the watches?" Dixie asked. "One hour is one hour."

  Karl's mouth quirked in a grim smile. "Nothing is more painful than being acutely aware of time passing. It passes slowly when you want something and quickly when you dread something. I want him to feel every single one of those thirty-six hundred seconds."

  Dixie's answering smile was sad. "Cold, but I can't say he doesn't deserve it. Hell, we probably all deserve to suffer like that."

  "You didn't kill those people," Karl said. "You guys have been doing your best to be quiet and harmless. I know that much. He walked over those bodies like they were puddles to be avoided. I can't—" He closed his eyes, gripped the watches so tightly they left marks in his skin. "I can't stop seeing it. I can't forgive them."

  "I'm still sorry you been dragged into our world," Dixie said. "Told Trick to leave you the hell alone, but that man ain't got a lick of sense. And as little good shit comes our way, I can't say as I blame him." He shrugged. "Just… there ain't no going back, darling, remember that. Only way out is to keep going, hope we come out the other side one day. They'll start hunting for you as hard as they're hunting us, and some days, that can be hard to take. We all flip our shit from time to time."