Deader Still sc-2

by Anton Strout

Reluctantly, Lanny leaned over my hand. I closed it into a fist, but Julius put the squeeze on my arms and Marten pried my hand back open. Lanford ran one of his bony fingers across my palm, hovering over the various lines in my hand.

  When he was done, he turned to Marten and nodded. His voice was solemn. “He’s marked.”

  Marked? I thought. What the hell are they talking about? The only thing I saw on the palm of my hand was a sliver of graphite under the skin from when I had accidentally jabbed a pencil tip into it when I was twelve.

  “Do you think so?” Marten asked with a hiss of sarcasm toward his brother. “What? Did you think his hand was glowing just for fun?”

  “Hey,” I heard Connor yelling from far off in the crowd. “Get your goddamn hands off my partner.”

  Julius’s meaty grip on my arms tightened painfully. Marten looked into my eyes as if he was studying me. I tried to look away, but it was no use.

  “Such a pity,” he said, disappointed. “Would that there was more time and we were meeting under more auspicious circumstances … Still, we can’t have you hounding us, can we?”

  Marten raised his free hand up to my face, the pinkie and index finger extended and practically touching my eyeballs. I struggled to pull my head away, but Julius’s chest pressed against the back of my head, making it impossible to move. Marten then muttered something barely resembling a language, and all of a sudden I felt like I wanted to throw up.

  Julius let go of me, and I was surprised to find that I couldn’t stand. I fell to the floor, gagging. I turned my head to the left and saw Connor arriving just on the other side of their tables.

  The Brothers Heron stepped over my body, heading toward their wagon.

  “Time to pull the old Baba Yaga, boys,” Marten said. Lanford and Julius looked at each other, total “is he serious” looks on their faces. They decided that their brother was indeed serious and made short work of stuffing themselves through the doorway of the gypsy wagon, Julius barely fitting. Marten backed up the steps. “We’re really not bad guys, honest.”

  He pulled the door shut as he backed in, and smoke started pouring off the tiny wooden wagon, forming voluminous black clouds. It reminded me of those black snake fireworks I’d had as a kid. Cloud after cloud of black smoke rolled off it and rose toward the convention center ceiling high overhead. When it cleared, the entire gypsy wagon had vanished.

  A few of the people who had stopped to watch applauded the spectacle, most likely convinced they were seeing some kind of staged Comic Con event.

  Connor helped me up. I choked on the last of the smoke, but thankfully the sickening sensation in my stomach was gone.

  “You okay, kid?”

  I nodded, winded and unable to speak.

  “Those guys had something to do with the chupacabra?” he asked.

  I nodded again.

  “I kinda figured that after you left me back at the booth playing ‘Where’s Lanford?’ with the crime scene photo.”

  Finally my throat cleared enough that I could speak.

  “Those douche bags are what gives gypsies an evil name, you know that?” I said. “Evil.”

  “One of them actually looked like he was evil-eyeing you,” Connor said, looking me over. He put his hands on my face and pried my eyes open to examine them. “You sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m fine,” I said, then stopped myself. “Hold on.” The stomach pain had passed and the smoke inhalation too, but I somehow felt … off. I walked over to the table of goods the brothers had left behind as a result of their hasty exit.

  I scooped up one of the totems at random with my bare hands. I pushed my power into it and … nothing. I threw it down and grabbed a deck of Tarot cards. Nothing. I scooped up several items at once, trying to roll my power into them.

  All nothing.

  “Kid?”

  “My power,” I said. “It’s gone.” Then, as an afterthought, “I hate Illinois gypsies.”

  22

  While I stared at my hands, Connor checked through the space previously occupied by the gypsy wagon just to make sure we weren’t having the wool pulled over our eyes by some sort of illusion.

  When we determined that the wagon truly wasn’t there anymore, I said, “Well, that’s pretty damn impressive.”

  The crowd that had cheered when the wagon disappeared had dispersed, since it looked like the magic show was over and the wagon wouldn’t be reappearing anytime soon.

  Connor paced in the now-empty booth. He looked hopeful, like maybe the wagon might suddenly reappear.

  “I thought gypsies only did folk magic,” I said. “Trinkety stuff … lucky rabbits feet, love potions, wart removal, that kind of thing.”

  Connor stopped pacing and looked up at me. He held his arms out and waved them in the empty space.

  “Usually, yeah,” Connor said. “I guess some folk magic is a little bigger than others.”

  “A little bigger?” I said. “We’re talking David Copper-field vanishing the Statue of Liberty proportions here. I think we should go fill the Inspectre in.”

  Connor agreed and the two of us returned through a sea of geeks and nerds to our booth to give the Inspectre our rundown of what had just happened. Including the fact that I had lost my power.

  “Don’t worry, kid,” Connor said once we had finished telling him. “We’ll figure something out.”

  “Oh, really?” I said, agitated. “That’s pretty positive sounding coming from someone who hasn’t just lost their abilities. You’ll figure something out? Tell me, Connor, just how much folk magic have you reversed in your day?”

  Connor held up his hand, his fingers tracing a circular goose egg.

  “Exactly,” I said. I turned to the Inspectre. “Sir, I’m sorry. I have to get out of here.”

  “Nonsense, my boy,” Inspectre Quimbley said, giving me an encouraging slap on the shoulder. “There’s plenty you can do around here to help with recruitment that doesn’t require a lick of power.”

  I walked out from behind our table and went over to the next booth. It was just your average Comic Con booth, set up with a wide array of collectible comic memorabilia. I ran my hands up and down through the cardboard coffins of comics.

  “Nothing,” I said, moving to the next table and the next one after that. “Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing.”

  I must have looked insane.

  Connor and the Inspectre stared in silence until I calmed down.

  “Feel better, kid?” Connor said.

  “Not really,” I said. “I feel kind of naked without my power, you know? It’s been a part of me for so long, I can’t remember life before it.”

  The Inspectre gave a loud ha-room, stroked his mustache, and walked around the table to the outer side of the booth.

  “Perhaps I’ll give you two a moment to collect yourselves while I check out this disappearing wagon for myself,” he said.

  As he headed off in the direction we had just come from, Connor and I lapsed into awkward silence.

  Several passersby sidled up to the booth, took a few pamphlets, and moved on. I was still shaking from the dawning realization of what losing my powers really meant. In many ways, they had defined my very existence up until this point.

  “Listen, kid,” Connor said after a while. His voice was soft when he spoke. “Up until you joined the D.E.A., you considered your powers mostly a curse, right? Always messing up any chance with the ladies. So look on the bright side—now you don’t have to worry about your power getting in the way of your life anymore.”

  I didn’t think I could feel worse than I already did, but apparently I was wrong.

  “Yeah,” I said, “I can ruin my life all on my own just fine. Thanks.”

  Connor cocked his head.

  “Troubles in paradise, kid?”

  I stepped back into our booth and sulked toward the rear of it.

  “I don’t know,” I said, thankful for the change of subject even if it was also a dark one.
“I don’t know if I can take her being in Greater and Lesser Arcana. I just don’t like Jane working so closely with Wesker. Every time I see them, she’s laughing and having a good time, but whenever I’m around her lately, it’s like she’s reserving all her lingering bits of darkness just for me. You don’t think that she and Wesker … ?”

  I couldn’t even finish my sentence without my brain feeling like it might explode. My heart jackhammered in my chest.

  “Wait, wait, wait,” Connor said. He came over to me. “Jane and Wesker? What? You think she’s doing the dark deed with the Dark Dud?”

  He started laughing and shook his head.

  “What?” I said. “I’m dead serious. What’s so hard to believe about that? He’s powerful, commanding; they share an affinity for dark things …”

  “But he’s Thaddeus Wesker,” Connor said, unable to control himself. I felt the uncontrollable urge to smash him in the face. When he saw the serious look in my eyes, he composed himself. “Look, kid. I know that actually maintaining a relationship is new to you. It’s probably why you’re having all these out-of-whack jealousy issues. It’s like you’re in high school.”

  Connor was right, though I hated to admit it. I felt my rageful urges calming down.

  “I’ve never had to deal with any of this before,” I said. “I’m in uncharted water here.”

  “You and Jane make a cute, if annoying, couple,” he said. “Don’t blow it over something as ridiculous as your imagined jealousy, okay?”

  “Should I really be taking this advice from someone as single as you?”

  Connor’s face darkened.

  “Hey,” he said. “My being single is a choice. I made that decision when I entered the Department, so that no one close to me would ever come to harm. Let’s not get off topic here. We’re talking about you.”

  I stared down into my hands—my powerless hands.

  “Believe me,” Connor said. “There are worse problems than not having paranormal powers.”

  “Things okay with you?” I said. Like the lights going out in a house, Connor’s eyes changed right before me, and he looked away.

  “It’s nothing, kid,” he said, but I could still see he carried some kind of extra burden. That letter he had received had something to do with his brother. I would have bet money on it. Why had it been blocked from me in my psychometric vision, though? I had to find out.

  “You know, you can talk to me,” I said. “About anything.”

  Connor gave me a sidelong look of suspicion. “Is that an order?”

  My stomach clenched at his words.

  “Knock it off,” I said simply.

  The Inspectre pushed his way back through the crowd, elves and Klingons flying to his left and right. He approached the booth, breathless.

  “Anything?” Connor asked.

  “As you said, the blasted wagon of theirs is nowhere to be found,” the Inspectre said.

  “So there’s nothing we can do,” I said, frustrated. The only people who might have any sort of answers about the chupacabras or my power loss had literally vanished into thin air. It was all I could do not to scream. “I have to get out of here.”

  The Inspectre, still winded, gave me a stern look.

  “Sir, please,” I begged. I held my ungloved hands up to him. “We’re called the Department of Extraordinary Affairs. Right now I’m barely qualified for ordinary affairs, if that. I just need to get away for some time to think.”

  My pleas seemed to soften the Inspectre, and he nodded.

  “Of course,” he said finally. “Why don’t you take the afternoon off from the show floor and collect yourself.”

  “Yeah, kid,” Connor said. I turned to him.

  “Can I use your phone?” I said.

  Connor hesitated. I never asked to borrow it from him, but that had been because I generally didn’t want to trigger off anything personal of his unless it was under the right circumstances. Without my powers, it really didn’t matter what I touched, but Connor didn’t move to hand it over.

  “Mine melted in the Oubliette, remember?” I reminded him.

  Connor nodded, and reluctantly pulled out his phone. He started to hand it to me, then pulled it away. “Maybe I should dial whatever number for you, just for safety’s sake.”

  I reached over and snatched the phone from him. It felt oddly liberating not to have to worry at all about keeping my power in check while holding it. Liberating, yes, but also a little bit empty.

  “Give me that,” I said, stepping away before he could grab it back. “I just need to get in touch with Jane.”

  I’d have to contend with Mina and the heist details later, but now that I was powerless, the desire to see Jane was suddenly overwhelming. Sure, I had poor impulse control, but I wasn’t scheduled to take “Controlling Your Poor Impulse Control” until next spring anyway, so I couldn’t feel guilty about it.

  23

  I called Jane and begged her to meet me once again at Eccentric Circles in half an hour. I didn’t feel like heading into the Black Stacks over at Tome, Sweet Tome in my current condition. Jane agreed to meet me downtown. I hurried off the floor of the Javits Center and headed down to the bar.

  Eccentric Circles was jumping considering it was midafternoon, but I wasn’t in the mood to talk to anyone. Thanks to the gypsies, I could walk around gloveless. Normally a bar was a potential minefield for my psychometric powers. It felt weird to be bare-handed.

  Since Jane had farther to travel coming down from Tome, Sweet Tome on the Upper West Side, I grabbed a beer and settled into the same booth Jane and I had dined in at the back of the bar the other night. By the time she showed up, I was down to the dregs of it. She had her trademark pile of arcane books sticking out of her shoulder bag. She didn’t look happy.

  “All this research is going to kill me,” she said, “or, at the very least, crush me.”

  “I hope you didn’t bring any books that have a vendetta against me,” I said, holding up my hands in a defensive posture.

  “It’s not the books you should be worried about,” she said, with a little attitude to it.

  I was a little blindsided after our time spent patching things up last night.

  Jane’s eyes went to my bare hands as she slid the bag off her shoulder and onto the seat. She raised an eyebrow.

  “You’re not wearing your gloves,” she said.

  “Yeah, about that …”

  I told her everything that had happened since seeing her last—about Central Park, chasing dead Dr. Kolb, and about the confrontation with the gypsies on the convention floor at New York Comic Con.

  “So they just evil-eyed you?”

  I shrugged. “Something like that. All I know is that I haven’t been able to read a single thing psychometrically since.”

  Jane took my hands across the table.

  “Wow,” she said.

  We sat there in silence for a minute, the bar and the rest of life continuing on around us.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  “Actually, yeah.” I smiled. “For so long, my power dictated who I was, or limited what I could do. I came to the Department of Extraordinary Affairs because, let’s face it, where the hell else was I going to fit in with what I could do. Now I feel kinda free. I thought about it while waiting for you … Maybe I should leave the Department. I thought I’d run it by you before I came to any real decisions, though.”

  Jane looked wounded, but then she shook her head.

  “I don’t think you want to quit, Simon. I really don’t.”

  “Why shouldn’t I?” I asked. “It’s not like I fit in with our little Island of Misfit Toys anymore. Besides, I wouldn’t have to deal with seeing you working for Wesker anymore …”

  Jane sighed but squeezed my hands.

  “Despite whatever issues you seem to be having with me, Simon, you’re good people. This job is in you, even if you’re never able to read another item in your life.”

  “How do you
know I’m all that good?” I sure didn’t feel like all that good a person. I was a jealous boyfriend and a deceiver. I thought about Mina and the fact that I was about to help her steal something. Was that what a good person let himself get wrapped up in?

  “How do I know you’re good?” Jane asked with a look of duh upon her face. “Because I’m constantly fighting my dark tendencies, especially these days. But you? You made a choice to walk away from all the bad in your life, and look at you now.”

  I squirmed in my seat. I was desperate to tell her that I wasn’t a saint, that right now I was plotting a nefarious heist with Mina. Sure, I had the best of intentions in doing it, but still …

  “If anyone’s made a change here, it’s you,” I said to Jane. “Coming over to the D.E.A. like you did, giving up everything that Faisal Bane and his organization had to offer.”

  Jane raised a hand and waved it away.

  “But working for the Sectarians was a delicious brush with dark power,” Jane said, “and that changes a girl, mostly for the worse.”

  “But you’re turning out okay,” I said.

  “That’s why I said mostly, dum-dum,” she snapped with dark anger, then caught herself. I sat back like I had been pushed. “See? See what I mean? It’s a hard habit to break.”

  “Hanging with Thaddeus Wesker probably doesn’t help,” I muttered to myself.

  “Whoa,” Jane said, pulling her hands away. “Can we stick to one mental crisis at a time?”

  “Sorry,” I said, but it was too late.

  Jane scooted herself out of the booth and pulled her bag of books toward the edge of the bench seat.

  “I’ve got to get back to the office,” she said, her face looking like she had tasted something unpleasant. “I want you to give something some serious thought, Simon. Maybe it’d be best if we took a break until you get your act together and get over this thing about me and Wesker.”

  “What?” My stomach balled up in an instant.

  “I don’t like what’s been happening between us,” she said. “I don’t need you going all jealous on me around Director Wesker every time you see me when I’m just doing my job. It’s like you only call me when you want to apologize and get all needy like this. I know you’re going through a lot right now and I know you’ve never really had the opportunity to be in a relationship like this before, which is why I’m not telling you to get lost. But honestly, there’s only so much a girl can take before the dark thoughts start taking over.”