“What did I do?” Druck asked.

  “If we leave now, we can be there by morning,” Matt said. “Ben, how long did Keep say he needs to recover?”

  “Forget it,” I said.

  “Not your call,” Matt repeated. “I have the address. I don’t need to know the timing.”

  “No. I mean forget worrying about what might happen. It’s my life we’re talking about, and Keep won’t leave without me. I’m in.”

  Matt smiled. “You’re making the right choice. And Keep can’t leave without us. We’re taking the Pony.”

  CHAPTER 8

  We were on the road within half an hour. While everyone on Team Hondo wanted to come along, I didn’t think stuffing the Mustang with an entire entourage and overwhelming David was the best approach. Since Alter and Druck were in the kitchen when Matt and Mom convinced me to make the trip, I gave them first dibs on the rear seats, which they accepted. Of course Shaq had badly wanted to come, but after what happened the last time I was here I wasn’t about to leave the farm or my family unprotected again. Between him, Keep, and Quasar, I had no worries that anything could happen to Mom, Sheri, or the Ackermanns while I was gone. It was an important job. More important to me than tagging along to visit a more likely than not dead end lead. I knew Shaq would defend all of them with his life.

  Already sound asleep, Keep had no idea we left. I knew he would be upset when he awoke to find both me and the catalyst gone, though I wasn’t completely sure which he would be more agitated about. I understood that it would only take a simple fender bender to complicate our trip back to Atlas. But I also had faith in Matt as a driver. He was fast but never outright reckless.

  Besides, he had been looking for an excuse to drive the Mustang, and watching him visibly loving every minute he spent behind the wheel of the car made the risk worthwhile. If he was tired, he didn’t show it, and we made good time traveling up I-5. Druck’s mouth kept going for a good part of the drive as he shared stories about his time in the military and afterward, both before and during his incarceration. He very obviously skipped over the events that had led to his imprisonment on the Persephon Penal Satellite, dismissing it as a misunderstanding. Matt and I told some stories too, reminiscing about our childhoods to his benefit and Alter’s, but mostly just enjoying one another’s company for the first time in what felt like forever. We hadn’t spent a ton of time together on Head Case. There always seemed to be some task that pulled us in opposite directions. The car ride gave us a chance to hang out again, talk about whatever, and for a few hours, forget about everything we had left a universe away.

  It was two in the morning when Matt pulled the car to a stop along the curb on the opposite side of the address Mom said belonged to David Morgan. He quickly turned off the ignition and headlights to reduce the risk of either waking the neighbors or David himself. In the back seat, Druck’s woodcutting snore broke off and he let out a soft groan and wiped drool from his chin.

  “Are we here?” he asked, groggy scratchiness in his voice. He cleared his throat.

  “Yeah,” Matt replied. “His house is right there.”

  Druck leaned across Alter to get a look. “Quaint. Simple. Like the rest of this planet.” Sitting back again he inhaled some phlegm from his sinuses. “So what’s the plan? Do we go in, drag him out, and make him talk? Or are we sending Enigma in to deal with him?”

  “We don’t even know if he’s alone in there,” Matt replied. “He might live with his mother or some other students. Most college kids can’t afford to rent their own house, especially in an area like this.”

  Druck looked at the home on our side of the street. “You’re saying this is a nice area?”

  “It’s a whole lot nicer than where Matt and I grew up,” I replied. “I’ll just go up and knock.”

  “And say what?” Matt asked. “It’s two a.m. and none of the lights are on. He’s probably asleep. I thought we would at least wait until morning.”

  “We don’t have time to wait for him to leave for school. I’ll figure something out.” I reached for the door handle, pausing when Druck held a blaster, grip first, between the two seats.

  “Take this,” he suggested. “Just in case.”

  “I’m not going up to his door with a gun,” I said.

  “I’ll come with you,” Alter said.

  “It’s better if I go it alone,” I replied. “You’re my backup. Keep an eye on me.”

  Druck pulled the gun back, reversing his grip on it. “I’m ready.”

  I pushed the door open and climbed out, closing it softly behind me. I glanced at Matt through the windshield as I passed in front of the car to cross the street. He looked tense. Did he expect trouble or was he worried this whole field trip would turn out to be a wasted trip? And a dangerous one at that? I knew how much he wanted David to have answers that would help me. More than even I did. I really wanted this to work out, for his sake and Mom’s as much as my own.

  I hesitated on the sidewalk, just ahead of the path leading up to the front door of the house. Alter kept her eyes glued to the home, narrowed slightly as though she had seen something in a second-floor window. I steeled my nerves with a deep breath and headed for the door. It wasn’t that I feared David or the situation. I just felt kind of guilty about waking him or anyone else up.

  A Ring doorbell was installed next to the doorframe, and I looked directly at the small camera as I raised my hand to knock, figuring it would be more quiet.

  “Can I help you?” a stiff voice asked from the doorbell’s speaker before I could hit the door.

  “Uh, yeah, maybe you can,” I replied. “I’m looking for David Morgan.”

  “Do you know what time it is?”

  “Two-twelve a.m.,” I replied. “I know. I’m really sorry. I need to talk to him right away. Is this his house?”

  “You aren’t a cop are you?”

  “Do I look like a cop?”

  He laughed. “You look like the last guy I played at the MTG World Championship.”

  “MTG?” I asked, confused.

  “Magic: The Gathering,” he answered. “I thought maybe you’re a little too toned to be a geek, but the Han Solo duds made me reconsider. Now I’m not sure what to believe.”

  “I know what Magic: The Gathering is,” I said. “I didn’t know they had tournaments, that’s all.”

  “Brrp. Geek card declined. What do you want with David?”

  “Well, I uh…I knew his father.”

  I tensed my jaw, unsure of how the guy on the other end of the doorbell intercom, who I assumed was David Morgan, would react to the statement.

  “Did he leave me any money?”

  “What?” I replied. That definitely wasn’t the reaction I expected, but maybe it should have been.

  “I said. Did. He. Leave. Me. Any. Money?”

  “Do I look like the executor of a will to you?” I answered. “I assume that means you’re David Morgan.”

  “Look, whoever you are. My father was an absent piece of shit who never did anything for me or my mother. So if you aren’t here to give me some inheritance I never expected him to leave me, you can sod off. Okay?”

  I stared at the doorbell, heart sinking. My longshot hope crashed and burned at the word absent. “Okay,” I replied. “I’m sorry to bother you. I thought you might know something about sigils. Thanks, anyway.”

  I turned away from the camera and started back down the walkway toward the car. A light went on behind me, and I heard footsteps rushing down stairs inside. I slowed my pace, ready when the door swung open to reveal a suddenly interested David Morgan.

  “Wait!” he snapped. I spun back around. David stood on his front steps in a pair of Sailor Moon boxer-briefs, his round stomach overhanging the elastic, a second chin rounding below the first. At least part-Asian, with serious eyes, a small nose, a mop of dark hair, and a sedentary physique, he trembled where he stood. “Did you say sigils?”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “Your father—”

  “I know,” he said, cutting me off. His gaze slipped over my shoulder toward the Mustang, and he suddenly looked fearful.

  “It’s okay,” I said. “That's my ride.”

  A pair of headlights flashed on toward the end of the street, jerking my attention to a dark van. It peeled away from the curb, coming our way. I heard Matt start the car.

  “What about them?” he asked, pointing at the van.

  “No. Not them,” I replied. I reached into my pocket, slipping a sigiltech ring onto my finger and clicking the needle into my skin. Every time I used it was a risk, but sometimes that risk needed to be taken. Especially with a black van speeding toward me.

  The sigil activated, glowing brightly as I pushed the van. The force of the action lifted the vehicle and threw it sideways where it crashed loudly onto a lawn and slid to a stop. Almost immediately, houses around the scene began lighting up.

  “Oh shit,” David said, staring at the ring. “I’ll be right back.” He disappeared inside.

  “Where are you going?” I shouted, my eyes on the van as the back door dropped open and a Sucaath SWAT team started climbing out. Of course not all of them had been killed at the processing facility. And of course they were surveilling David.

  “I need to get my laptop!” he shouted back. “Don’t let them murder me.”

  Sirens blared in the distance. Across the street, Alter and Druck exited the Mustang and moved across the lawn toward the attackers while Matt did a U-turn to park in front of David's house on this side of the street. The front passenger side door swung open.

  “Seriously,” Matt shouted at me. “Five minutes, and we’re already in trouble?”

  “I actually don’t think that’s a record,” I replied.

  Druck found cover behind a smallish tree trunk, crouching as six bad guys moved toward us, rifles aimed mostly at me. They didn’t notice Druck at first, their standard gunfire crackling over my head. I dove to the grass. Druck's counterattack lighting up the street as his energy blasts brought one of them to the ground.

  Alter sprinted toward the van closer to the houses, using their landscaping as cover to make her approach. I leopard-crawled toward David’s front door while Matt opened the driver's side door, using it for cover.

  “David, what the hell? Get your ass down here!” I shouted as bullets kicked up dirt in front of me. Matt laid down a barrage of cover fire, buying me a few seconds to dive through the open front door, while our suckass attackers took cover behind the hedge across the street. Constant fire from Druck and Matt was successfully distracting them.

  “I needed my laptop,” David explained from the top of the stairs. He had a backpack slung over his bare shoulder and a pair of Converse All-Stars on his feet. He hadn’t wasted time putting on the clothes he held in a ball under one arm. “I knew I was being watched. I just freaking knew it!”

  Matt unleashed another stream of plasma bolts, hitting one of the shooters in the arm. The police sirens were getting closer. "Move it, David. We don't have time for a powwow with the cops."

  He hurried down the stairs, seeming more pleased with the astuteness of his observation than he was worried about being shot. “You didn’t really know my father, did you?”

  “Yeah, I did. I killed him,” I replied, ducking back as fresh rounds struck the doorframe. David froze halfway down the steps, and for a second I thought he might bolt back up them.

  He recovered quickly, resuming his descent. “Cool.”

  CHAPTER 9

  “That’s it?" I stared at him in surprise. "You think it's cool I killed your dad?”

  He shrugged. “I met him and my half-sister once when I was four. My mother took me to his place to try to get him to acknowledge my existence. He screamed at her, told me I was his biggest mistake, and then called the cops on us. He also decided to press charges, which put my mom on probation and me in foster care for almost a year. So, yes. Cool.”

  I had no words for him, so I acknowledged his explanation with a nod and activated my embedded comms. “Come on, guys. Cops are getting close. We need to get a move on.”

  “I’m almost there,” Alter replied.

  “Whoa,” David said, reaching me just inside the front door. “That gun of hers is not firing bullets.”

  I grabbed him, pulling him back just before a few rounds whizzed past where he had just been standing. “Their guns are. Stay back.”

  The attackers leaned out from behind both ends of the hedge. One of Druck’s rounds caught one of them in the helmet, piercing his headgear and killing him, leaving three still upright.

  “Your ring,” David said.

  I glanced down at it. The glow had faded but the sigil remained visible. “What about it?”

  “My father was into those symbols. I spent the first six months since I first saw them convinced he was part of a Satanic cult.”

  “Yeah, he sort of was,” I answered. “But these are a lot more than symbols.”

  “I always had a feeling, but I never believed it until now. You threw that van like it was made of styrofoam.”

  “I didn’t throw it. I pushed it.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  I ignored his question as flashing lights reflected off one of the houses.

  Matt saw the lights too. “Alter, hurry!” he snapped. “Druck, fall back to the Mustang. Ben, grab David and let’s go.”

  I glanced at David. “We’re making a run for the car, got it?”

  He clutched his balled up clothes in both arms. “I’m ready.”

  The gunfire from the van stopped suddenly as Alter finally reached the shooters. “Come on!” I growled, grabbing David’s arm and urging him toward the Mustang. Druck joined us there as Matt climbed behind the wheel and pulled his door closed. David ducked into the back while I took shotgun in the front. We peeled away from the curb into another U-turn as Alter finished off the last of the attackers. She dropped him next to the car as Matt stopped and opened his door for her to slip into the back seat.

  The first squad car rounded the corner ahead of us, followed by two more. Glancing at the rear view mirror, I saw a second batch of police coming to squeeze us from behind.

  “Shit,” Matt said, slamming down on the pedal and peeling out. He went about twenty feet before turning into an empty driveway.

  “Are you parking?” I accused.

  “Shut up,” he replied, accelerating toward the fence at the end of the line.

  “There could be another car on the—”

  “Let’s hope not,” he said.

  We smashed through the fence, emerging onto a slice of lawn before mowing down a small rhododendron and bouncing up onto one end of a circular driveway in front of the house behind David’s. Fortunately, there was no car parked there. Tires screaming, we barreled out into the street. I heard more squealing tires as the cops followed us through the hole in the fence, hoping to close in on us.

  “Hey,” Druck said, apparently to David. “Nice panties. Who’s the anorexic chick all dolled up like Gia?”

  “What?” David replied.

  “Hold on,” Matt barked, swinging us around the next corner. The momentum threw Druck into David, while Alter managed to grab onto the back of Matt's seat to keep from piling on.

  The Mustang roared as it accelerated, shooting down the street leading out of the residential area. A police car came around the corner in front of us, sliding across the road to block us in.

  “Ben!” Matt shouted.

  “Distra,” I said softly, ring glowing as I thrust my hand at the police cruiser, flinging the back end out of the way. We raced past, leaving the officer behind the wheel stunned and confused.

  “Nice,” Matt said.

  “The girl on your undies,” Druck continued. “Who is she?”

  “I wish you’d stop looking at my crotch,” David replied.

  “Come on, man,” Druck pressed. “I’m just curious about the origin of the cartoon character. She looks just like a friend of mine.”

  “Your friend is a cartoon character?”

  “No, I mean the outfit. I’ve seen her wear something just like that in one of her videos.”

  “You don’t like lollipop,” Alter reminded Druck. “If you watched her video, it was only to see her in that scanty outfit.”

  Druck grinned. "Can you blame me?"

  “Can you all shut up back there!” Matt yelled. “I’m trying to outrun the cops!”

  They quieted down as Matt skidded around the corner onto a wider street. Fortunately, the early morning hour meant the roads were mostly deserted, allowing him to peg the gas pedal to the floor. The road ahead was clear of cops, but police cars began filling in behind us, trying to keep pace with us.

  “Ooh, yeah,” Druck said. “That looked really hard, Boss. Took a lot of concentration. Now…" He returned his attention back to David. "...back to your underwear.”

  “Help me,” David said, looking at me.

  A bright spotlight hit the car, shining down from a chopper as it swooped in overhead.

  “Shit,” Matt cursed. “You were saying, Druck?”

  “I didn’t say anything,” Druck replied.

  “We need to ditch the car,” David said.

  “We can't ditch the car,” I shot back.

  “We go into a parking garage, we ditch the car, and we escape on foot,” he repeated. “I saw it on old episodes of Cops on Netflix like a hundred times.”

  “Oh, and how’d that work out for the perps?” I asked.

  “Okay, but they couldn’t catch everybody.”

  “We don’t ditch the car, and we don’t split up,” Matt said. “That’s final. Ben, I need—”

  “It’s dangerous,” I replied, already well aware of what he wanted. “My hand is numb. I could be paralyzed.”

  “I know, but what else—”

  A whoomp from the back seat preceded the plasma bolt that arced up toward the chopper and slammed into the rear stabilizer. The chopper peeled away, the pilot losing control.