Josie wandered the city. She kept an eye out for troublemakers. She wondered if she
had to put more people in the ground. Her mind worked at the timing of the tax bill
as she walked.
She frowned at the thought that she had deposited the brick, and they had turned the
guards on her within hours. And they had groups for the Hole in the Wall, and Jane’s
people. What had they wanted doing that?
Then her thoughts turned to the Harps knowing Old Man Warner. She had not
thought that would happen. Was Hawk Ridge the center of the Society’s reach? She
wished she knew more about what he had done for the Society when he was there,
and he had cost Harp his arm during one of those actions.
She knew she could find those things out if she wanted to bad enough. Did she want
to? What things were out there that Warner had dealt with when he was there?
She wished she had not started the quest against the Montrose. She wasn’t ready to
kill people until she was done.
How did Jack hold on to himself after what they had done?
She found a place to sit outside and watch the street. She checked in case she needed
to spend money. Some people let you sit if you kept to yourself, some called the
police.
And the police in Hawk Ridge were just as bad as back home, if not worse.
She thought that the tax bill had been dummied up because of the brick. Maybe the
Exchange has asked the guards to raid in the hopes of finding more bricks. Raiding
Jane might have been trying to grab two prizes for one.
Setting them on fire might have been too much.
Killing people cleanly had to be better than setting them on fire and waiting for them
to cook like racks of ribs. She had went overboard on that.
She decided that sitting and wallowing in guilt was not for her. She had done the
things. She could live with it. She had two puzzles, but one of them could be
explained by an order given from the Exchange. The other could only be settled by
research.
How did she do her research into Warner’s former adventures in Hawk Ridge?
Any place that had information would be closed at that time of the night. She didn’t
feel like breaking in and searching for stories about Warner. She could do that in the
daytime.
What did Elaine and the Ducklings think about her now?
She had exploded into the tax collectors and killed them in columns of fire. She didn’t
have to do that. She could have used Bulletgirl, or Richard Dragon, instead of
resorting to the flashy use of power she had done.
She needed to think about other names on her watch. Zatanna was versatile enough
to handle most situations. She had some good hand to hand fighters with the Karate
Kid and Richard Dragon. Johnny Quick gave her speed. She had two good shooters
with Bulletgirl and the Green Arrow. She needed to have some defensive players to
stop things in their tracks before she resorted to something like Fire again.
She needed something like whatever Jack had used to build the phone bands. She
needed a little more imagination than what she had used so far.
“I thought I’d find you here,” said Jack. “Do you want to talk?”
“Not really,” said Josie. “I took care of the kids and Elaine and Jane’s Amazons. I
used too much flash on it.”
“I crashed a party from the Exchange,” said Jack. “Guin is miffed at us. He wants us
to lay low until he has assessed the damage I caused.”
“How much damage did you cause?,” asked Josie.
“I don’t know exactly,” said Jack. “Guin just knows something’s up since I asked him
to identify the bodies at the estate.”
“So what do we do now?,” asked Josie. She looked at him. He stood with eyes
scanning the street. She knew he wasn’t wearing his habitual smile. She took a breath
to try to center her thinking.
“Guin asked us to wait, and then have a meeting,” said Jack. “Then we see what we
have to do from there. I think he is afraid of the king coming down and wiping out
the city as a threat to the rest of the country.”
“We stopped some things, but did we do anything worthwhile?,” asked Josie. She
didn’t feel like she had done anything to be proud of with her power.
“Yes,” said Jack. “I enabled true love to have a chance of being the right thing. I’ll
put that against anything else. The others are worried about you. I’m worried about
you. I think we need to find some booze and some cards and try to cheer up.
Tomorrow will show us what kind of disaster I actually committed.”
“Maybe you’re right,” said Josie. She felt something on her face. She brushed it away
with the back of her hand. “I have been thinking about things I did wrong. Maybe I
should be thinking about what we can do next. More of the Montrose will be coming
into town after what we did.”
“Guin is right,” said Jack. He put his hands in his pockets as he watched the people
on the street. “We have been using names that are flashier than what we should be
using. We might need to tone things down, grab people like Mesmero to do the job.”
“I was thinking the same thing,” said Josie. “We will have to leave the clerks at the
Exchange alone until their management can be replaced.”
“How long will that be?,” asked Jack. “We should tell them to do the work and pay
themselves until they figure out what they want to do. Maybe we can get Guin to help
them open another bank and seize that building for them.”
“You want to compete with the bank in charge of taking women with a bank run by
women?,” asked Josie.
“It’s just a thought right now,” said Jack. “We have to think of it as a next step. We
might have to help them run the other bank out of town.”
“All right,” said Josie. “We should go by and let them know that most of their bosses
have been murdered. I’m sure they will love that.”
“I just introduced them to the natural features of time,” said Jack. “Let’s go over and
talk to the clerks, and then we’ll see if we have to protect them from their bosses
when Guin pulls back any protection they might have at the moment.”
“All right,” said Josie. She felt lighter. She knew when she reached the Hole in the
Wall, she would break down and cry. For now, she could put on her stoic face and try
to help someone else with their problems.
“Are we walking, or flying?,” asked Jack.
Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.
“We can fly,” said Josie. “I have Hawkgirl ready to go.”
“That’s good,” said Jack. “Because I am already there.”
He jumped into the air and became the Falcon. A flap of his wings and he was
climbing up over the city.
Josie shook her head. She pushed the button her watch and became a hawk. She beat
her wings so she could reach the same area in the sky and glide toward the Exchange
building.
Jack dropped down on the roof of the Exchange building a few minutes later. He
smiled as Josie came in for a landing. She released the persona to be normal again.
“Now we just go in and tell the clerks they are in charge until someone from the home
office comes and talks to them,” said Jack. “But we also have to tell them that the
Exchanges are making money from stealing people. I’m sure they will love that.”
“Maybe we can rig another bank with Guin’s help,” said Josie. She thought about the
twenty five branches spread out on the map at home. “We might be able to seize this
building and put it under the city’s control somehow.”
“That’s a good idea,” said Jack. “He might want to dissolve our partnership after the
mess I made.”
“You may have accidentally made things easier for him since wizardry is obviously
not his strong point,” said Josie. The depression slowly lifted. “I gave the surviving
tax collectors to Lorelei and Bob. They were called to serve the bill almost
immediately.”
“So someone from the bank told them to try to grab you and whatever gold you might
have lying around?,” said Jack. “That feels right. It was probably Emer.”
“Or we missed someone,” said Josie.
“We’ll know after Guin’s investigators get through sorting things,” said Jack. He
opened the door for them to go downstairs.
The pair made their way in silence to the barracks room. The women were asleep on
their beds. Josie took out a piece of paper from her bag. She used her quill to write
a short note for the lady who might be Emer’s replacement. She left it on the woman’s
pillow. They retreated from the room.
They walked back up to the roof and sat down after making sure the door was locked
behind them. Candles lit the dark below them and in windows across the city. Torches
burned on top of the wall that surrounded the city.
“What do we do now?,” said Josie. She was sick of killing but she still had people she
had to defend.
“We wait,” said Jack. “We walk the kids to their lessons, we keep an eye on things,
we let Guin do his thing until he’s ready to be our partner again. I screwed up clearing
out Hent’s estate like I did. I didn’t find any girls except for the ones they were using
at the dinner.”
“They might be hidden in the dark somewhere,” said Josie. She felt a pang. “I think
we should make sure.”
“I guess checking wouldn’t be interfering, but we can’t let Guin know we’re looking
around while he is looking around,” said Jack.
“I think one go over with the Vision should be enough,” said Josie. She rubbed her
face. “Why did you look for me?”
“We’re worried about you,” said Jack. “You’re my best friend and the kids’s adopted
sister. You turned them around, and they don’t want to lose you on top of everything
else. And Elaine asked me to make sure you were okay, so she’s worried too.”
“I just don’t think I did the right thing,” said Josie. “I had to speak to one of the guy’s
wives. She’s stuck with kids and no one to help out unless she does what I tell her and
asks Jane for help. I don’t know if Jane will help her after what her husband tried to
do at the estate.”
“Remember what you’re always telling me,” said Jack. “I think you should put a little
faith in that at the moment.”
“Hope for the best, expect the worst,” said Josie. “It just doesn’t seem that good right
now.”
“You can always adopt Harry Bosch’s if you think you’re man enough,” said Jack.
He grinned at her.
“What’s that, dipstick?,” asked Josie.
“Everybody matters, or nobody matters,” said Jack. He hugged her. “You matter.
Let’s go look around and then you can get me some more ice cream.”
“I’m not going to reward bad behavior,” said Josie.
“You can’t prove anything,” said Jack. He checked his watch before becoming the
Falcon and flying off into the night.
Josie smiled. She stood, brushing off her pants. She changed into Hawkgirl and sailed
into the sky after him. She tried to enjoy the wind on her face as she swooped down
to a landing outside a mansion with dead bodies scattered everywhere.
Jack had already switched to the Vision. He scanned the grounds, turning in a circle
in the same spot. He frowned as he paused.
“There’s an underground thing under the house,” said Jack. “I can see cages, but I
don’t see any women.”
“I think we should open it up for Guin,” said Josie. She looked around. “Maybe his
guys will look things over while they are sorting out the bodies.”
“I agree,” said Jack. “Mole Man maybe?”
“I think Quakemaster should be good enough for this,” said Josie. “Then we can let
the guys find everything on their own without making Guin even more madder than
he is now.”
“Quakemaster?,” said Jack. He pointed at where a tunnel should go.
“Third rate villain,” said Josie. She called on the body she wanted. She pointed her
hand at the indicated spot. The ground split open under her influence.
She let the persona go when the job was done.
“Let’s head home,” said Jack. “We can hang out while we try to think what our next
move should be.”
“I was going to research Warner’s jobs,” said Josie. “The Harps both know him. Their
ages don’t seem quite right.”
“Your sword teacher knows the old guy who used to do what we are doing?,” said
Jack. “Get out of here.”
“That was my reaction too,” said Josie.
“We can both react that way over a bowl of ice cream, and maybe some apple pie if
we are fast enough to get one before the store closes,” said Jack.
“You and your apple pie,” said Josie.
“You and your tequila,” said Jack. “Maybe we can rustle some of that up too.”
“How in the world would we rustle up some tequila?,” said Josie.
“The same way you rustled up the coffee and hot chocolate in a world where there is
no cocoa,” said Jack. “Wait. You already rustled up some tequila, didn’t you?”
“No,” said Josie. “I’m still dry.”
There had been a few years where she couldn’t get out of bed without a shot. She had
dragged herself to a show, and then stopped drinking right after. She knew she would
always remember Bobby Koontz, their drummer, dropping dead after mixing a bunch
of things together and downing half a bottle of vodka on top of that.
She had never told anyone about it after she reported Bobby’s death. She had simply
closed that time of her life off.
Jack had been in the Army. He had known she had drunk some, but she had kept all
the gory details to herself. She knew he would have deserted to bail her out, but she
was such a mess, she couldn’t even ask for help.
“Hot chocolate to go with our ice cream and pie?,” said Jack. “If you think you can
beat me home.”
“I am already there,” said Josie. She pushed the button on her watch and stepped
across the city as Zatanna. “What a maroon.”
“You cheater,” Jack said a moment later, appearing in a cloud of dust. “I can’t believe
you.”
“If you ain’t number one, you’re number two,” said Josie.
“You and your Ricky Bobby,” said Jack.
“Just be glad I don’t make you carry a mountain lion around all the time,” said Josie.
She discarded the persona as she opened the door. Elaine and the girls stood on the
other side of the door.
“Welcome home,” said Elaine.
Alicia stepped forward. She raised her arms. Her stolid face shook.
“It’s okay,” said Josie. She hugged the girl. “Some things had to be done, and now we
have to wait to see what happens. I’m still looking out for you.”
“Ice cream, Elaine,” said Jack. He ruffled the girl’s hair. “I have made a lot of people
unhappy and now I must recharge to make more unhappy in the next few days. You
know what we need? A newspaper.”
He vanished into the kitchen.
Josie shook her head. She looked at her sisters. They all had the same look of
determination.
“Tomorrow we go about our business,” she said. “Right now, we have to make sure
Jack doesn’t eat the rest of the ice cream.”
“Not the ice cream,” said Angelica. She led the charge into the kitchen. “Not my
precious.”
“Go ahead, Alicia,” said Josie. She tried to smooth the girl’s hair down. “Your sisters
need you to stop your big brother from committing the greatest crime in history.”
“I was scared,” said Alicia. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay to be scared,” said Josie. “I get scared too. Only people with brain damage
don’t get scared.”
“I’m not scared of some meddling kids!,” came from the kitchen. “Why don’t you get
a giant dog to help you out?”
“Case in point,” said Josie. She let a bit of exasperation show. “Let’s see what we can
do about the ice cream. We can’t let Jack have it all.”
“Not number two,” said Alicia.
“I agree,” said Josie.
They walked to the kitchen door and looked at the rest of the Ducklings trying to
corner Jack who was using the table as a defense. He wore a grin, and had the ice
cream in hand.
“Ice cream, Jack,” said Josie. “Bowls and spoons, girls. Let’s have a little order.”
“Ah, Josie,” said Jack. “I was about to blast out of here with my prize.”
“I’m sure,” said Josie. “Let’s have a moment to celebrate, but then we have to get
ready for bed and tomorrow we are taking lessons and learning things.”
“I don’t want to learn things,” said Melanie.
“I know,” said Josie. She smiled slightly.
“Luckily,” said Jack. “I brought home a pie to go with my ice cream and I have
nowhere to go tomorrow.”
“You fiend,” said Melanie and Angelica at the same time.
Jack laughed.