Tim Waggoner - Dark War

I tapped Carl's paper with my left index finger. "You knew about my extra-dimensional exploits," I told him. "Is it such a stretch to think you might know where the Hidden Light is located?"

"Getting information from other dimensions is easy if you know how," Carl said, a bit smugly. "But finding out anything to do with the Hidden Light? Well, that's damn near impossible."

"Rumor has it that even the Darklords don't know how to find them," Fade said.

Skully had been quiet since I'd first mentioned the Hidden Light, but now he said, "You think the Hidden Light will be able to help you get Devona back?"

"That's what I'm hoping," I said.

"She's a good woman," Skully said. Then his fleshless mouth seemed to stretch wider, as if he were grinning. "Better than you deserve."

I smiled back. "Don't I know it."

He thought for a moment more before, finally coming to a decision. "I can tell you what you need to know." Before Carl or Fade could say anything, Skully looked at the two reporters. "And no, I'm not going to tell you two, and if either of you ask me a single question about it, I'm going to bring out Silverado and lop both your heads off." He said this as calmly as if he were making a comment on the weather, but I knew he wasn't joking.

Carl and Fade kept their mouths shut, but they were clearly unhappy about it.

I'd come here hoping that Skully could give me a lead on someone who could help me track down Maggie. I hadn't expected Skully himself to have the knowledge I needed. This had turned out better than I'd hoped.

Before he could say anything more, though, the bar's iron door opened and the two biker vampires walked back inside. The sparkly kid wasn't with them, and they were covered in copious amounts of blood – far more than one skinny teenager should've been able to contain.

One of the vampires looked at me, and his upper lip curled in a disdainful snarl.

"Now that we cleared that punk out, let's do Skully another favor and get rid of that stinking deader." The second vampire grinned in agreement.

I looked at Skully and he shrugged in apology.

"Sorry, Matt. They're new here."

"Don't worry about it," I said.

I rose from my seat as the biker vampires stomped across the floor over to me. One of them gave Varney a disgusted look.

"What are you doin' hanging out with a goddamn zombie?" the vampire said. "You're Bloodborn. You're better than that."

Varney pursed his lips and the light in his cyber-eye turned an angry red, but otherwise he didn't react.

"This goddamn zombie has a name, you know," I said evenly.

The first vampire grinned at me, displaying his fangs. "Look, Marlon, it talks!"

Marlon said, "What do you know, Brando? I thought all deaders could do was walk around moaning while they look for somebody's brain to munch on."

"This one must be like some kind of genius of the living dead!" Brando said, and laughed.

I looked at them. "Marlon and Brando? Seriously?"

They scowled, and now both bared their fangs at me.

"You say you got a name, deader," Marlon asked. "What is it?"

Using my left hand, I drew my 9mm, aimed, and squeezed off two shots. The vampires' mouths exploded in twin showers of blood and broken teeth. They staggered backward, then fell to their knees and doubled over, blood streaming out of their ruined mouths and splattering onto the concrete floor.

"Fuck You's my name," I said. "But you can call me Mister Fuck You."

"The way you took care of those two loud-mouthed vampires was totally awesome!" Shamika said.

"Totally stupid, you mean," I muttered. "Given my current condition, the recoil from my gun nearly tore my hand off." As it was, I was having trouble keeping my left hand attached, no matter how hard I concentrated, and my loose limbs made me look more like a drunken scarecrow than ever. I was glad Varney had turned out not to be a real reporter, because I really would've hated for him to shoot any video of me the way I looked right then.

We'd left Skully's via the basement trapdoor, climbed back into the hodgepodge cart, and were heading through the Underwalk once more, headlights on, electric engine humming. As near as I could tell, the tunnel we were traveling down paralleled Sybarite Street, and I wished the vermen carts came equipped with GPS so I'd know for sure. I was impatient to reach our destination, and I really didn't want to take any wrong turns and be delayed, or worse, end up lost. The longer I was separated from Devona, the more worried about her I became and the harder it was for me to control my emotions. But she needed me to keep cool if I was going to be of any help to her, so I shoved my feelings down, put a tight lid on them, and concentrated on doing what I had to do.

As we drove, I wondered if I was going about this all wrong. Maybe asking the Hidden Light for help wasn't the way to go. Back at Papa Chatha's, Dis had told me that he couldn't interfere in a dispute between two Darklords, but surely the current situation had progressed beyond that. If Gregor was involved, it was no longer just a clash between Talaith and Varvara, and if that was the case, then perhaps Dis would step in and do something. I had no idea how powerful Dis was, but he'd dealt with the Watchers the last time they'd infested the city, and there was no reason to think he couldn't handle them again. And if Dis was still reluctant to help, I could try the other Darklords. Amon had no particular dislike for me, but then again the king of the shapeshifters also had no love for me, either. I'd helped Edrigu recover a mystic object that had been stolen from him – though he had rewarded me by making it possible for me to return to mortal life for twenty-four hours, giving me the chance to have children with Devona. Edrigu might figure our accounts were balanced and be disinclined to help me. Galm would wish to help, if for no other reason than to protect his future grandchildren. But I wasn't sure I could trust him. What if we found Devona only to have Galm try to take her and lock her away in the Cathedral, where she'd be safe until she delivered our babies? And once they were born, what if Galm chose to keep them so that he could exploit their magic, whatever that might be?

The more I thought of it, the more the idea of going to any of the Darklords for help seemed like a bad idea. The more of them that got involved in this mess, the worse it would get, and the war between Talaith and Varvara could easily become a war between all five Darklords. And besides, it wasn't as if Gregor wasn't keeping all the Darklords, Dis included, under observation. Gregor might not be powerful enough to defeat the Darklords in a direct confrontation, else he would've done so long before now, but if I sought out any of their help, I'd expose myself and Gregor would have no trouble taking me out.

No, if I wanted to rescue Devona, free the abducted magic-users, and stop Gregor, I was going to have to do it myself. And that meant I needed the Hidden Light's help.

I glanced at Shamika and Varney. Make that we needed their help. I was grateful that the two of them had chosen to accompany me. Having a highly trained spy and a powerful alien entity along for the ride would no doubt come in handy. Plus, though I hated to admit it, I'd gotten used to working with partners over the last few months, and having them with me was a comfort. Despite myself, somewhere along the line, I'd become Matt Richter, the Not-SoLone Ranger. And you know something? All things considered, it wasn't so bad.

The air in front of the cart's headlights began to ripple in a way I found disturbingly familiar. A ghostly image superimposed itself on the tunnel – another tunnel, higher and wider, with metal rails on the ground. We passed the phantom figures of men and women standing on a raised platform. They gawked at us as we drove by, and I had to resist a crazy impulse to wave hello. The images became more solid, and suddenly I found myself having to steer around and between the ground rails in order to keep the cart from overturning. It was happening again, the crossover to Earth, only this time it was more than just a ghostly overlapping. This time we were really co-existing in the same dimensional space. Which was unfortunate for us, because the bright headlights of a subway train glowed in the distance, growing ever larger as they drew near. If the train was as solid as the railings beneath our cart, our quest to find the Hidden Light's HQ was about to come to an abrupt and very dramatic end.