Marc Zicree - Ghostlands

“’Preciate the offer,” Enid piped up, and Colleen was struck again by how even his speaking voice was musical. “But I need to keep loose, so’s I can spin my own kinda shell.”

“Right,” Cal agreed. Colleen knew as well as Cal that Enid’s ability to weave a musical cloak about them, to shield them from being detected by whatever dwelt at the Source, might be their most vital armor of all.

Cal turned to Colleen, raising the garments.

“Uh-uh, no way,” she said, backing. “Only two more sets, I know which of my favorite bookends are gonna be in them.”

Cal moved to speak, but Doc cut him off, took Colleen aside.

“Don’t give me that kindly Russian doctor act, Viktor. I mean it.”

Ignoring this, he said, “We both know that you are by far the better fighter, Colleen, and in any skirmish you will be on the front lines, no matter what any might command to the contrary.” He stepped close, peering at her with those gray eyes that had seen so much anguish and retained such compassion. “It would ease my mind greatly.”

Dammit, trust him not to fight fair…. She felt her resolve melt like an Eskimo Pie shot into the sun.

Scowling with extremely bad grace, she stalked back to Cal. “Gimme that,” she said, snatching up the grotesque rig.

She slid her arms into the loose-fitting tunic-which smelled thickly of musk and other loathsome things that made her want to lose last year’s lunch-and pulled it on. Christ, she felt lost in this thing; it made her feel like a little girl wearing Daddy’s clothes. She pushed the thought away, subdued her rising gorge. Seeing that the sides had leather laces (she didn’t even want to think about what part they came from), she tightened the garment until it fit better and allowed a proper range of motion.

She saw that Doc was holding the remaining suit of armor toward Cal. “No arguments, Calvin. We both know what is required here.”

“Gandhi only wore a loincloth,” Cal said.

“Yes, and look what happened to him.”

Cal sighed and took the armor.

“Spacibo,” Doc said.

Cal gave Dahlquist the thumbs-up.

As soon as Rafe Dahlquist keyed in the initiating sequence, the gemstones encrusting the Spirit Radio took on a numinous glow, a largeness and purity of light like the clarified essences of color produced by a prism. And like a wall dissolving to reveal an unknown territory beyond, the blue crystal faded from sight, replaced by a glowing fog…a fog that stayed bound within the parameters of Mama Diamond’s gems.

It no longer looked anything like a blue crystal, Mama Diamond mused as she stared into the hypnotic, swirling mists writhing voluptuously within the flashing circle of gems. If she had to describe it (and she was grateful she would never be called upon to do so), she supposed the closest she could come would be to say it looked like every light on the Vegas Strip as seen through her milky bad eye (her formerly bad eye, she corrected herself; since the tete-a-tete with Stern at her shop, she was seeing just fine through it, thank you very much), if someone at the same time were slowly flipping her ass-over-teakettle so everything in her field of vision did a languorous three-sixty.

“The field’s holding steady, we’ve got it contained,” Rafe Dahlquist reported to Cal. “But I wouldn’t trust it longer than twenty minutes, not at this point.”

“Okay, so the meter’s running.” In his rough-hewn black armor and helmet, Cal Griffin looked incongruously like some slightly undersized biker from hell or mountain man who skinned and tanned his own duds-certainly not like the modest young man who’d been surreptitiously practicing his sword moves on top of the dorm building so no one might see him being so lethally beautiful in his movements.

Cal nodded toward Colleen Brooks and Doc Lysenko, Herman Goldman, Shango, Howard Russo and Enid Blindman. Howie had a ruby-glittered, Tech Nine automatic stuck in his belt, while the others sported gem-encrusted rifles slung over their backs, plus their usual weapon of choice-machetes, sledgehammers, crossbows and the like. In addition, Enid was outfitted with his big guitar and the Hohner Meisterklasse harmonica he favored. Larry Shango carried the heavy-duty bag Mama Diamond had seen him load up with the homemade explosives he and Krystee Cott had been cooking up in the chemistry lab.

But of course, there was no telling whether old-style explosives would work on the other side, Mama Diamond knew; that they did so here was certainly no guarantee.

And if there was one thing Ely Stern’s unheralded arrival in Burnt Stick had taught her-and nothing along the way had dissuaded her since-it was that the best course of action was to expect the unexpected, and rely on nothing.

The seven of them approached the roiling portal, its van Gogh palette of lights playing over them, making them look as though they were adorned in living war paint.

“Now, you remember, Enid,” Howard Russo said, dogging the bluesman as he sauntered toward the rainbow font, “anything grabs you by the short and curlies, you cut and run. No heroics. You don’t want to live on in your music-you want to live on in your body. ”

“’Spect you to do the same it comes to that, Howie,” Enid responded.

“You can take that to the bank,” Russo muttered.

Colleen Brooks made a preemptive move to step through the portal, but Cal restrained her.

“You threw me a party, this one’s mine. I test the water, then you can dive in.”

“Cal-”

“No, Colleen.”

She ran an exasperated hand through her short, spiky hair. “How do we know it’s a transporter device, and you’re not walking right into the disintegration chamber? I mean, I think I can confidently say we all saw that Star Trek episode.”

“Uno momento,” Goldie said. He moved closer to the misty wall of light, turned an ear toward it. “I can hear voices on the other side. Plus I’m getting a murky picture…nothing clear, just a feeling of elbow room. There’s considerable real estate over there.”

“Well, that certainly reassures me,” Colleen grumbled. But she relented, stepping aside to let Cal take point.

Concentrating, Mama Diamond felt she too could hear the sounds on the other side, dimly. The noise was an impasto of voices too thick to be comprehensible, but each layered syllable was somehow distinct, embodied, solid. Mama Diamond imagined that if she closed her eyes she would see a legion of ghosts crowding around her. Which was why she kept her eyes firmly open.

Cal turned to Dahlquist. “If something starts to go south, if it heads toward meltdown, kill it, shut it down. Don’t worry about us.” Mama Diamond read the uncertainty in Dahlquist’s eyes, but he nodded his agreement.

Cal addressed Krystee Cott, whom he had delegated to command those left standing guard. “Keep everything cool, no one in or out.” He shot a glance at Jeff Arcott, glowering but silent against the wall. Arcott deliberately ignored him.

As for Theo Siegel and Melissa Wade, Mama Diamond saw each was staring into the portal as though hearing a music being sung only to them-and perhaps, she realized, that was the case.

Cal turned back toward the portal, was about to step through. It’s now or never, Mama Diamond thought urgently. Three quick strides brought her up to him.

“Forget something, Mr. Griffin?” she asked pointedly. She might also have said someone, given the promise he’d made her on the roof of the dormitory building. Up close now, she could see that blue sprites of static electricity danced in his hair.

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” Cal said, not unkindly. “But we’re going to have to take a rain check on that.”