1.

The Doctor sawed through the cast, revealing the pale white skin beneath, covered in a layer of fine hairs.

“How's it look?” Algernon asked.

“Look?” the Doctor repeated, glancing up at him, “it looks fine. Everything is in its right place. You should be glad.”

Algernon nodded.

“Anything else I should know about?”

“Know about? Just be careful the next few days. Walking should be fine, but try not to run or skip.”

Sliding off the table, Algernon flexed his knee, and found it stiff.

“Just give the nurse your insurance information,” the Doctor told him.

Algernon nodded, and stepped out of the room. The halls bustled with repairmen and doctors, mingling shoulder-to-shoulder, and glancing at each other with disinterested and vaguely arrogant eyes.

He still favored his mended leg, not putting too much weight on it out of habit, and when he reached the Nurse's station, he rested his right elbow on the desk, and produced his wallet and insurance card with his left.

“That will be a sixty dollar co-pay.”

Algernon nodded, and checked his wallet. He paid with two crumpled twenties, a ten, a five, three ones, and a handful of loose change. The nurse glowered at him as he stacked it up and slid it across to her.

“Can I get a receipt?”

She muttered something, and handed him the slip of paper, which he stuffed in his wallet before heading out.

He passed a sign on his way out:

“WE APPOLOGIZE FOR THE INCONVENIENCE; THE REPAIR CREWS WILL LEAVE AS SOON AS THE CAUSE OF THE GAS EXPLOSION IS FOUND.”

“It wasn't an explosion, you know,” a voice said from off his left elbow.

Turning, Algernon looked at Theia. The short, stout woman had dark circles under her eyes, and her short hair was an abstract mess clinging to the top of her head.

“Mmm?” he responded.

“Can I have a cigarette?” she asked.

“You smoke?”

“Only when stressed.”

“In a hospital?”

“We can go outside.”

The two of them selected a sunny spot outside the cancer ward and lit up. The flame from Algernon's lighter rose higher as Theia lit her cigarette, and there was a crackle as a lock of her hair fell too close to the flame and melted.

“Damn,” she said, puffing away. Reaching up, she tugged loose the singed hairs.

“What was it you were saying, inside?”

“Wade did it. The explosion.”

“What? Like with a bomb?” Algernon asked, furrowing his brows.

“No. He...changed into something. A living thing made of bony blades. He's why Cincinatus hasn't left here.”

“Has he woken up?”

Theia shook her head.

“Braindead.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

“He changed to. A giant bird thing.”

Algernon looked at her.

“Theia. You're not the picture of sanity, right now.”

“I know.”

“Have you talked to someone about this?”

“I fucking know, alright?” she hissed through clenched teeth, “I know what I saw. I know what happened, okay? Some weird shit is happening.”

2.

“The surgical mask, the rubber teat
Are singed, give off an evil smell.
You seem to weep more now that heat
Spreads everywhere we look.
It says here none of us is well.

The warty spottings on the figurines
Are nothing you would care to claim.
You seem to weep more since the magazines
Began revivals on the Dundas book.
It says here you were most to blame.

But though I cannot believe that this is so,
I mark the doctor as a decent sort.

I mix your medicine and go
Downstairs to leave instructions for the cook.
It says here time is getting short.

That I can believe. I hear you crying in your room
While watching traffic, reconciled.
Out in the park, black flowers are in bloom.
I picked some once and pressed them in a book.
You used to look at them, and smile.”

The door of The Unreal City opened. A sliver of light fell upon the ground, the harsh, yellow glare of outside slicing into the smoky darkness within.

Mari looked up from the glasses she was cleaning, and saw the black silhouette against the outside light, a hole cut in the fabric of the world, looming with his head almost at the crossbar of the frame.

“Wade?” she asked, knowing as soon as she did that the figure in the door wasn't him.

“We're closed,” she declared.

“I'm just here to make a delivery,” the figure stated in a deep voice, closing the door behind him. The square of glare remained in her pupil until he was at the bar.

The man was tall and dark-skinned. He wore a crisp, new suit and gloves like butlers did in period pieces. His movements were smooth and graceful, though he looked uncomfortable in formal dress. Though his accent was local, there was a strange note to his words, a certainty of rectitude behind even the small missteps and strange rhythm of his voice, as if he had learned them phonetically.

“You are Mariposa Harris?” he asked, arching an eyebrow.

“Yeah? What do you need?” she asked letting her left hand rest on the wooden baseball bat she kept under the bar. The touch turned into a grip when he reached into his jacket, and relaxed when he pulled out an envelope.

“My employer asked me to deliver this to the Heller Agency, but no one answered when I called. I understand they rent the upstairs from you?”

She nodded, slowly.

“Well, then. If you wouldn't mind forwarding this to Mister Heller when he returns. It's an invitation of some sort. I was also supposed to leave this,” he said, removing a card from his jacket, “in case there were further questions regarding the event.”

He pivoted on his left heel, and headed for the door, glancing back over his shoulder, he said: “you have a nice day, Miss Harris. Please make sure that Mister Heller receives the envelope.

With that, he slid out the door.

“Christ, what the hell was that?” she asked, as Wade's footsteps caused the stairs to creak, descending into the bar.

Looking up, she let her shoulders sag.

“Wade, why the hell are you dressed like that? Didn't we buy you some new clothes?”

He was dressed in the same clothes he wore when she first saw him: the flannel shirt, the jeans, and the t-shirt with the “NOMAD” patch ironed onto it.

“What? They're clean.”

“I saw you wearing them yesterday. That's not clean.”

“Depends on your perspective,” he said, “compared to the staff bathroom attached to the kitchen, they're fucking immaculate.”

“Staff bathroom? Mo hasn't cleaned that yet? ...Dammit.”

“Got any fruit?” Wade asked, “I ran out of cereal up in my closet.

She stepped back into the kitchen, and tossed an apple to him, underhanded. He snatched it out of midair, and took a bite from it in the same motion.

“I don't know why,” Wade said, “but for the past week or so I've been really hungry. Don't know what the hell's going on with my gut.”

“If you got a tapeworm, you didn't do it here.”

He laughed for a moment, and stopped when she looked at him.

“Nah. Not a tapeworm. I can go without food, I just get hungry a lot.”

“That sounds like a tapeworm.”

“Are you going to make me go to a doctor again? I'm alright, okay? Never felt better.”

3.

When Algernon entered the bar, she gave him the envelope and the card.

“A 474 number?” he asked, looking at the card, “G-H-I, P-Q-R-S, G-H-I...GRI. Grimsby.”

“You can tell that by looking at the phone number?” Mari asked.

“If it's a land-line. Otherwise it's just a coincidence.”

He hooked his index finger into the fold at the top of the envelope and opened it with a jerk of his wrist.

“You are invited to an event at Carver Manor, an open house on October 12, 2011...”

“That's a sick joke,” Algernon said, “on the anniversary of the last Carver Killing. What Old Algie Farquahar thought was someone cleaning up the city. Turned out to be someone who read the Scarlet Pimpernel too man times.”

There was a moment of silence.

“Were you named after him?”

“Who? Benjamin Carver?”

“No, Algernon Farquahar.”

He shook his head, and looked back at the invitation, pressing his tongue to his cheek in thought.

“Yeah. Kind of. A.F. Was a fiction, though. An alias.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. It's an open secret in the Trib offices that Algie Farquahar was Ambrose Bierce.”

She furrowed her brow, and tilted her head to one side.

“The guy who wrote the Devil's Dictionary?”

“Yep.”

“Weird.”

“I'd better ask Wade if he wants to go. It's addressed to the agency, and he's got that weird thing about Victor Carver. Otherwise...you want to go?”

“With you?” She asked, quirking her left eyebrow upward.

“Yeah,” he said, smiling slightly, “why not?”

“Why not, indeed?”

They looked at each other for a moment.

“Is that a yes?” he asked, breaking the silence.

“Of course it is, jackass.”

“Right. I'll go talk to Wade, then.”

Algernon headed for the stairs, his left knee complaining sullenly as he did. Partway up he paused. Leaning against the wall, he extended the leg, and bent the knee as far back as he could several times, before continuing up.

Both the doors were closed, he checked the closet first.

Wade had made himself at home, adding a lamp, folding table, and a small bookshelf stuffed with paperbacks to the spartan arrangements. From the bar on one wall hung several shirts and pairs of pants. It was somewhat more lived-in than it had been previously, but still looked spare.

Going into his office, he saw Wade standing in the bathroom washing his hands.

“Wade,” the older man said.

“Hey, Algernon. I'll be out in a minute.”

“I need to ask you something.”

Wade grabbed the towel, and looked at him.

“Yeah?”

“We got something from that Carver guy. An invitation.”

“What sort?” Wade asked, leaning against the frame of the bathroom door.

“Some kind of open house. It's on an anniversary important to the Carver family.”

“What anniversary?”

“One of his multi-great uncles was a murderer. It's the anniversary of the last killing.”

Wade looked down at his feet, and shook his head.

“He got in town the same time I did. He's scheduling it then on purpose.”

“Are you coming?” Algernon said.

“What? Hell no, and if you were smart, you wouldn't go, either. That guy's bad news, Algernon.”

Algernon shrugged.

“I happen to think it might be an entertaining...possibly even an educational evening. Anyway. Mari and I will be going, then.”

“What about the bar?” Wade asked.

“Who cares? She'll figure something out. U.C. is doing pretty well, right now. She can probably find someone to cover for her on a Wednesday, if she can't deal with closing it.”

Wade shrugged.

“Can I have your stuff when you don't come back?”

“Why are you convinced that something bad's going to happen?”

“You'll see, Algernon. You'll see.”

4.

Algernon and Mari got out of her car, the chill evening air hurrying them up the drive, toward the door. Algernon wore a dark blue suit that he had ironed on his desk, and Mari wore a pale blouse and a skirt so deep and red it could be a shade of black.

The man who had delivered the invitation, Maxwell—Something Maxwell, or Maxwell Something, he had never said, and the card provided no insight—stood at the door in the dimming light of evening.

His face was expressionless and mild, and he ushered them in.

“Welcome, welcome. Come on in, Miss Harris and Mister Heller.”

They stepped past him, into the foyer, where portraits of the Carver Patriarchs wreathed the room between tall, narrow, windows. The sounds of laughter and music could be heard from further into the house.

Algernon whistled through his teeth.

“All one hundred sixty years,” he said, “all the way back to Lucky Phillip Carver.”

The painting that Algernon was the oldest, yellowing and warped at the edges. The man sitting in the picture frame was equal parts haunted and severe, like the commander of a loosing army, or a boy forced to shoot his own rabid dog.

“Why was he called 'Lucky,' anyway?” Mari asked, tilting her head to the side.

“Entrepreneur. He was like King Midas. Everything the man touched turned to gold. Built this house and most of town.”

“Could be just savvy,” she said.

“Yeah, but 'Lucky' sounds better. Suffice to say it wasn't just an ironic nickname.”

“Who are these other ones?” she asked.

Algernon pointed to each in turn, “Jorge and Joseph Carver, who studied native cultures, Phillip Carver the Third, got involved with organized crime between here and California, Charles Carver, the scholar and probably last of the 'gentlemen scientists' and next to him is his bodyguard Hasan, and younger brother Benjamin—”

“The Lead Mask killer,” Mari whispered.

“The same,” he pointed up to a painting of a seated, blonde woman and two men, “Over here you've got his sons Jonathan and Alexander, soldiers and adventurers. The woman's Ilyena, she was a soviet soldier and married them each in turn. Jonathan died, and she married Alex two years later.”

The next painting was of a similarly blond young man, standing next to a smiling, dark-skinned man with sharp features.

“Anastas Carver and his adopted brother Samir. After Anastas and his wife disappeared, Samir managed the estate, and became Victor's guardian in the early 1990s.”

Mari shook her head in wonder.

“There's a lot of history, here,” she said, before muttering, “and a lot of crazy.”

Algernon glanced over at her, smiling wanly.

“You've got no idea, Mariposa. Come on, they'll give us weird looks if we hang out in the foyer all night.”

5.

A Sand Walk ensemble played soft music in the central room. A massive, freestanding staircase led up to the gallery on the second floor, emerging from the black-and-white tile like a red velvet and dark mahogany waterfall. Overhead, the light of the full moon lanced in, supplementing the lowered light of the electric lights sprinkled around the room in their anachronistic brass fittings.

The room was full of milling people, and a soft murmur of speech punctuated irregularly by laughter.

A bar had been set up along one wall, joining in one corner with a long table of food.

“Would you look at that?” Mari muttered, looking up at the skylight.

Algernon followed her gaze, and blinked.

Hanging from the ceiling were three metal sculptures. Androgynous, faceless, winged figures dangled from the ceiling by chains attached to their ankles. All had their hands clasped and their wings spread open. Each was twice the height of a man, and the moonlight glinted off of their steel frames. They cast looming shadows on the ground, ignored by the party-goers.

The band played on, a slightly warped version of Aquarela do Brazil filling the air, the zither and accordion struggling to fit in to the more typical double bass, guitar, and drums. The accordion and the saxophone cooperated on the melody section, the two players nervously watching one another, while the bassist stood behind them, gazing at his shiny black boots.

“What do you want to do first?” he asked her.

“Drinking's nothing special,” she said, and looked over at him, “but that food does smell good, doesn't it?”

“Yeah, I'm starving,” he replied.

The two retrieve plates and sit at a table, and eat, watching as the party goes on around them. When they finish, Algernon sits back and sips on a cup of qahwa arabiyy, savoring the feeling of the gritty, black liquid slide down his throat.

“What do you think this is all about?” Mari asked, raising a glass of water to her lips.

“Who knows?” Algernon said, licking his teeth to remove the grounds that had become deposited their, “he's a Carver. All Carvers are crazy.”

“That's somewhat unkind,” a voice said, as a figure sat heavily in the seat to Algernon's left.

They turned, and saw a man in a black suit. A cool gaze met their startled eyes through horn-rimmed glasses.

“But you are correct, there is a history of madness in the family,” Victor said.

“I'm sorry...” Algernon said, “you have me at a loss.

Victor smiled, an expression confined to the lower half of his face.

“My name is Victor Carver. You are the constituents of the Heller Detective Agency? I thought there was a young man in your employ. A Mr. Larkin.”

“You mean Wade,” Mari said, “he had a prior engagement, this evening, though, personally, I think he made a poor choice.”

Victor laughed.

“That he did. It's been quite an evening, thus far, and it might prove to be quite a morning. But tomorrow is tomorrow, and not our concern, is it?”

“I suppose not,” Algernon said, his eyes level, “might I ask, Mr. Carver, why you chose to return to Valley City? I've heard of your...intellectual prowess...and surely, a man like you could find something to occupy himself in a more...interesting....locale?”

Victor continued smiling.

“You're trying very hard to be polite. I appreciate that. Suffice to say that, despite being born elsewhere, I consider Valley City to be my home. As to my business, my Grandfather and Great Grandfather were scholars, of sorts. Scientists. Inventors. That sort of thing. My intent is to popularize their works and possibly mass-produce some of their more interesting inventions.”

Mari cocked her head to the side.

“Sort of like Nikola Tesla?”

Victor laughed again.

“Yes, very similar. Not quite the same, though.”

A white-gloved hand fell on his shoulder, and Victor turned to look at Maxwell.

“Mister Carver. I'm sorry to interrupt, but you are needed.”

Victor nodded, and smiled once more at Mari and Algernon.

“If you'll excuse me. Please give Mr. Larkin my best.”

Standing, he left, disappearing into the crowd, leaving Mari and Algernon alone at the table with their depleted drinks and empty plates.

“Interesting,” Algernon said.

“What is?”

“I can see why Wade acted the way he did.”

“Oh?”

He turned to her.

“You want to dance?” he asked.

“If you do,” she replied.

“A demure attitude doesn't fit you, you know,” he said, holding out his hand, “c'mon.”

They rose, and moved as one to the dance floor, where they fell into a simple variation on a waltz. The band was playing Blue Danube, with the same awkward attempts at fitting their music to the song.

Algernon pulled her closer.

“He's a freaky individual, isn't he?”

“Freaky?”

“That smile never touched his eyes. He was on autopilot the whole time he was talking to us.”

“So? He could've just been disinterested.”

Algernon turned his head and glanced around, bringing his mouth closer to her ear.

“Yeah, but it stopped when we said Wade wasn't there, and he was looking at the same place the entire time.”

“Oh?” she asked.

“Yeah. And that Maxwell guy's even worse. It's like he doesn't know how to work his eyes, or something. They both act like a thug who just got asked a difficult question.”

“You're over-analyzing,” she said, “can't you just have some fun?”

He turned and looked her in the eyes.

“Okay. Alright, Mari. If you want me to let it alone, I will.”

He shrank back from her, took her hand, and spun her around.

“If you want me to ignore it, I will.”

6.

“Are you sure she's the right one?” Victor asked.

“Yes, Doctor Carver. She matches your requirements exactly. She's sedated, and I've strapped her down.

“Good. You keep everyone occupied, I'm going to the other place, and performing the operation. Give me two hours.”

“If you're certain. It's across town, and you'll be on foot.”

Victor smiled, thinly.

“If you know anything, you should know that the distance is shorter, this way. It should hardly take me thirty minutes to get there.”

Resting his hands on the gurney's push bar, he looked down at the woman, with her short black hair and tired-looking eyes. She had an odd sort of liquid beauty to her, as if she were not composed of solid matter like everything else, but a sort of fluid softness.

Maxwell stepped out of the elevator, and Victor pressed the “Down” button.

The service elevator sank into the bowels of the earth, and opened onto a concrete tunnel with bright halogen lamps every twenty yards.

He pushed her along, gradually picking up speed as the tunnel dipped ever-so-slightly. They passed beneath Grimsby and Venburg in the first five minutes.

After a distance, the whispers began, and the walls began to leak and weep.

“...not worthy...”

“...No Son of Mine...”

“...assume your place on...”

“...Open the gates, and bring forth...”

“...Unclean, I am unclean....”

“...Altar. Or platform...”

The voices of his ancestors echoed in the watery darkness.

A third of the way down, he saw the sign of the hawk, twin silhouettes painted onto the wall by Jorge Carver, shortly after these caves had been drained and reshaped into a corridor.

Shortly afterward, he came into a widening of the chamber, directly beneath the river. The doorway to the Mausoleum, where the bones of all his ancestors since Joseph Carver rested, all save his father and mother's. He stopped, and rested his right hand on the door, saying a silent Prayer to No One.

Passing it, he entered the Snake Hole, a section riddled with holes in the walls as wide as a man's thigh. Victor did not know why it was the Snake Hole He prayed he never found out.

Two-thirds of his way through the trip, he came to a door, and produced a key hanging from a thong around his neck. Unlocking it, he pushed the gurney through.

The wheels splashed in the standing water beyond, and he began the sharp ascent to the laboratory.

The last door was unlocked with a second key, also on the thong, and he entered. Charles Carver's private playground.

The smell of ozone permeated the room, and a vague blue light danced from the Apparatus that was the Altar of this temple. He pushed the gurney into its heart, looking down at the symbols he and Maxwell had painted on the ground, in the blood of a young steer that they had killed and drained, keeping it alive with electric shocks and medical attention.

He lowered the cage of wire around the apparatus, and stepped into the booth, spinning up the generators far below his feet, pulling energy directly from the heat of the Earth.

7.

Algernon and Mari had to find another place to sit after dancing for a half an hour, both felt their age aching their muscles. Their table had been coöpted by the editor of the Tribune, and Algernon had slunk away, Mari in tow.

A flushed woman sat at the table, her red dress holstering her form. She was a middle-aged Palestino woman, resembling Mari, but somewhat more advanced in years. Smiling at them when they sat, she spoke in a deep, smoky voice.

“Enjoying yourselves?” she asked, by way of a conversation opening.

“The music is good,” Algernon said, smiling toward Mari. Her face looked troubled, and her hand rested on her stomach.

“That it is,” the woman said. She looked thoughtful for a moment, and spoke again, “I know you two.”

Algernon and Mari looked at her, their faces searching.

“I think Mr. Carver mentioned you. Detectives, right?”

“I am. This is my landlord,” Algernon said.

The woman smiled.

“Fascinating. There used to be many more of your ilk around here, you know. Pinkertons, and freelancers.”

Algernon nodded.

“That's right. Not many Pinkertons, these days. My name's Algernon, this is Mari. Who are you?”

the woman continued smiling, her expression unchanging.

“Oh, you can't be interested,” she said.

Algernon raised an eyebrow, noticing, out of the corner of his eye, that Mari was watching him.

“I asked, didn't I?” he replied.

“It's an old name. People call me Astarte.”

“Star?” Algernon asked.

“Astarte. It's an old, old name. You can ask one of those Revivalists, if you want to know more.”

Algernon felt something brush against his shin.

“You know,” he said, slapping his left pocket, “I think I'm getting a phone call. Excuse me.”

Standing, he headed for the door. Passing through it, he waited to a count of twenty, and returned.

“Uh...Mari? I'm sorry to cut the evening short, but I've got to go. You don't mind do you?”

She looked at him, and he could see her face had grown paler, her eyes a little more sunken, since he'd last looked at her.

“No, that's alright. Let's go. Nice to meet you, Ms. Astarte.”

The woman looked at them, that same smile adorning her red lips.

“The pleasure is mine.”

8.

The normal cashier—Nawal? Was that her name?—had been gone from the convenience store, and a man named Larry had given Wade his cigarettes out of a clenched fist. Now, he walked back home, to read and turn in for the evening. Another day in his now-monastic existence.

This part of town, Little Masyaf, had proven dangerous in the past, but Wade had trouble shrugging off his curiosity when he heard the tearing sounds coming out of the alleyway.

In the back of his head, he could feel that mindless presence brush against his perceptions, the almighty idiot with neither body nor mind to hinder it. The thing, the pure power, would protect him, he was certain.

He walked down the alleyway, placing one foot flat on the ground before shifting his weight onto it, walking with one knee projected out before him. He moved in a footpad's crouch, with a burglar's step.

His certainty, his shield, evaporated when he saw the source of the sound. One body lay on the ground, belly-up, another body crouched over it, its back towards him.

Turning, the thing looked at him with yellow eyes and a bloody mouth. It grinned, revealing a mouth full of arrowhead shark-teeth, it raised a hand with long, dagger-like nails, or were they claws? It was hard to tell where a nail ended and a claw began.

The distinction, however, was irrelevant. Wade attempted to seize at that lunatic power that dwelled inside of him. He wanted the Arafel, that shadowing, dark cloud that cloaked him in the midst of danger.

But it did not come. The Almighty Idiot melted away as the ghoulish thing rose to a crouch and turned to shuffle towards him. It was a picture of starvation, with its belly distended outward and knife-thin limbs.

It lurched forward once, then pounced towards him, moving faster than he thought possible.

Reaching out, he seized it by the wrists. Its head snapped forward, and its jaws snapped shut, inches from his nose.

Instinct kicked in, and his muscles uncoiled. His head slammed forward, bringing the bony plate of his forehead into the bridge of its nose, causing the thing—he couldn't tell whether it was man or woman—to stagger back.

He released its right hand, keeping its left in his right.

Pulling on the arm, he shifted his weight, and brought his foot around in a half-moon arc. His heel connected with its knee, and he could hear something crunch.

It fell, and he released it.

Glancing at the fallen body, where the thing had been feeding, he saw a familiar face: the girl from the convenience store. She wore her vest, and on the tatters of it, he could see her name-tag dangling. Nawal.

Reaching into his pocket, he grabbed the switchblade Algernon had given him and snapped it open. With a growl, he fell upon the monstrous thing and stabbed it in the throat.

It reached up, and tried to stop the bleeding, but Wade kept cutting it.

He didn't stop slicing into the creature's flesh until long after it stopped moving, after its flesh began to turn to liquid and run from its bones.

Before he left the scene, he closed the dead woman's eyes, and began heading back to Unreal City, where he could wash the ghoul-thing's stink out of his skin and go to sleep.

But before he did, he dialled 911 into his phone, to report the body in the alleyway.

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