Chapter 24

"Déjà vu," I said tightly.

"What do we do, Rick?" asked Lauren. She couldn't seem to tear her eyes away from the sparkles.

I thought a moment. "If we close the vault door, we'll never get it open again. I don't know if we need it open again, but it would be real nice to get out of here the same way we got in. Maybe we can fix the dish somehow. For now, let's stay out of the room but leave the vault door open." I paused. "Shit. The other girl. She's still—"

"I'm on it," Lisa said, heading back into the inner room.

"Stay out from under the dish!" I yelled after her. "Don't get touched by any sparkles."

"Rick?" Lauren's gesture towards the door through which Victor had just escaped made her question obvious.

"Yeah, I have to get out of here somehow and go cap his ass," I said in my best urban voice. "This is getting ridiculous." I kept a faintly joking tone in my voice but inside I was seething. If I had a chance to point a gun at Victor again I wasn't going to leave it unfired.

"Use my card."

I looked around. The speaker was Chip Keller. He still seemed disconnected, like he was sleepwalking, but he was holding his ID card and gesturing towards the card reader by the door. "Security. Opens all the doors," he said in the same slow, flat voice.

"Perfect, " I said. "And ... Chip. Do you mind if I borrow your gun?"

"My ... my..."

"Your gun, Chip. Please. Now. Hand it to me, OK?" I wanted to get him away from his gun because I had no idea how stable he was.

He started at me a moment more, and then shook his head once, not in negation, but as though he were trying to wake up. Then he unsnapped his holster and handed me another automatic, this one a Glock.

"Great. Thanks," I said. "Lauren, can you hold on to this?"

She took it, looking at me questioningly.

"We should have made some time for firearms training," I said quietly. "Do you... ?"

She shook her head. "Not really," she said. "Just point it and pull the trigger, though, right?"

"Well ... yes," I temporized. "But there's a kick, and you have to..."

"Excuse me," said Courtney. "Can I... ?" She stepped up and reached for the Glock, which Lauren surrendered willingly. She looked at me, then dropped the magazine into her free hand and worked the slide, locking it back. In the next motion, she thumbed the slide release, letting it come forward, and then slid the clip home again and racked the slide to chamber a round. She paused for a second and then dropped the magazine again, then cycled the slide and caught the elected round neatly in mid-air. She loaded it back into the magazine, slid it back in place once more, and let the slide release go, loading the pistol with a chambered round again. She then released the hammer and safed the pistol, pointing it at the floor.

I goggled at her.

"I worked at WDFN in Detroit on the overnight when I was starting out. You ever walk eight blocks in Detroit at 3 AM?"

"OK," I said. "Courtney is in charge of room defense. Do not, under any circumstances, let anyone get into those sparkles back there, OK?"

"What sparkles?" she asked.

"Those! In the room!"

She looked carefully into the otherworldly light of the sparkles, and then back at me. "Rick," she said, "I don't see what you're talking about."

Lauren piped up. "There! Look right there, over the platform!"

I remembered Victor, back in New York: Some people see the sparkle and some don't. We think it has to do with individual sensitivity to the free induction decay of the ether fabric material.

"Sorry," I said. "It's just the free induction decay. Don't worry about it." Courtney gave me a concerned look but said nothing else.

"OK," I said. "Time's a-wastin'. I'm going out after him. If he comes back here without me, and you have any chance at all, you shoot his ass dead."

"What if someone else comes?" Courtney asked.

I sighed. "Use your best judgment."

"I want to go with you." Lauren was looking at me steadily.

"No. Absolutely not. We can't—"

"I know," she said softly. "I know this is a better plan. I want to go with you; I will stay here and help keep this ready. Maybe I can find a way to call Brock. I'll be useful here, I promise. But ... I want to go with you."

I nodded. "I'll be back, don't worry." I gave her a quick smile and pulled her close. "Besides, this is true love. Do you think this happens every day?"