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  Neal sat on his couch, naked, with the
  remote control and a bottle of hand lotion close by.
  He kept sucking the left corner of his mustache in be-
  tween his lips, absentmindedly chewing it. He was
  watching a porno movie called Bridal Whorehouse—
  supposedly Her best. He’d seen it twice already, try-
  ing to figure out what was so special about Her. He
  hadn’t seen a damn thing—just plenty of body hair and
  chemically tanned flesh.
  Nothing to make you think you were watching a
  goddess.
  Neal wasn’t much of a skin-flick fan, but he’d
  caught himself thinking about it at work that after-
  noon—getting a little aroused, too.
  What the hell, he’d thought. I’ll just use it the way
  they meant it. Maybe that’ll do the trick.
  The best scene was next. She was in it, flushed and
  flustered, trysting with Her groom’s closest friend.
  He had to admit, She was even acting a little—bit-
  ing Her nails, looking conflicted. Neal found himself
  liking it. Everything about the scene said that She was
  a woman who didn’t want to do the wrong thing, but
  was compelled—carried away by Her own lusts. Sure
  there were tits and ass and dick, moaning and grunt-
  ing and contorted faces, but it was the story that got
  to Neal. The transgression.
  He also liked the fact that they hadn’t made an
  obvious “best man” joke. Neal’s hand moved faster
  and he stopped thinking about his facial expression,
  and then two men kicked in the door.
  “Freeze! Or I’ll—oh my God!” said the first one
  when he saw what Neal was doing. (That is, what
  Neal immediately stopped doing.) He even turned his
  head, squeezing his eyes shut.
  The second man just started laughing—big belly
  laughs. Around his snickers, he finally managed to say,
  “Drop your weapon!”
  Neal just froze, an icy sensation of shock running
  from his heart right down to his groin. Then he dou-
  bled over, trying to hide his genitals with his hands
  and body. Only after that did he notice the guns.
  Both men were large—larger than Neal, anyhow.
  The first one was kind of portly, with straight dark
  hair and thick glasses. The second man was taller,
  more muscular, with dark ginger hair. He also had a
  beard, which was mostly covered by his surgical mask.
  The first man had an identical mask. Both wore rub-
  ber gloves and raincoats as well. Pistols with silencers
  completed the picture.
  The dark-haired man walked into Neal’s trailer,
  looking around in disdain. (It wasn’t even a double-
  wide.) The larger man followed, closing the door be-
  hind him. Their movements were easy, but alert, and
  the two black barrels of their pistols never pointed
  away from Neal.
  “Uh. . . you guys mind if I . . . ?” Neal nodded to-
  wards the bedclothes wadded at the end of the couch,
  opposite the pillows he’d been leaning against.
  “Sure,” the ginger man said, but the other shook
  his head sharply.
  “No way.”
  “What? Why not?” Neal asked. A tiny part of him
  wondered if this was how a lot of people behaved at
  gunpoint.
  “For all I know, you got a gun hidden under
  there.”
  “Oh, come on!” Neal cried. The taller man guf-
  fawed, earning him a dirty look from the dark one.
  Their body language said that the shorter one was in
  charge, but that they didn’t get along. “How paranoid
  do you think I am?”
  “Not enough,” said the tall man, still snickering.
  “Profile says you’re one of them chaos freaks,”
  said the boss. “Even if there isn’t a gun there now, you
  could witch one up if I let you. I’ve seen your type
  RollBones
  Your
  
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  practically pull ’em out of thin air,” he said, and raised
  his gun slightly to make his point.
  “Well, shit, could you at least give me some un-
  derpants? Look, I’ll . . .” He almost said he’d put his
  hands up, but he didn’t really want to. “I’ll keep my
  hands right here, you can give me some pants, and
  we’ll just talk, okay?”
  “C’mon, Bob. Give the poor bastard a break,”
  said the tall one.
  Bob just grunted, then nodded, while Neal des-
  perately tried to figure out if they were going to kill
  him. If they were, why go to the trouble of covering
  their faces? But if they weren’t, why would the tall one
  call the other by name? Was “Bob” some kind of code
  name? Or was the big one just careless?
  “Top drawer in the dresser,” Neal said gratefully.
  “You get it for him,” Bob said emphatically.
  “Don’t worry, I ain’t ’fraid of no underpants,” the
  tall man said. Neal couldn’t see him grinning, but he
  could hear it in his voice.
  The corners of Bob’s mask crinkled, and when he
  spoke it sounded like he was smiling, too. “You
  haven’t looked in a bachelor’s drawer in a long time,
  have you?”
  If you want Chance for yourself, you gotta give
  yourself to Chance. No one had said it out loud; the
  phrase had just echoed through Neal’s mind. Risking
  your money or your reputation—that’s powerful. But
  how much more powerful is it to risk your life?
  Neal had been taught that risk was the basis of
  Chaos Magick. That was why, when the tall man
  opened the drawer and tossed him a pair of boxers,
  Neal lunged across the couch, grabbing the bed-
  clothes and flinging them behind him.
  “Fuck!” Bob cried, and fired. The shot was no
  louder than a finger-snap, but when the bullet hit,
  Neal felt like he’d been struck in the ribs with a
  sledgehammer. He’d been diving towards an open
  window, covered with cheap blinds and a screen that
  gave way as he crashed against it. He hit the ground
  shoulder first. There was a nauseating pain as his
  brain crashed against the side of his skull, but it was
  overwhelmed by the torrent of sharp agony from his
  bullet wound, which took his breath away and left
  him gasping. But on another level, Neal could feel
  something completely different.
  Power.
  He’d had little tastes of it before, while gambling
  away his savings, riding roller coasters, playing “chick-
  en” in a stolen car—but now he knew what it was,
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  knew how to use it, knew how to use it to stretch and
  bend reality. It was the power of magick, the power of
  chaos, and through his gasps he muttered the words,
  “Police car.”
  “Little bastard!” Bob was standing in the window,
  pointing the gun at him. They both heard the sirens at
  the same time. Bob glanced up, then looked down at
  him and pulled the trigger.
  Nothing happened.
  “Fuck!” Bob cried out in frustration, then turned
  from the window. His tall friend had already jumped
  out of the front door and was legging it towards a
  Lincoln Town Car. Neal started rolling under the trail-
  er, hoping it would shield him from more bullets.
  When he was well underneath, Neal looked back
  towards the front yard. He could see Bob’s legs pump-
  ing as the short man bolted towards the car, and he
  grinned through his agony and said the word “Pain.”
  Calling up the cop car had taken a lot out of
  him—the power was weaker, and the agony in his side
  made it hard to concentrate. He could feel the tan-
  gled strands of chance, will, and magick snarl, resist
  his pull, and he let it go. No parting shot at Bob; but
  he was alive.
  “What the hell?” he heard someone say, and he
  rolled his head around to see two pairs of blue-clad
  legs ending in comfy-looking black shoes. Cop shoes.
  “Help,” he tentatively said.
  “Good lord! Lookit all that blood!”
  Aurora’s finest, Neal thought. Then he found
  himself thinking about his mother telling him to wear
  clean underwear in case he had to go to the hospital.
  “Well, that was a balls-up,” Bob said in
  disgust, yanking off his mask and gloves. His partner—
  who was called Cage—just nodded. They drove with-
  out speaking for a moment, listening to a police band
  scanner.
  “Sounds like they don’t have a good fix on our
  car, at least,” Cage said.
  “Yeah, with a description like that they’ll never
  find us. Pull on the freeway here.”
  “Which way? East or west?”
  “Less traffic to the west. We can turn around in
  DeKalb.”
  They were silent for a while, then Bob spoke
  again.
  “Thought I had the little punk, but he must have
  put a whammy on my gun.”
  “A whammy, huh?”
  “Yeah.” Bob turned to Cage and glared. “What
  else?”
  “I thought you told me you have to work the slide
  on these guns before they shoot again. That’s why
  they’re so quiet, right?”
  “I did work the fucking slide!”
  “Really? I didn’t see you do it.”
  “Well, I did.”
  “If you say so.”
  They were silent for a little while. Then Bob
  spoke again.
  “I didn’t see you putting a cap in his ass at all.”
  “Didn’t expect him to bolt.”
  “Why the hell not? That whole underpants thing
  was a ploy. I thought so from the first.”
  “Oh Jesus, Bob, are you serious?”
  “Yes! I’m totally serious! I knew he was yanking
  our chains.”
  “Bob, the only thing he was yanking was his dick.
  We could not possibly have surprised him more than
  we did. Or was he tossing off in front of a porno
  movie in order to trick us, too?”
  Bob relaxed a little. “What a jerk.”
  Cage started snickering again. “Come on, you
  have to admit it’s kind of funny.”
  “Yeah, I guess.”
  “And those cops didn’t follow us.”
  “We lucked out.”
  More silence, then Cage asked “So where’s the
  brass?”
  “What?”
  “You know, the brass thing off the bullet you shot
  him with. The, uh, casing. If you worked the slide like
  you said, it should have been in your hand, right? I
  mean, you wouldn’t leave evidence like that behind,
  would you?”
  Bob was silent for a moment.
  “Okay, maybe I didn’t eject the fucking cartridge,”
  he said at last. “Goddamn, what a balls-up.”
  Miles away, in one of his Gold Coast
  apartments, Alex Abel stared down into the stone of
  an emerald ring. It wasn’t big or gaudy—no “Mr. T.”
  jewelry for him. A classy ring, the way only expensive
  things are classy. Alex found it very calming to look
  down into its green, cool depth.
  One of his operatives had spread the rumor that
  Abel’s emerald ring was the Ring of Solomon, giving
  
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  him dominion over the Spirits of the Air, who would
  devour the liver and kidneys of anyone who dared to
  attack him. This was, of course, utter bullshit. The
  ring was just a ring.
  The charm that would dissolve the liver and kid-
  neys of an attacker was made of failed lottery tickets,
  sandwiched between pictures of Princess Di and
  James Dean, cemented together with toad’s blood and
  the fat of a murdered man. He kept it in a sealed gold
  case, because the smell was not to be endured.
  Alex Abel was not a man to keep waiting, but
  here he was, waiting—waiting for the report of a
  southern white-trash witch who predicted the future
  by reading the serial numbers off dollar bills.
  Really, Abel didn’t mind waiting—he didn’t have a
  lot in the way of “down time” and he’d always found
  it strategically valuable to step back and reassess every
  once in a while. Running a multi-million-dollar multi-
  national corporation with multiple accounts, multiple
  investments, and multiple projects took a lot out of
  you; add to that the distractions of masterminding a
  private occult conspiracy and you got a life almost too
  full to bear. Still, it beat working on a road crew.
  The girl—really, she didn’t look any older than
  twenty—glanced up at him apologetically. “Ah’m sorry,
  Mr. Abel. Ah’ll try to hurry this up for ya.”
  He smiled. “No hurry. I’m willing to wait for
  quality.” His voice was deep, clear, and possessed of
  absolutely perfect diction. He’d spent a lot on voice
  coaches. Although he’d only admitted it to his private
  psychologist a month before he terminated services—
  that is, right after he’d stumbled across the occult un-
  derground—he’d felt more than fully repaid when, af-
  ter months of bargaining for Tower Construction over
  the phone, he’d finally gotten fed up, completed a
  hostile takeover, and only then met Dale Tower, III, in
  the flesh. Tower had never suspected that Abel was
  black, and the man’s cleft chin had dropped like . . .
  “Okay, ah’m getting something heah.” The witch
  had charts and books spread out on the table, along
  with bills from his wallet and a yellow legal pad for
  her notes. “On two of your bills, the second number
  is two, which reflects duality and conflict and corrup-
  tion. Coupled with the foah in the first position,
  which indicates stability in the past . . .”
  “Ms. McIntyre . . .”
  She looked up at him, politely dismayed. “Oh,
  yew can call me Violet,” she said.
  “Violet, then. I trust your methods. I’m only inter-
  ested in the results.”
  “Oh.” She began flipping through her notes again.
  Abel idly wondered if she’d go to bed with him. She
  was pretty, but not his type—he’d always felt a vague
  contempt for rich black men who pursued white
  women. (He’d read Frantz Fanon.) He also wondered
  if she found it weird to work for him. Probably not;
  people who could wrap their brains around magickal
  thinking were usually too abstract to get bogged down
  in social conventions. (Though there were exceptions.
  With magi, there were always exceptions.) He decid-
  ed it would be nice if she wasn’t bothered by working
  with a black man, but he’d also prefer it if she
  wouldn’t go to bed with him. It wasn’t a race thing;
  she just seemed like a nice girl, and Abel liked to be-
  lieve there were a few nice girls left.
  “All right. You remembered last tahm, when ah
  said your position of strength was threatened?”
  “By a young man.”
  “Uh huh, an initiate armed with the powers of
  chaos and destruction, but not yet their master.”
  “I remember.” Abel had compared her predictions
  with those of his tarot reader, who had told him that
  his plans would soon cross with a young man, a magi-
  cian, who would come into money—probably through a
  game of chance. The tarot reader had furthermore told
  him that this man might become his ally or his rival.
  “Ah foresee conflict between you and this man.
  He’s already overcome you—you or one of your plans.
  The big confrontation is yet to come.”
  He leaned forward. This was new.
  “There’s also a woman—a powerful woman, stand-
  ing between the two of you. He’ll pick one of you.”
  “Is the woman a magician?”
  “Ah can’t tell,” she said apologetically. “If ah had
  some of her money, maybe. These nines might lead
  one to think that she’s a so’ceress, but it could be that
  she’s deeply religious.”
  “Or both.” Abel grated his lower jaw lightly against
  his upper teeth, like he was chewing a thought. “A
  young man with the power of chaos, who’s thwarted
  my plans once and who’s interested in a religious or
  powerful woman?”
  “Uh huh. Does that sound familiar?”
  “Maybe,” he said, thinking it was definitely Neal
  Brinker.
  When Neal woke up in the hospital, it took
  him a moment to remember everything that had hap-
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  passed before a uniformed woman entered.
  “Oh, Mr. Brinker. So glad you’re awake. How are
  you feeling?”
  “Really sore, groggy, exhausted . . .”
  “That’s normal.” She started paging through the
  clipboard at the foot of his bed. “The doctor said you
  were very lucky. Apparently the bullet didn’t do much
  damage at all.”
  “I’d feel luckier if it hadn’t done any.”
  She kind of laughed, then saw something in his
  chart and frowned. “About your insurance . . .”
  “I don’t have health insurance.”
  She went a little pale when Neal said that.
  “Well, that’s something of a problem . . .”
  “Just bill me . . . I’ll pay it however I can.”
  “Yes, well . . . we’ll see what we can do. Are you
  feeling well enough to answer a few questions?”
  “Huh?”
  “There’s a police officer here who’d like to talk to
  you.”
  “Please, not just yet.”
  Her expression softened. “Of course, Mr. Brink-
  er.” She waddled away.
  Neal sat back and thought. A cop outside was
  good—for now. Good if those goons came back.
  (Thinking about the two men, he found himself blush-
  ing. He got mad at himself for being embarrassed at
  what two men who’d tried to kill him might think
  about his personal habits.) No way could he tell the
  cops the whole story, though, even if he knew it. First,
  they’d never believe his claims to be a “magician” and
  secondly, if he did persuade them, the rest of the oc-
  cult underground would be on him like red on a bab-
  boon’s butt. The one iron law followed by all schools
  of magickal study was, “Snitches get stitches.”
  He sighed. Down inside, he knew who he had to
  call, but he didn’t like it.
  He reached for the phone.
  Bob Franklin and David “Cage” Kajinski
  looked around the elevator they rode. It was the nic-
  est one either had ever been in. Bob kept wiping his
  hands on his pants and Cage’s lips kept pursing and
  relaxing, like he was rehearsing a facial expression.
  They’d been called in to see the boss. It was the
  first time for each of them.
  “Man, I’m going to be one pissed pilgrim if Abel
  thinks we dropped the ball,” Cage finally said.
  “Pipe down, fer Chrissakes. This elevator could
  be bugged, for all we know.”
  “I ain’t gonna pipe down. You are so fucking sus-
  picious it’s not even funny.”
  “I’m suspicious ’cause I’ve learned. Seen too many
  ox-eyed assholes ready to believe the best in people.
  They got cut down like you wouldn’t believe.”
  “So you think Alex Abel has his elevator bugged?
  You think he’s got nothin’ better to do than spy on
  people in his elevator? Is that it?”
  “It just pays to be careful.”
  “I’ll show you careful. Hey Abel! Only a fuckwit
  would have run when that guy ran!”
  “Shut up, you asshole!”
  “Asshole, am I?” Cage put his hand on Bob’s
  shoulder and shoved him.
  “Knock it off!”
  At that moment the elevator door opened, and a
  man was standing there facing them. The man’s fea-
  tures were anonymous, plain, flat, immobile. He
  stood a little slumped, hands at his sides.
  Bob’s flash assessment was that this guy had at
  least two guns on him and probably a knife. The scars
  on his hands and wrists said “violence” and the crude
  tattoo peeking out of his shirt collar said “jail time.”
  Cage looked at him differently, noticing how his
  muscles were developed—big, but not well-cut—like a
  plumber or an old-time boxer. Someone who uses his
  body instead of building it. He stood relaxed, his
  weight on both feet, comfortable—and ready to move
  in any direction.
  Mostly, though, both noticed the man’s eyes. Bob
  had seen eyes like that over long rap sheets rife with
  phrases like “brutal” or “execution-style” or “chilling
  lack of remorse.” As for Cage, this man’s eyes remind-
  ed him of his dad. He didn’t like it one bit.
  “Gentlemen?” The man’s voice was flat, empty of
  affect, just like his face. He gestured to his left. Wari-
  ly, Bob and Cage got off the elevator and followed
  him towards a door.
  “Mr. Abel? Robert Franklin and David Kajinski
  are here to see you.” He held the door for them. The
  soul of courtesy, but each of them stepped through
  with a feeling that Abel’s man was ready to slam the
  heavy oak door on his trailing ankle and then pound
  the hell out of him while he was limping.
  “Thank you, gentlemen.” Alex Abel looked short-
  er in real life, but he had that same nice telephone
  voice that made Cage feel like his shirt was untucked.
  “Allow me to introduce my associate, Eponymous.”
  Bob and Cage glanced back at the man from the ele-
  
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  vator, who was standing in a prime position to back-
  shoot the both of them.
  “It’s a pleasure to meet you, sir,” Bob said. Cage
  just nodded.
  “Thank you, Mr. Franklin. Now. Why don’t you
  tell me about what happened with Neal Brinker?”
  Bob cleared his throat, glanced at Cage, who
  raised his eyebrows and nodded back at him.
  “Well, sir, as instructed we approached the sus—
  that is, the subject, from a position of strength. We
  were masked, gloved, wearing raincoats as requested
  and carrying the, uh, ordnance we were issued. So.
  We’d located his residence, watched him come home
  from work, waited about a half an hour to let him re-
  lax and unwind . . .”
  “That’s when most people are most off guard,”
  Cage added. Bob glanced at him reproachfully.
  “We’d surveyed the residence beforehand and
  knew the subject was alone. The curtains were drawn,
  so we decided to proceed with caution. We kicked
  the door open—I was on point—and then, we . . . uh
  . . . well . . .”
  Alex Abel leaned in. “Yes . . . ?”
  Bob swallowed. Then Cage’s face began twitching.
  “Mr. Kajinski, do you have something to add?”
  Cage shook his head. His face was turning beet red.
  “The subject was, uh, not . . . that is, he was naked.”
  “I thought you said he was alone.”
  Cage was still battling to keep down his giggles.
  “He was alone, sir. He was masturbating.”
  At the word, the guffaws that had been torment-
  ing Cage broke free at last.
  “I’m sorry, sir, but you should have seen the look
  on his face!”
  Bob put his hand over his eyes in disgust, until he
  heard Abel laughing, too.
  “So you mean you kicked the door in expecting . . .”
  “Anything! Black magick, a machinegun emplace-
  ment, him gone . . . anything but him in there, rough-
  ing up the suspect!”
  Abel and Cage had a good laugh, which gradually
  wound down.
  “So . . . how did he get away?” Abel said at last—
  and there was nothing amused in his voice any more.
  Bob was tempted to blame the whole thing on
  Cage, but it just wasn’t his style. “We were off guard,
  sir. As you can maybe appreciate. I mean, he didn’t
  seem very threatening. We talked a little bit, and then
  he threw his bedclothes in the air and dove for the
  window.”
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  “You ‘talked a little bit’? About what?”
  “The usual kind of thing—‘who are you guys, what
  are you doing in my trailer’ . . .”
  “. . . ‘Can I put on some pants’ . . .” Cage added.
  Bob glared again.
  “. . . so while we were distracted, he jumped out
  the window. I opened fire when he jumped and hit
  him in the torso.”
  Abel nodded. “Left side, just above the floating rib.”
  Bob blinked. “Right . . . so I, uh, went to the win-
  dow to finish the job, and there was a police car com-
  ing.”
  “Mr. Kajinski, where were you while this was hap-
  pening?”
  “I was out the door. I meant to chase him down,
  but I switched when I heard the sirens. I went to start
  our car instead.”
  “So you never fired?”
  “No. Didn’t have a good shot.”
  “I see. Bob, you only shot him once?”
  Bob licked his lips.
  “Well, I tried to shoot him a second time, but the
  gun jammed.”
  “I think the guy may have put some kind of
  whammy on it,” Cage added.
  A voice rumbled up from behind the pair, star-
  tling them briefly. “Did you work the slide?” Epony-
  mous asked.
  Bob swallowed, looking over his shoulder for a
  moment. “I’m not sure, sir.” He looked back at Abel.
  “I’m sorry he got away. It won’t happen again.”
  “I’m sure it won’t.” Alex Abel stood up. “Gentle-
  men, I sent out three other teams this morning with
  similar missions—approach known area chaos magi-
  cians with messages of intimidation and attention.
  Only Neal Brinker resisted, which indicates that we’ve
  smoked out the man we wanted to find.”
  “Why were you looking?” Cage asked. Bob winced.
  “We have intelligence indicating a chaos mage
  may soon be in a position to . . . compete with us. I
  don’t like competition.”
  “But you didn’t know which one?”
  “And now I do, thanks to you gentlemen. Epony-
  mous will show you the door . . .”
  “Excuse me, sir,” Bob interjected. “But what do
  we do now?”
  Alex Abel blinked, and in a dangerously neutral
  tone said, “‘Do,’ Mr. Franklin? You go home and wait
  for further orders.”
  “You must know where he is if you’ve got his hos-
  pital records. Why not have us finish the job?”
  Abel looked at Franklin long and hard. “Finish
  the job?”
  “If this guy’s a threat, he only knows me and
  Cage. Why expose other agents to trouble when we’re
  the ones he knows? If he’s as dangerous as you say,
  anyhow.”
  “Our predictions indicate that he may be in a po-
  sition to ally with us or oppose. Do you think you can
  recruit him after putting a slug in his back?”
  “Sure,” Cage cut in. “Scared people do stupid
  things. You know he’s going to be a big deal, right?
  Does he know? If you send in the marines, he’s going
  to twig to that. If he sees the same two guys, he may
  knuckle under before he even realizes how important
  he is.”
  Able pursed his lips, ground his teeth a little. “Very
  well,” he said. “But if you can’t recruit him, kill him.”
  “You know, I knew it was you the moment
  I picked up the phone and heard, ‘Dan, can you come
  down to the hospital and see me? And oh yeah, bring
  some pants.’”
  Neal rolled his eyes. Dan had been his mentor,
  taught him everything about stealing cars and chaos
  magick, until he’d been sent to the state pen for five
  years. When Dan got out, he’d seemed a lot smaller to
  Neal. Maybe the old man had just lost his nerve (after
  all, magick based on risk was much tougher on an old
  body) or maybe the difference was Neal’s five years of
  high rolling, big risks, and big setbacks. Now he
  couldn’t look on his former idol without feeling a lit-
  tle let down.
  “How’s it going, Dan? Rolled yer bones lately?”
  “Shaddap, ya lil’ snapperhead.” For a moment, it
  was just like old times. “Whatcha tell those cops?”
  “I told ’em that these two guys came into my
  house and started yelling and shooting, so I jumped
  out the window.”
  Dan nodded. “Good to know you’re that smart,
  at least.”
  “Yeah, the bad thing is they’re thinking these guys
  may have had a case of mistaken identity, so now they
  don’t want to watch me.”
  “Neal, that’s a good thing.”
  “It ain’t all good.”
  “Yeah, I suppose.” The old man looked idly
  around the room, picked at a flake of his skin. “So,
  they got you on any good drugs?”
  
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  “Not too bad . . . you’re not trying to score, are
  you?”
  “No! I oughtta knock your block off for even sug-
  gesting! I’m just thinking money.”
  “Since when do you have to think about money?”
  “Ah, you don’ know nothin’. You get older, it’s
  harder to build a charge. Harder to find a risk you can
  do that won’t kill ya. Besides, I got some money now.”
  “Enough that you won’t risk it all on a single toss,
  huh?”
  “Yeah, that’s it, smart guy. What, you think you’ll
  never get that much? You think you’ll always be will-
  ing to put your whole stake on a hand of cards, when
  you got a couple daughters and a mortgage, huh?”
  “Man, did you ever get weighed down.”
  They were silent for a while.
  “Dan . . . who are the Hit Squads?”
  “You mean the guys who gotcha?”
  “Who else would I mean? I been hearing rumors
  for months about armed goons in raincoats, face
  masks, and rubber gloves wiping out magicians. Not
  just chaos magicians either—clockworkers, booze-
  hounds, a couple types of Satanist. I’ve heard they’re
  some new school based on fear, that they’re a secret
  government agency, that they’re agents of the Vatican
  . . . and some goofier theories than that. What gives?”
  Dan sighed. “I dunno who they are, but I know
  what they are: they’re trouble. Listen, you remember
  Simon Linnbid?”
  “The short guy? Tarot card guy? Had that,
  whatcha call it, the Magician card tattooed on his
  chest?”
  “Guy had a handmade steel tarot deck—razor-blade
  edges. I saw him cut an orange in half with one from
  twenty paces. So not a guy to mess around with.”
  “Yeah? So?”
  “So this cop named Bob Franklin whacked him.”
  “Same guy who put you in for your nickel?”
  “Very same. Officer Bob had a thing about witch-
  craft. I don’t blame him much—I heard Linnbid did
  something to his wife. Some Ten of Swords thing.”
  “Shit. So this Bob Franklin is some kind of ba-
  dass?”
  “No, the thing is he ain’t. At least not when he
  put me away. I mean, he knew his ass from his elbow,
  but he couldn’t have taken down a balls-out freak like
  Simon. Not without help.”
  Dan sat back and cleared his throat, looked
  around.
  “So I get out of the can—and let me tell you, I did
  hard time, someone got to that judge, ’cause he put
  me in fuckin’ proctology school—I hear that Officer
  Bob is dead.”
  “So some kind of superior badass killed him?”
  “I didn’t know what to think—until I hear from
  this guy and that guy that Officer Bob is still around,
  only now he’s enforcing the law ‘unofficially.’ I’ve
  seen it happen—guys go over the edge, lose what they
  love, and get a mission instead.”
  “So you think my ‘Bob’ is your Officer Bob?”
  “Thick eyeglasses, you said? And dark hair? It
  could be. I think it is.”
  “But you still haven’t told me who the Hit Squads
  are.”
  “I know they’re called the New Inquisition. That
  doesn’t make me feel too warm and fuzzy.”
  “So they’re just kacking magicians?”
  “You know as much as I do.” Dan grimaced and
  looked at his watch. “Lissen, I gotta get Gracie from
  her ballet class or her mom’s gonna squawk. I brought
  you some stuff.”
  Dan had arrived carrying a paper bag with the
  top rolled up. He glanced at the door, making sure it
  was closed, and opened it.
  Inside, wrapped in a pair of cheap khaki pants
  and a t-shirt, was a chrome .38 special revolver, a box
  of hollow-point bullets, and a long, thin strip of met-
  al—a car thief’s “slim jim.”
  “The gun’s numbers are filed off, so I could be in
  big shit if I got caught with it. I brought you the slim
  jim ’cause I figured you’re gonna need some way to
  get fired up for a while. Some way that isn’t gonna get
  you hurt.”
  “And the gun?”
  Dan sighed.
  “Look, you gambled your life once. You rolled for
  your bones and got a taste of the long juice. If you de-
  cide that’s the path you wanna take—well, here’s your
  tool.”
  Neal popped the cylinder on the revolver. Inside
  was a single bullet.
  “If you decide you wanna play some Russian rou-
  lette, that’s your thing. I just ask that you wait until
  I’m out of the hospital, all right?”
  Travelling on the elevator down from Neal’s
  floor, Dan kept looking at his watch. He thought of
  Neal as the son he never had, and he didn’t like see-
  ing the poor kid shot up and messing around with
  
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  things beyond his control. He’d almost cautioned
  Neal to play it safe, but some shred of pride had
  stopped him. He knew what Neal thought of him,
  and couldn’t stand to bear out his student’s most con-
  temptuous suspicions.
  “Not like he’d listen anyway,” he muttered to him-
  self.
  He went into the hospital garage with his hand in
  his pocket, pulling out his keys. They snagged on a
  loose thread, and he yanked hard, then dropped
  them. With a muttered “Christ,” he bent down to get
  them and that was how he happened to see Officer
  Bob and a big hairy guy come around the corner. Of-
  ficer Bob was dressed in hospital scrubs and the other
  guy had on a leather jacket and steel-toed boots.
  “I always drive because I’m the boss,” Bob was
  saying. “Now would you shut up? Our source says he
  gets his drugs around this time. Once he’s lit up, I go
  in and . . .”
  “. . . and I wait at the end of the hall, I know.
  Damn Bob, you act like I’m nine years old.”
  Dan quietly crept to the other side of a pillar.
  “No, you act like you’re nine years old. That’s
  how come I got to keep repeating everything.”
  “At least I know how to work the slide on a gun.”
  “I worked the slide already!”
  From somewhere nearby, a car sang out a cheery
  “bee-oop” as the alarm was activated. Bob and his
  tall friend immediately shut up and went into the
  hospital.
  Dan’s mind was whirling. He had to warn Neal—
  but then what? Neal was one gun, and no great shoot-
  er, plus he was injured. Dan would be in deep shit if
  he got involved in something shady, and he had to get
  Gracie . . .
  A portly black man in a grey flannel suit came
  around the corner and Dan walked right into him.
  “Oof,” Dan said as he fell back on his ass.
  “Oh my God! Are you okay?”
  “Yeah, I think so.”
  “Here, let me help you up.”
  “Naw, I can get up on my own.”
  “You want to come inside? I’m a doctor, I can
  look you over . . .”
  “No problem. It was my own damn fault.”
  “All right. I’m terribly sorry.”
  “Don’t worry about it.”
  The doctor went into the hospital, thinking he
  was lucky the guy wasn’t going to sue him.
  Dan waited a few tense seconds, then pushed a
  button on the doctor’s key chain. In the garage, a car
  went “bee-oop.”
  “Hello?”
  “Neal, listen closely. Don’t take your meds.”
  “Dan?”
  “The Hit Squad is in the building now.”
  Neal felt a cold ripple of fear. It seemed to radi-
  ate from his bullet wound.
  “Now? What the . . . what do I do, Dan?”
  “Listen closely. First, load that damn gun up.
  Then after your pill guy comes, Officer Bob is going
  to enter your room. He’s got a partner, tall guy. He’ll
  be by the elevator.”
  “Shit.”
  “They don’t know you expect them, and they
  don’t know you have a gun, Neal. They’re expecting
  you to be drugged. Is there a back door on your
  floor? Like a staircase?”
  “I don’t know.”
  “I’m calling from a black BMW. I’ll be waiting out
  front with the motor running.”
  The door opened.
  “Neal? You still there?”
  “Yeah mom, I’m fine. Lissen ma, I gotta go. My
  pill guy is here.”
  “I can’t wait too long in a stolen car.”
  “Yeah, ma, uh huh. I love you, too.”
  “Luck loves ya, baby.”
  Neal hung up, smiled at the male nurse.
  “Mom. She worries a lot.”
  The nurse grinned. “Tell her how good we’re tak-
  ing care of you.”
  “You bet I will.” As the nurse leaned in, Neal
  pulled the gun from under the covers and pointed it
  at his head.
  “Scream and I’ll kill you,” he said quietly.
  Bob padded down the hall in his comfy cop
  shoes and brand new doctor’s coat. No one gave him
  a second glance—like he was invisible. He was always
  amazed by the power of a uniform and a clipboard.
  He saw the rolling table covered with pills and water
  glasses—were they supposed to leave those unattend-
  ed? But really, none of his concern.
  He stepped into Brinker’s room and gently pulled
  the door shut behind him. There was a very short hall-
  way into the room—about three feet long, as wide as a
  
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  closet. Pity there wasn’t a lock on the door, but there
  was a bracket for his clipboard. The modified pistol—
  the silent “hush puppy” he’d shot Brinker with the
  first time—was in a holster under his belly, and the si-
  lencer was in his left pocket. His rubber gloves
  stretched and rolled as he reached for both. Eyes wide
  and ears straining, he pulled out both and screwed
  them together. Next came the surgical mask.
  Oddly, he found his attention momentarily ab-
  sorbed by a piece of roast beef stuck between two of
  his back molars. He worked it with his tongue while
  assembling his gun. Then he took a deep breath and
  stepped into the room.
  “Brinker. Don’t make me finish what I started.”
  The room faced south and was filled with the
  harsh glare of late-afternoon sunlight. Under the bed’s
  white and beige covers, a figure lay on its side, facing
  the window.
  “Brinker. Wake up.”
  Bob began to feel a prickling sensation in his
  scalp. Something was wrong here. He saw that the
  body in the bed was shaking.
  “Nothing to be scared of if you make the right
  choices.” He took a step closer, reached out for the
  covers, pulled them down to reveal a stranger in a
  nurse’s uniform.
  The door to the bathroom swung open and
  Brinker stepped out, leveling a gun at him. Bob’s re-
  flexes were faster than thought, and his own weapon
  swung up into Brinker’s face.
  “So what’s the right choice . . . Bob?”
  Now it was Bob’s turn to be scared. How did
  Brinker know about him? Where had he gotten a gun?
  “Put the gun down, first off.” He kept almost all
  the fear out of his voice.
  Brinker took a step closer and smiled. He looked
  pale and more than a little crazy.
  “Or what? You’ll shoot me?”
  “That’s right.”
  “Hear that hissing?”
  “What hissing?”
  “They have central oxygen piped in here. I
  wedged the port open with a paper clip and turned
  on the valve. One little spark and this room will go up
  like a Detroit tenement. So maybe you better put the
  gun down.”
  “Oh God!” moaned the nurse in the bed.
  “Shut up!” Bob and Neal both said it in unison.
  For a moment, the room was silent except for the
  sobs of the nurse.
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  “Okay. You don’t want to put it down. Maybe I’ll
  call the nurse,” Neal said, reaching for the button.
  “Touch it and you’re a dead man!”
  “Along with you, this asshole and the rooms on
  either side? Your conscience wanna carry that to heav-
  en?”
  “I don’t hear any hissing.”
  “I could be bluffing. I’m willing to take risks. Are
  you?”
  Bob thought about getting caught—people finding
  out he was still around, all the bad news that would
  involve. Would Abel leave him alive, a trail right to his
  door? Unlikely.
  “Okay,” Bob said in a calm voice. “I’ll put it
  down. Here’s how we’ll do this thing, all right? I’ll go
  to the other side of the bed, and you take a step away
  from the nurse button.” Neal nodded, and like careful
  dancers they acted out Bob’s words.
  “You, in the bed. Lie flat on your belly.”
  “Oh God, don’t kill me!”
  “I ain’t gonna,” Bob said irritably. “Now move!”
  The nurse complied. Neal watched with narrow
  eyes.
  “Now I put the gun down on his back and let it
  go.” Bob did so, but kept his eyes locked on Neal and
  his hand close to the gun.
  “So far so good. Now you pop open the cylinder
  on your gun.”
  “Put your hands up first.”
  “I will when you open the cylinder.”
  “No!”
  “Together then.”
  Slowly, Bob raised his hands as Neal worked the
  mechanism on the gun. When the cylinder fell out to
  the side, Bob put his hands all the way over his head.
  Both men relaxed minutely.
  “You ready to talk now, Brinker?”
  “Hell, no,” Neal said, and yanked the covers to-
  wards him. The nurse screamed, and Bob dove to the
  floor. Neal dodged towards the door, crouching, flick-
  ing the pistol closed with his right hand while picking
  up Bob’s gun with his left hand.
  Behind the bed, Bob yanked his backup gun—a
  .32 snubby—from its ankle holder and glanced up at
  the reflection in the blank TV screen. Neal was at the
  door, a gun in either hand. Bob scuttled to the foot of
  the bed and poked head and gun around the corner.
  “Freeze!” he shouted.
  Neal fired the silenced pistol. Bob ducked back as
  the glass window behind him shattered. He waited
  half a moment for the explosion Neal had promised,
  but nothing happened.
  “Fuck. He was bluffing,” he muttered as he
  lunged to his feet.
  Out in the hall, Neal yanked the pill cart in front
  of the door and sprinted towards the right. The eleva-
  tors were to the left—along with the other gunman.
  “Drop ’em, motherfucker!”
  Neal looked back and there was the second gun-
  man—only this time without gloves or mask. He was
  running towards Neal in a zig-zag pattern, holding a si-
  lenced gun with both hands.
  Neal turned and grinned. “Come on then!” He
  pointed both guns and pulled the triggers simulta-
  neously. The big man ducked behind the pill cart just
  as Bob stuck his head out the door and pulled it back
  in.
  Nothing happened from the silenced gun—had
  the safety gone on somehow?—but there was a loud
  crash from Dan’s .38, and a picture down at the end
  of the hall shattered. People started screaming, and
  Neal felt the rush of power come into him again.
  He’d dared the tall guy to shoot him, and he’d won,
  and now Fortune loved him. He turned and ran
  around the corner of the hall. Under his breath, he
  muttered the word “Distraction.”
  Cage angrily yanked the pill cart aside and lunged
  after Neal as Bob came out of the room.
  “You chase, I’ll cut him off!” Bob shouted. Cage
  made no reply but raced down the hall . . .
  . . . just as a door opened right in front of him.
  He pulled up short of flying face-first into it, then
  shoved the door—and the frightened woman behind
  it—out of his way and kept running, but by that time
  Neal was around the corner.
  Bob ran the other direction, towards the eleva-
  tors. The hospital hallway was laid out like a square,
  with the elevators on one interior wall. Neal was on
  the opposite side of the square from the elevators,
  and there were stairways in two corners. They were
  on the eleventh floor.
  He hit the button and waited for what seemed
  like hours—but he felt sure Neal would go for the
  ground floor. There were no other buildings around,
  so the roof would be a dead end, and eleven flights of
  stairs would exhaust even a man in good shape (which
  Neal probably was) who hadn’t been shot (which
  Neal certainly had).
  Neal sprinted through the door to the stairs just
  as Cage bobbed his head around the corner, then fol-
  
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  lowed. Neal slammed the door behind him, looked in
  vain for something to block it, then started down the
  stairs three at a time, glancing in terror over his shoul-
  der.
  Cage kicked the door open and stepped aside, ex-
  pecting gunfire. He was thinking that Brinker had five
  bullets left in the revolver at most, and didn’t seem to
  know how to work a hush puppy.
  “That fuckin’ slide, gets ’em every time,” he mut-
  tered as he lunged into the staircase, eyes wide, gun in
  front of him. He grinned at the steel doors and ce-
  ment walls of the stairway; now he could shoot with-
  out worrying about bystanders.
  He heard Neal’s footsteps and gasps beneath him
  and started running. He bobbed his head over the
  railing and saw Neal almost directly below. He put
  the gun down and fired—and immediately worked the
  slide. The pistol was silent, but the ricochet made a
  sound like an angry cat.
  A floor below, Neal’s body was in agony, but his
  spirit was still riding an ecstasy of probability. Calling
  an image in his mind, he said “Orderly.” Just as he
  reached the next landing, the door opened and a slim
  young woman in hospital whites entered. Her jaw
  dropped as she saw him.
  “Run down the stairs,” he said, pointing the guns.
  She screamed—but complied. He darted through the
  door.
  Cage arrived seconds later, just in time to see the
  door closing. He could hear footsteps beneath him.
  Was it a fakeout? Which way to go? He had only an
  instant to decide, and he continued down the stairs.
  Entering the hallway, Neal stuck both guns under
  his shirt and walked quickly towards the elevators. He
  could still feel the surge and throb of possibility cours-
  ing through him, just waiting for him to nudge it this
  way or twist it that way . . .
  “Elevator,” he muttered, and the door to one
  opened. He didn’t even have to push the button, be-
  cause someone was getting out, wheeling a gurney.
  Neal stepped towards the elevator, and only saw Bob
  the instant Bob saw him.
  Both men drew and dodged. Bob lunged towards
  the “door close” button—right next to the door was
  one of the few places to hide from a shooter outside
  the threshold. Neal fired, putting a hole in the back
  wall as the doors slid shut.
  “Fuck! Another elevator,” he said, pounding the
  button and staring as Bob’s elevator sank towards the
  ground floor. When the door opened, he pointed the
  guns inside and stood back. “Everyone out,” he said.
  They hurried to obey.
  Cage caught the orderly two floors down;
  she started crying when he wheeled her around by the
  shoulder.
  “Where did he go?” he demanded.
  “He got off on nine,” she wailed.
  “Damn!”
  “Don’t hurt me!”
  “It’s okay, I’m a cop,” he effortlessly lied. “Look,
  stay right here and you’ll be safe.” He bit his lip and
  started racing down the stairs again, wondering if he
  could outrun the elevator. Probably he could if it
  made a few stops, but a chaos mage could maybe stop
  that . . . five bullets left . . .
  Bob figured hospital security would be
  going crazy now that there were reports of gun-toting
  psychos on the elevators, so between floors he put his
  gun in the belly holster (an awkward fit), pulled off
  the mask, and put his gloves back in his pockets.
  On the first floor, there were security guards
  pointing pistols at him. He put on a shocked, inno-
  cent face and asked what was wrong. They breathed a
  sigh of relief and waved him out.
  He didn’t even need his clipboard.
  Stepping into the lobby, he looked around. Gawk-
  ers. That meant no shooting yet. There were three se-
  curity types watching the elevators closely. Bob casual-
  ly walked to a corner by the gift shop. He could see
  the front door, with minivans and BMWs idling out-
  side, and he could see the elevators. When the eleva-
  tor doors opened, he’d be in a position to fire—assum-
  ing a nervous security jock didn’t do the job for him.
  Cage, gasping, pushed open the last door
  and realized to his dismay that he was in the parking
  garage instead of the lobby. He turned towards the
  lobby and saw Bob watching the elevator. Something
  in his agitated, oxygen-deprived brain clicked; if Bob
  shot Neal, he’d want to get away fast. If Neal shot
  Bob, he’d want to get away fast. In either case, Cage
  would want to be present in a vehicle—to assist or pre-
  vent, as the case might be.
  He switched his gun to his left hand and reached
  for his keys.
  
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  Except for the muttering of the gaping
  spectators—Bob’s old police partner called them “bul-
  let magnets”—the lobby was silent when a slight “ping”
  announced the arrival of the elevator. Bob slid his
  hand under his shirt, and the security guards licked
  their lips with nervous anticipation as the elevator
  door slid open, revealing . . .
  . . . nothing.
  The guards looked around in confusion. Had
  someone hit the button to call the elevator? No, no
  one had.
  There were confused mutters for a moment, bro-
  ken by a loud crash from above.
  Bob spun around just in time to see a shower of
  broken glass fall outside the window, then the billow-
  ing collapse of the awning by the driveway.
  He started running towards the front door just as
  the guards realized their quarry must have gotten off
  on the second floor and gone through the window.
  “Police officer! Out of the way!” Bob shouted,
  brandishing his pistol. He fought his way through the
  crowd to the door, only to be confronted by flopping
  masses of fallen awning. He struggled through it just
  in time to see Neal limping around a black BMW. Bob
  fired. Neal looked up and fired back as Bob ducked
  behind the cover of the awning. Behind him, Bob
  heard someone scream. One of the bullet magnets.
  He looked out and saw the BMW pulling away.
  With a shout of rage he pointed his gun at the speed-
  ing car . . . gave it a lead . . . let out an easy breath . . .
  and pulled the trigger.
  The car sagged and swerved as the back tire blew
  out—but the driver regained control and fishtailed
  around a corner. Bob cursed, then heard a honking
  horn right behind him.
  “Need a lift?” Cage yelled through the window.
  Dan kept a fever grip on the wheel. The
  BMW was doing reasonably well with the blown tire,
  but he had to be careful. He took a glance at Neal in
  the passenger seat.
  “You okay, son?”
  “I think I hurt my leg, but I’m not shot.”
  “That was Officer Bob, I think. Damn good shot,
  too.”
  “Can you keep it going?”
  “Sure—but right turns are gonna be kind of a
  bitch.”
  The old man glanced at him again and grinned.
  “Guess Gracie’s gonna have to wait, huh?”
  “You crazy old bastard. I knew you wouldn’t let
  me down.”
  “Shaddap. I shouldn’t have to bail your punk ass
  out. I’m too old. Fuckin’ snapperhead.”
  They both started laughing, and then the back
  windshield shattered.
  “Damn! These guys just don’t give up!” Neal
  yanked on the seat lever and reclined it as far as it
  could go, squirming around so he could fire back-
  wards.
  “C’mon, Dan, can’t this German piece of shit out-
  run a fuckin’ K-Car?”
  “It’s a Town Car, and remember we got only
  three tires. Lemme get on a straightaway where I can
  open ’er up . . .” Dan hit a button, and the windows
  all started to roll down.
  “What are you doing?”
  “The guy I stole this from seemed pretty nice—
  might as well spare his windows.”
  Behind them, in the Lincoln, Cage was driving
  with his right hand and trying to get a good shot with
  his left. The gun recoiled and sparks flew off the
  beamer’s bumper. He pulled the trigger again, then
  pulled it back in the car.
  “Stupid slide! What good is a goddamn two-hand-
  ed gun?” He put his left hand on the wheel and
  reached inside his jacket for his regular gun.
  In the back seat, Bob was sliding from the left
  side to the right, every once in a while firing, trying to
  get a good shot at their quarry.
  “Who’s he got driving?”
  “I dunno, but he’s good.” Cage gritted his teeth,
  slammed down the accelerator and crunched into the
  black car’s back bumper. It skidded, the side with the
  flat tire swinging wide, and for a moment the cars
  were perpendicular. Neal took a shot through the
  beamer’s empty rear windshield and might have hit
  Bob if the ex-cop hadn’t been flying forward to break
  his nose on the gearshift.
  “Ow! You idiot!”
  “Get down! I have a shot!”
  In the BMW, Dan cursed, yanked the wheel, and
  gunned the engine.
  “You hit him?”
  “I missed!”
  “We gotta get on the highway.” Dan grinned, and
  he sounded a little crazy when he asked, “You ready
  to roll yer bones?”
  
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  Both men felt the prickly thrill of danger as Dan
  floored the crippled car through a red light. A chorus
  of car horns was their fanfare as they shot towards the
  highway. They were going far too fast to stop. With a
  blasted tire, anything but the slightest change of direc-
  tion would put them in a skid—probably a roll. If
  there wasn’t a gap in traffic, they were shit out of
  luck—no options.
  That’s what chaos mages mean when they say
  they’re going to roll their bones.
  Dan crowed as they muscled onto the highway.
  He felt a surge of power he hadn’t known for years.
  He reached out and grabbed the patterns of traffic—
  an amalgam of random chance, driver choice, and the
  slight modifications of civil engineers—and cracked
  them like a nine-tail whip, rearranging them to open
  up for him, giving him a straight shot away.
  “Dan? They’re still behind us!”
  “I don’t believe it!”
  Cage had been ready to say his prayers when he
  pulled off the road and rumbled across the gravel
  shoulder, then onto the highway going the wrong
  way. Bob couldn’t see a thing—his eyes were covered
  with blood from his broken nose and dim with tears
  of pain—but Cage had seen every car, heard every
  honk as he gunned it towards the median strip and
  then over it, praying they’d make it. If they got stuck
  they’d get it from both sides and there wouldn’t be
  enough left to bury in a shoebox. He winced as the
  car grated and rasped across the concrete island, and
  his head had hit the ceiling as the tires bounced over,
  but they’d made it. They were still on the trail.
  Neal sighted back at their pursuers and seized all
  the threads of potential he could grasp. He’d been tak-
  ing chances but spending his luck almost as fast, and he
  had little left to burn. He put it all on one shot at the
  tall driver, focusing everything on improving his shot,
  on honing his luck. He pulled the trigger . . .
  . . . and missed. The Lincoln’s windshield shat-
  tered and the rearview mirror fell, dropping an air
  freshener on the dashboard, but neither of the Hit
  Squad was hit. He almost wept in frustration and
  pulled the trigger again and again, blindly, before he
  heard the click of the pin on spent cartridges through
  the screaming wind.
  Bob saw Neal crouch forward and he said “He’s
  reloading! If you can ram him, do it now!”
  “I can’t! They’re too fast!”
  Both men continued firing, and Cage put the ped-
  al to the floor.
  JOHN TYNES
  
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  “Neal.” Dan said. He didn’t yell, and his voice was
  flat and calm. It got Neal’s attention more than any
  desperate shriek would have. “Only put in one bullet.”
  Neal thought he understood. He did as he was
  told and closed the gun. Spun the cylinder. Put the
  hot barrel to his head.
  “No,” Dan said, still calm and flat. “My head.”
  “Dan?”
  “Final lesson, shithead. Risking your stuff is
  strong, and risking your life is stronger . . . risking the
  life of someone you l—of a friend. That’s the stron-
  gest. And you’re upping the bet with your own life
  ’cuz I’m driving.” He, too, had the pedal down and
  the German engine was roaring full. They’d come to
  an empty stretch—cars were getting out of the way
  right and left. Their flat tire had worn through and
  they were trailing sparks. Four tires rumbling, the Lin-
  coln was gaining.
  “Let’s roll the bones,” Neal said. He put the gun
  to his friend’s head and pulled the trigger.
  Cage first saw something fly and splatter out the
  driver’s side window, like they’d dumped a bucket of
  paint. An instant later he saw the car turn left but
  keep going straight, and his foot hit the brake with a
  desperate gentleness—he couldn’t afford a locked-
  brake, four-tire blowout at 120mph.
  “Awesome shot, Bob!”
  “I didn’t do it!”
  The BMW started to roll. The doors flew open as
  it crashed over the side, into the ditch, rolling and
  tumbling.
  Cage gritted his teeth and gently slowed the car.
  Absurdly, automatically, he put on his turn signal as
  he pulled to the side. Then both men jumped out of
  the car and began pelting down the road towards the
  wreck, guns in hand.
  The BMW had landed upside down, and they ap-
  proached it with caution.
  “No one could have lived through that,” Cage
  said, but his voice wasn’t certain.
  Bob cautiously squatted, looked in the driver’s side.
  “The driver’s pulp,” he said evenly. “No sign of
  Brinker.”
  “No,” said a voice from the rows of corn beside
  the road. “I was miraculously thrown free of the
  wreck.”
  Bob stood. Cage, wide-eyed, opened fire.
  Neal was laughing as he limped right at them. Bul-
  lets raced through the corn on either side of him but
  somehow, every shot managed to miss him. The left
  side of his beard was spattered with blood, and he
  crackled with power. Cage and Bob couldn’t see it or
  smell it, but they could feel it in the way their flesh
  crawled and their hairs prickled.
  Soon, their guns were clicking on empty, and
  Neal continued his slow limp forward.
  “Out of bullets? Here, I think this is yours.” He
  tossed Bob’s silenced pistol high in the air. Somehow,
  coincidentally, the slide must have been worked dur-
  ing the wreck. Strangely, providentially, the gun went
  off when it hit the pavement. Oddly, randomly, the
  bullet’s trajectory took it through the back of Bob
  Franklin’s right thigh.
  It could have been destiny, but it was Neal Brink-
  er’s will. Bob crumpled to the ground wailing.
  “Give me your car keys,” Neal said.
  “Yeah, okay,” Cage said, making no effort to keep
  the fear out of his voice. He held out the keys, hands
  shaking.
  When Brinker was close enough, Cage took a
  swing—a lightning-fast barfighter’s punch, not a tricky
  karate move or anything; just an attempt to shove his
  fist through Brinker’s face. The fact that his fist was
  holding a heavy pistol was just icing on the cake.
  The blow was halfway between them when Brink-
  er reacted, and his reaction was the word “Pain.”
  He’d hurt people with magick before, but never
  with so much power to put behind it. All across
  Cage’s body, the skin sundered and popped—on his
  hands, his chest, in his armpits and the rims of his
  ears, across his eyelids, and on the bottoms of his feet
  he felt shock and agony as the word “Pain” was in-
  scribed through his flesh dozens of times. He reeled
  back and fell.
  Neal picked up the keys. He could have made any
  key on his ring fit the Lincoln’s ignition, but waste
  not, want not. In a daze of power and ecstasy he
  walked towards the car, a slight smile playing on his
  lips. He’d killed Dan, but he’d think about that later.
  Right now he felt good.
  The two agents of the New Inquisition groaned
  behind him as he started the car and changed the
  blinker. He looked over his shoulder and pulled onto
  the highway. He’d need some luck to avoid the cops,
  but he had more luck than most families see in a life-
  time.
  “Money,” he muttered—and his glance fell on
  something sticking in the crack of the seat, next to his
  seat-belt buckle.
  A lottery ticket.
  
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  “Pretty posh, huh?” Bob managed a thin
  smile at Cage from his wheelchair.
  “Yeah. You seen that nurse?”
  “The redhead?”
  “That’s the one. Wish I wasn’t so wrecked. I’d ask
  her out.”
  “She can give me a sponge bath any time.”
  “I think she likes the bad-boy type.” Cage’s body
  was covered with stitches and butterfly bandages. The
  doctor had been puzzled by the injuries—not cuts or
  bruises, more like the burst flesh on boils. But there
  was no swelling to account for the breakage, let alone
  the fact that the word “Pain” was spelled out repeat-
  edly. If all went well, there wouldn’t be any scars—at
  least, not legible ones.
  “Nah, chicks like that are suckers for authority fig-
  ures,” Bob said. The bullet had broken his leg, but not
  shattered it. He’d have a star-shaped scar and proba-
  bly a limp.
  “How you figure?”
  “Elementary, my dear Datsun. Where do people
  go? Where they can get what they want. What is there
  in a hospital? Lots of doctors—meaning a lot of men
  in authority. Therefore it follows, as the day the night,
  that our sexy redhead nurse wants an authoritative
  man.”
  “Like a cop for example?”
  “For example, yeah.” Both men were grinning.
  Both knew they had a snowball’s chance in hell with
  the nurse, but talking trash helped pass the time.
  Cage glanced at the clock and reached for his
  channel changer.
  “Maybe she goes for rich guys,” he said. “Private
  clinic like this, right?”
  “Yeah, so? You wanna suck up to the boss by fix-
  ing her up? I had you pegged for a lot of things, but a
  suckup was never . . .”
  “Hey, pipe down a minute!” Cage was staring,
  rapt, at the television. “Oh nine . . . eleven . . . sixty-
  seven . . .” Cage’s eyes went huge. “Shit, man! Those
  are my numbers!”
  “Huh? Come on Cage, the lottery’s just a tax on
  suckers who can’t do math.”
  “Oh yeah? Well I just won! I just hit the goddamn
  PowerBall! I won twenty-three million dollars!”
  Bob’s jaw dropped.
  “You’re shittin’ me!” he cried, but he didn’t think
  Cage was that much of an actor. The big man was sit-
  ting up, quivering with excitement, biting his lip.
  “I won! I don’t believe it!”
  “Where’s the ticket?”
  “It’s in my pants pocket, man! Get me my pants!”
  Bob wheeled over and flung Cage his jeans. The
  big man burrowed in the pockets clumsily, eagerly,
  like a kid on Christmas morning.
  “I just bought it! Maybe my wallet . . . ? No, I put
  it in my front pocket!”
  “Maybe it fell out in the closet,” Bob said, turning,
  thinking briefly about asking the nurse to bend over
  and look for it. Then Cage was silent, and Bob looked
  over and saw on his face a look of mounting dread.
  “No,” Cage said slowly. “I think it fell out in the
  car.”
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Unknown Armies [multi]/Unknown Armies [1st & 2nd ed]/Unknown Armies Roll Your Bones.pdf