Joe narrowed his eyes on me. "What did you say to the girl?"

"What can I do, Zondorae?" I asked, spreading my hands wide, palms up like I was harmless.

We both knew I wasn't. Maybe at one time I'd been, but no more. Life had taught me that.

And death.

"Yes, Caleb... what can you do?" he chuckled, his arrogance forcing his agreement. Turning away I hid a smile that Gramps caught.

He lifted the side of his swollen lip. "That's my boy," he whispered.

I grinned suddenly and Parker nodded. He knew more than he was letting on. But, I knew that somehow, this whole thing had been predestined. That I had to just do whatever seemed right.

Pretty easy, that's just the way I rolled.

My eyes fixed on the Null, Jabez. He'd be the first to go. Without the dead, I didn't have any chance. None.

The auctioneer came to stand by the girls. He gripped the sides of a makeshift podium and slammed a gavel against the surface. The girls jumped. Tiff cringed. Randi had started to become more awake, the sedative wearing off. That was gonna be critical. We weren't escaping this mess without her.

"Do I have the first bid?" a man from the mass of fragment asked, standing head and shoulders above the others. As I studied him, I noted he looked vaguely like the guys of the Band.

I looked at Jade again, clenching my eyes shut then opening them, little more than a long blink of agony. I could feel the hands of the fragment hanging on to my arms. I was stuck. But not for long.

A chorus of voices rose from the crowd and then the question I'd been dreading was asked.

"How much for the untried?" Their eyes roamed our girls hungrily. But one girl had caught his eye and he approached the platform. He was big and tall, my height, his chin coming to the platform's edge.

I tensed and Sophie gazed at me with naked fear in her face. Hang on, my face said, hang on.

"Stay back," a fragment guard growled from the corner of the platform. The male's eyes flicked over the bare wood then back to the girl he had his eyes on.

I clenched my eyes again so I could expunge the image of him looking at her.

At Jade.

I couldn't wait another second. Who I was rebelled against everything that I could see, hear, touch... feel.

It was like food poisoning but worse.

Circumstance poisoning. And I had the cure.

When I opened my eyes they locked onto Sophie and I screamed in a focused yell, "Now!"

Joe Zondorae jerked his head in my direction and Parker threw the vial with the partial antidote in it. It spun toward me in a lazy arc, catching the sun as it did, the amber-colored liquid sloshing as it approached.

I could hear the brothers screaming as my peripheral vision caught Parker jerking his fist in accomplishment, a look of fierce joy on his face.

It wasn't going to make it in time! I flung myself outward, startling the fragment guards that had loosened their clasp on my shoulders. I grabbed it in midair and was gone before I fell.

*

I hit the planks of the platform, Sophie having torn me through realm and deposited me in a neat pile, fifteen meters from where I'd just been standing. I stood up and realized I had two seconds to execute The Plan.

I jammed the vial in my pocket and stabbed out my hand with all the precision I'd been taught, my training in judo as automatic as breathing.

I aimed for the back of Jabez the Null's head and he went down, slumping forward, boneless and unconscious.

The fragment came for me, leaping up the sides of the platform, taking the steps three at a time. I saw Sophie was still in realm, hanging limply against the bindings, having sacrificed her travel to get me the necessary distance to where I stood now.

Over the unconscious body of Jabez the Null who could no longer derail my power.

The fragment swooped in and I lurched forward as I bellowed a call to the dead that rippled like a shouted plea underneath still water.

A tidal wave of death responded.

The ground rippled underneath the platform, the wood undulating like a poked snake.

Hands broke through the wood and sought who came for me.

The first break of the day. The dumbass fragment had built their stage of illegal trade on top of an old burial site.

A grin of pure malice stole over my face as the first of them came through.

The Red Men.

I knew it was the most unpolitically correct thought but I let it take form anyway: I loved the Indians.

Fully armed and ready to do battle for me.

Then Howie said the one word that made everything halt.

"Stop!" he roared at me and I stood stockstill, the death energy choking me like a silken noose, not fully eclipsed in its command. I stood while the fragment made their way between zombies held in thrall by my unfinished directive. My paralyzed eyes held frozen in my skull.

But his command had been for me and me alone. It was unshakable.

Unbreakable.

Fear and misery seized me. To have come this far to saving the whole thing... to be stopped by dumbass Frazier.

Jonesy came up and clocked Frazier in the back of the head with a rock the size of his fist.

"Hot damn! That felt great!" he screamed and ran as the fragment poured after him.

Jonesy could run like the wind.

Parker met my eyes. He opened his mouth and breathed out toward my zombies. "Live," he said quietly, his soft utterance caused their eyes to fill out in their heads like plump grapes that were once raisins.

Purpose and intent stood where nothingness had been a moment before.

Frazier was unconscious and I was back in business.

The brothers backed up but I looked at the Red Man that was closest. I was definitely a follow-through kinda guy.

And I knew the Indians were.

"Get them," I said.

He didn't ask who but flew toward the brothers, his weapons ready, the war cry shrill, shattering the silence as the birds left their roost from the safety of the nearby trees.

A call so unnatural it scared every living animal that was close. Even the bugs moved through the grass like slow-moving brackish water, weaving between the grass turned green by late summer.

CHAPTER 21

I ran after the Chief of the Red Men before he split the skull of the brothers.

It was one of the hardest restraints I'd ever imposed on myself. I was almost proud.

Of course, there was the small detail of blood collection. That old expression that Gramps used, you can't get blood out of a turnip. Well, I was going to apply it here.

You can't get blood outta a corpse either.

Subdue, I thought at him in a hard command through our conduit of death. He staggered a step as he neared them, then regained his balance, moving forward again he twirled the tomahawk held fast in his muscular grip, the blade glinting as it spun. He never hesitated, bringing the blunt end down with smooth precision on Joe's head, a light skull tap.

He made a surprised "O" with his mouth and slumped. The Indian caught him and rolled him with finesse as additional warriors surged forward, clamping on to Gary's arms, they dragged him to the ground.

I watched as an especially enthusiastic Indian began to pound his face into the fragrant earth.

Probably trying to get to those brains, I thought. The first real smile of the day touched my lips briefly, then disappeared as I spoke to the Enthusiast, "No head-banging."

I saw Clyde wading into a small knot of fragment that had surrounded the guys and he said, with characteristic Clyde Charm, "Cease and desist, vermin, or it shall be your last thought."

They didn't know Clyde was dead, they just thought he was a smart ass.

They were right, in his way, Clyde was The Smartest Ass.

But he was also quite dead. Strong, vital, lightning fast... and without mercy in the right circumstance.

That circumstance was now.

Alex saw him move through them like a tsunami finding its perfect island to ravage. He followed suit and between the two of them, they delivered the pounding of the century to men that deserved it.

The Js sprinted to the platform as the foreign fragment, a riot in mind, went to loot the girls from underneath the domestic fragment's nose. They ignored the threat of the Indians.

Bad move. I watched as they came to realize the error of their ways, the Indians began to latch onto the clothing of each fragment that came, pitching them into each other, trees, whatever was standing.

In the end, with what seemed like hours but was really minutes, nothing was standing.

They turned their eyes to mine as Jabez the Null began to stir.

I turned a frantic look at him, realizing his consciousness would start the whole ugly ball rolling down the mountain of shit again.

As his eyes found mine he opened his mouth to speak and the Chief grabbed the back of his head by hair that was fashionably long by this world's standards.

He scalped him where he lay. The hair tore away like a stubborn velcro strip, the baldness of his scalp stood like a poached egg, white for the moment, filling in with red as I watched.

Chief met my eyes and seeing no dissent, ran the small blade he had in his free hand, the tendons and muscles flexed like tight cords swiping along the flesh of the throat of Jabez.

Severing his vocal cords.

He wouldn't be shutting down the dead any time soon.

Or ever.

*

Gary Zondorae was bellowing at the Indians that held him as I moved slowly toward him and I took note of the Js untying the girls. Finally frustrated, John used one of the tomahawks to cut the ties at the girls' feet. Mia's eyes widened at this but once she was free, Bry was there and they fell into each others arms. He stroked her dark honey-colored hair while she sobbed in relief.

Hated the hospitality here, I had to say.

I moved between fragment that backed away as I came. They knew what I was now, what I'd called. My eyes met Parker's and I jerked the vial and the collector out of my filthy jeans, the metal button long gone.

Gary saw them in my hand and smiled. "You can't undo what we've accomplished here."

I shook my head. "You're right. But I can save my friends, and I'm not done by half... with what I plan to do."

Parker smiled, nodding. Zondorae looked at him. "He's not some messiah, Parker."

Jeffrey Parker shook his head. "We don't need one. He is the one that wanted to do the right thing, could do it. You're done here. And you're done there as well."

We both knew that he was talking about my world.

This world.

They had paranormals now too. The future uncertain. But what I could change for the future, I would.

As the Indians held Gary, who wouldn't stop screaming, the Indian who was closest raised the blunt hilt of his small dagger and Gary shut his mouth.

I pierced the collector into his skin, twisting it as I did. He flinched and I watched the opaque collector, the size of the now-defunct fifty cent pieces, fill with wine-colored blood. Hitting the air it looked red, but without oxygen it ran blue in the veins.

See, I hadn't totally flunked Biology.

His eyes bulged as Parker extracted an eye dropper type gizmo and we mixed his blood with the antidote.

It was disgusting but necessary.

I went to Jade who was thrashing in Brett's grip, his face a tight mask of pain. She saw me come and started screaming for me to get away.

My stride faltered but then I took a deep breath and kept coming. I reminded myself that I'd get my girl back when she had the antidote inside of her.

Brett met my eyes. "Does this mean she's going back to you, Hart?"

"Does that matter?" I yelled. "Look at her!" I said, flinging my hand at Jade.

Parker came forward. "Do it, Caleb, before it's too late."

I placed the stopper at the ground, close to my body like it was worth a billion bucks.

As I gazed into her face, I knew it was worth that.

I held her still, her eyes wide with irrational fear, seeing and hearing things only she could.

A face I'd held with passion, with care.

With love.

A face I now held in a crushing grip she couldn't escape. I pressed against the side of her jaw and as tears streamed down her cheeks Parker moved in and pinched her nose, her mouth popped open and her tongue rose to the roof of her mouth to scream.

A glittering jewel-like amber drop hung suspended above those lips I'd kissed. Tremulously it held, then with exquisite slowness it fell, landing right underneath her tongue.

I let go of her face, her accusing eyes locking on me, the stare one I'd hoped never to see.

Hate and revulsion shone in that gaze. I closed my eyes against it, standing and turning as I moved away to give the drop to my infected friends, leaving Jade in the arms of Brett.

For now.

*

"I do wish to depart this world of ill repute," Clyde said in his matter-of-fact way, folding his arms across a suit that had to be the-seven-shades-of-hell-hot. Bobbi Gale linked her arm through his and grinned at his summation of the wonderful parallel world.