Stake-outs are the worst part of my job. I’m too easily distracted. If I do a crossword puzzle or text on my phone while sitting in the car, there’s a good chance a cheating husband walks right by me, grinning and tucking in his shirttail. Contrary to the exciting lives of television detectives, real investigations consist of a lot of sitting on your butt in a cluttered car, looking at your watch, and drinking cold coffee.
I check my watch for the hundredth time, wondering how long I should wait before calling it a night. Another unfortunate trait of cheating husbands—and wives—is they tend to do their extracurricular activities at night. While I enjoy a night out as much as the next guy, any more of this night stalking and my behind will be the same shape as the car seat.
I flip open the case folder and stare at the allegedly adulterous husband. Mr. Paraday looks like a nice guy. He could be your local banker or congressman; mid-thirties, brown hair, green eyes. Still in good shape from his twice-weekly trips to the gym near where he works as an investor.
I lift his file to examine Mrs. Paraday’s photo beneath. She’s a beauty. Pale blonde with eyes of amethyst. Tailored clothes and expensive jewelry. Funny, no matter how hot your spouse is at home, the fires always seemed brighter on the other side of the white picket fence. Mrs. Paraday came into my office, sure the lipstick on her husband’s collar wasn’t hers. There are probably a million other signs her husband is cheating, but that one convinces her. Her hefty retainer pays for trips to my favorite diner and this month’s rent.
The passenger door opens and someone slides into the seat. I almost spill my coffee. I’m sure I locked the passenger door.
“Good evening,” Mr. Paraday says. “You looked lonely over here.”
“Who? What?” I’ve never had a person I’m surveilling engage me in conversation in my car.
The man laughs. “Sorry. I’m an observant guy, always looking over my shoulder.”
“There’s been some kind of mistake.”
“Don’t worry,” Mr. Paraday says. “You’ll still get paid. She always loses me about here when she tails me, so she hired a professional.” He sticks out his hand. “I’m Andrew.”
I haven’t decided between fighting and flighting, so I sit with my mouth open and shake his hand. He looks younger than his picture. He also appears more alert and less like an investor. I’m acutely aware of my rumpled suit, spare tire, and the mustard stains on my tie.
“I’m Amos,” I say. “Amos Kelm. Sorry. I’m usually better than this.”
“No worries. She doesn’t really think I’m having an affair. She wants to know what I’m up to when I disappear at night.”
Since he’s being so forthright, I work up the courage and ask, “What are you doing at night?” He probably has a pretty girlfriend, but he might reveal something about himself if I ask.
“I’ve got a side business.” He glances at the empty street. “That’s what she wants to know about. I shouldn’t have married her for her inquisitive mind.”
I don’t know what to say. Having seen Mrs. Paraday, no one would have been attracted to her only for her mind. “Now if you’ll leave, I’ll return your wife’s retainer to her. No hard feelings.”
“Don’t take it personally,” Andrew says. “I’m sure you’re very good. Unfortunately, I can’t have any witnesses, and you’re making me late.”
“Late for wh—” A bright light flashes outside, and the man raises his fist and punches me in the mouth.
I awake the next morning to the sound of birds chirping. The interior of the car is hot. I’m drooling. Now I’m really annoyed at Mr. Paraday. Breaking into my car, punching me in the jaw. Finding him in a sordid affair would suit me fine. I rub my chin; it’s sore but nothing’s broken.
My car is a couple miles from where I’d parked. Around me are tall buildings with lots of glass. I rub my stiff neck and lick my split lip. I don’t look at myself in the mirror.
I return to my apartment, shower, and try to sleep. It’s barely noon, and I have blackout curtains, but my brain keeps replaying my conversation with Mr. Paraday. Witnesses to what? I get up and call a friend at the police department downtown.
“Hey, Les.” I try to sound friendly. “Did you lose much on the game last weekend?”
“Cut the crap, Amos. It’s nuts around here today.” There’s shouting in the background.
“What’s going on?”
“Where have you been? We had an explosion on Dixon Street during the night, and a dozen people appeared in the middle of it. No injuries and no IDs.”
“What did they say when you questioned them?” Dixon Street is where I saw the flash of light and where Mr. Paraday clocked me.
“Nothing. They’re speaking a language we can’t understand and wearing strange clothes. We’re bringing someone in from the university to try to talk to them.”
“That is weird,” I say. “Guess I need to turn on the TV.”
“Yeah,” Les replies. “You don’t know anything about it? You’re the weirdness magnet around here.”
“Innocent until proven guilty. Call me if a herd of dinosaurs shows up.” I hang up. I have a reputation for encountering the supernatural, but nine times out of ten, it’s a weird guy with fake fangs. It’s the one of ten that keeps me awake at night.
What does Mr. Paraday have to do with strange people appearing out of nowhere? Human trafficking? Refugee smuggling? No wonder his wife believes he’s up to something. I do too, but for the life of me, I can’t guess what.
I fix myself a cup of coffee and turn on the TV. The local news runs a short segment on the strangers being taken to the hospital. They are tall and blond but look like Native Americans with high cheekbones and long straight hair. They stare at the crowd and stand together as the police and paramedics lead them to waiting ambulances. From the hospital, the newscast says, they’ll be taken to police headquarters for questioning about the explosion at the abandoned Sun Bank building.
“This is strange,” I admit.
Someone knocks on the door. Grateful I’m at least in my bathrobe, I answer it, coffee cup in hand.
“Well,” Mrs. Paraday says. “What did you find?”
I clutch my robe together with my free hand. “How do you know where I live?”
She looks like a million bucks in a suit that matches the color of her hair. “I do a background check on everyone I hire. Are you going to invite me in?”
“Sure,” I say, although the place looks like the maid hadn’t been in for several years, which she hasn’t. “I’ve got your retainer around here someplace. I didn’t find out anything about your husband. He just disappeared.”
I find the envelope of money and hand it to her.
Her delicate brows dip. “You’re giving up?”
“I can keep following him, but he knows he’s being watched. He’s unlikely to do anything suspicious within camera range.”
“I thought you were better at your job.” She hands me the money back. “Keep following him for a week. Tell me everything he does.”
“Are you sure?”
“If you can’t find his girlfriend in that time, keep the retainer.”
Considering how empty my refrigerator is, I don’t refuse. I take the money and open the door. “See you in a week.”
She gives her hair a flip and bounces out of the room, leaving me with a packet of money and no idea how to continue the case. My face can’t take more smashing.
It’s easy to follow Mr. Paraday from his office that evening; he goes straight home after work. I review the photographs I’d taken the night before on Dixon Street. Lots of shadows and Mr. Paraday entering the building.
I eat a greasy burger at the diner and locate Mr. Paraday’s car. Assuming he’s home for the night, I drive to Dixon Street. Part of it is cordoned off with police tape where the strangers appeared, but I find Sun Bank where I’d seen Mr. Paraday. It’s an abandoned bank and not an apartment building. A chunk of the front wall is missing. A barricade of sawhorses blocks the entrance.
I take my camera and go for a closer look. Skirting the police tape, I search for an entrance aside from the damaged facade, but the side doors are secured by heavy chains and shiny new locks.
Stepping off the curb, I stumble. I save my camera by holding it in the air. I make sure no one saw me lose my dignity as my butt hits the pavement. Brushing myself off, my fingers come away coated with dark green algae. It glows faintly under the streetlights.
“What the—” I scramble to my feet. The slime is difficult to rub off. I follow the stream of phosphorescent material to the source. Oddly enough, the glowing material isn’t in a circular pattern. Rather, it is a series of lines. Could it be writing?
Wishing for a higher vantage point to get a better view, I snap a few pictures. I feel sick to my stomach and weak while standing within the lines. I shake my head and back away.
This isn’t getting me any closer to finding out what Mr. Paraday was doing here, so I return home to wash off the algae and see if I can determine anything from the weird markings on the street.
Hours later, cleaner and back in my faded bathrobe, I have more questions than answers. Manipulating the digital photographs of the markings on the street, I guess what they might look like from above. I end up with a large triangle and a circle at each corner. In the center of the triangle is an eye. Reminds me of the etchings on a dollar bill.
It’s after midnight, but Madame Mystic’s little storefront might still be open. She knows archaic symbols, and for a few bucks, the fortune teller may be able to tell me how the symbol connects to the strangers’ arrival.
I didn’t bother to call. Madame Mystic never answers the phone.
When I pull up outside the storefront, it’s 1 a.m. and the TAROT sign is lit. I enter without knocking. The room has the prerequisite trappings: bead curtains, candles, incense. The white-haired owner sits at a round table, a flickering globe casting dappled shadows on her lined face. Her eyes flash violet. She doesn’t smile when I close the door behind me.
“It’s late, Amos.” Madame Mystic keeps shuffling cards with her long, thin fingers.
“Do you have time to look at something?”
“If you’ve got the money, I’ve got the time.”
I take out my wallet and the photos I’d printed. I pull out a chair and sit. “Are you okay?”
She reaches for my wallet and takes out a twenty. “You can’t show me anything stranger than the things I’ve seen this week. A woman with no lifeline. An old man with a tattoo clawing its way out of his skin. Something’s going on, and I’m too low on the arcane totem pole to know what it is.”
I push the photos with the strange symbol toward her.
Her eyes barely scan them before she jumps to her feet. “What the hell? How could you show me this?”
“What is it?” I ask.
Instead of replying, she turns and heads through the bead curtain to her small apartment in the back. Within two minutes, she returns with a duffle bag and a large book. She slams the book down on the table and scoops the tarot cards and crystal ball into the bag.
“That symbol is suns dying, planets colliding, and giant cephalopods breaking out of dimensional prisons. My advice is to say good-bye to your loved ones.”
I consider running, but I wouldn’t know from what. “What does the symbol mean?”
Closing her bag, she says, “This is a book of deadly symbols. I should have burned it. But the knowledge of what’s coming may give you solace.”
I stand. “Relax, Mystic, and tell me what it means.”
She doesn’t answer. Instead, she grabs a purple shawl and walks around the table to the door. “Blow out the candles when you leave. I hope to see you again someday in a higher realm.” She slams the door behind her.
I pick up my wallet and wonder what to do next. Madame Mystic is the best at dealing with supernatural crap. What frightens a psychic so badly that she runs away when she sees lines on asphalt? I pull the leather-bound book to me. It’s heavy, covered in dark brown leather with a demonic face raised on the cover. Dark hollows for eyes rest above a hook nose and a frowning mouth. I sit and open the book.
The first few pages are with woodcut illustrations of people affected by curses and hexes. Images appear of snakes, spiders, and imps torturing men and women, usually naked and in chains. I flip past drawings of grisly warts and boils until I come to symbols of destruction. Some aren’t bad compared to the plague of locusts and rivers of blood, but I find the triangular symbol I’d photographed, the Burning Eye. I read down the page. The symbol represents an upcoming apocalypse the likes of which the four horsemen would flee.
The destruction foretold by the symbol is brought about by the Sovereign and his eleven heralds. Whenever he and his underlings arrive, annihilation occurs.
Okay, I get the picture. Mr. Paraday is possibly the Sovereign, a dimensional bad guy who thinks he rules the universe. The book doesn’t mention what the heralds are capable of, but I suspect they aren’t here to cut in line at your favorite bistro. Is there a counter-curse? I turn the page but nowhere is there a hint of how to stop the Sovereign and his henchmen.
Why me? When the fates call for someone to save the universe, I’m not on their speed dial. This is bigtime apocalypse stuff and way out of my league. Damn Madame Mystic.
I blow out the candles and head to the door.
⟦“What?”⟧ a voice asks from the gloom. ⟦“Are you going to leave me here in the dark?”⟧
I look around for a speaker but see no one.
⟦“Down here, dumbass,”⟧ comes a voice from the table.
The book smiles at me.
✱
Driving back to my apartment, I glance at the tome lying in the passenger seat. Have I lost my mind? My great aunt accosted the mailman with a colander, convinced he was a Martian. Maybe insanity runs in the family.
“This can’t be happening,” I say.
⟦“It’s a surprise for me, too.”⟧ The book’s voice is deep. ⟦“Where can we get our hands on some explosives?”⟧
“Explosives? What do you want to blow up?” I can’t believe I’m talking to an inanimate object in the middle of the night.
⟦“Madame Mystic would leave me with a guy with fewer brain cells than Xanderax the Fool. At least he had gunpowder.”⟧
I refuse to argue with a book, but I repeat my question. “What do you want to blow up?”
⟦“The eleven extensions, of course. We have to kill them before they destroy the world. You saw the symbol.”⟧
“You want to kill the eleven people who appeared on Dixon Street?”
⟦“Don’t make me repeat myself. An army with projectile weapons could do the job. The sooner we destroy them, the quicker the Sovereign leaves.”⟧
The book is more insane than I am. “No one is killing anyone. If the symbol causes the end of the world, how did someone live long enough to put it in your book?”
The book snorts. ⟦“Because I’m indestructible. Maybe you do have more brain cells than Xanderax the Fool. So, what’s the plan?”⟧
I don’t have a plan. I’ve lost my flipping mind. Someone opens a portal and lets bad things in, and a talking book is telling me it’s the end of the world. “Do you have a symbol for stopping an apocalypse?” I ask.
⟦“I’m not the Book of Benevolent Symbols, numb nuts.”⟧
“Amos,” I say. “My name is Amos.” I wrack my brain for someone who knows as much about the supernatural as Madame Mystic but can’t think of anyone. I can’t go to the police with a fairy tale. Or a talking book with its own bloodthirsty agenda.
⟦“Did you read the footnotes?”⟧ the book asks. ⟦“The bastard likes to think he’s being fair by leaving a loophole.”⟧
I haven’t seen any footnotes. “A way out? Some way to defeat the heralds?”
⟦“I’d be nodding if I could. He always gives the target world a slim chance of survival.”⟧
“You’re from another world?”
⟦“Another universe, baby. Just like Madame Mystic.”⟧
I look up at the night sky. “From a distant star?”
⟦“Did you sleep through science class? I said universe, not galaxy. All those stars are galaxies in our universe. One of zillions of universes.”⟧
I can’t comprehend it. A more personal question keeps cycling through my brain. In for a penny… “The Sovereign let me live. Am I the loophole, some kind of Chosen One?”
It laughs. ⟦“Chosen to die of fatty tissue buildup in your cardiovascular system within five years? Possibly. Save the Earth? Not without a lot of help. You’re too unimportant for him to waste time on you. Do you know any other wizards besides Madame Mystic?”⟧
“No.”
⟦“C4 it is.”⟧
I need to think without the book asking me where I keep my explosives. “Why would the Sovereign marry a woman with an inquisitive mind?”
⟦“Is this a riddle, Ambling Amos? I don’t know.”⟧
“He told me that the night he opened the portal.”
I pull over on the empty street and stop. “Madame Mystic once told me she was taken from another universe as a child, things got messed up, and there were copies of her running around.”
⟦“That’s true. I have seen others, younger and older, in her shop. One of them probably traded me for something.”⟧
“Do they all have purple eyes, Babbling Book? Mrs. Paraday has violet eyes. Is she a supernatural creature, a Madame Mystic?”
⟦“Biblio is my name, not Wikipedia. I don’t know anything about anyone named Mrs. Paraday. Would she have firearms?”⟧
If Mrs. Paraday is connected to this mess, maybe she’ll know how to solve it.
Otherwise, I’m going to need a lot of dynamite.
✱
Mrs. Paraday doesn’t look bad for being woken before sunrise. She opens the door to invite me in, her silk robe a soft pink.
“Coffee?” She turns to the kitchen. “I’ve already made a pot. Andrew left early this morning for the office. Said he had work to do.”
I imagine he did. The cops wouldn’t be able to keep the heralds in processing much longer.
“Coffee would be good.” I lay the Book of Deadly Symbols on the kitchen counter and turn it so the book can see her.
She returns with a full cup. “Black, I assume?”
I take it with lots of cream and sugar, but I don’t correct her. “That’s fine.”
“What’s this?” She points to the book. “Something to do with my husband?”
“Possibly. You’re not going to believe this—”
The book’s eyes open wide. ⟦“No, no, no! She’s too young! She’ll be no help at all.”⟧
Mrs. Paraday looks at the book and then at me. “What’s going on?”
“Biblio, what do you mean?” I ask.
⟦“The older Mystics have all the power. They don’t learn their most powerful spells until they’re over a hundred. This one can barely light a candle without a match.”⟧
“What is going on?” Mrs. Paraday asks. “How does it know I can light candles without a match?”
“It’s a long story,” I tell her about the heralds and how I suspect her husband is the Sovereign. I don’t believe it myself, but she listens.
“You mean there are other versions of me?” Mrs. Paraday asks. “How is that possible?”
⟦“Different universes,”⟧ Biblio says. ⟦“Madame Mystic seems to be in all of them. Old, young, powerful, weak.”⟧
“And Andrew married me because I might be one of them?”
“He has a sense of humor,” I say. “By having a powerful but untrained sorceress for a wife, he thinks you won’t be able to stop him.”
“I can’t believe it.” She rubs her temples. “I knew he was different but not this weird.”
She takes the book from me and flips through pages. “Is there something we can use? Droughts, turbulence, mustard gas, surfeitancy. We need to apply the symbol to Andrew to stop him, right?”
⟦“Or find some dynamite,”⟧ comes the muffled reply from Biblio. The book is open with his face against the counter.
“Wait,” I say. “Did you say surfeitancy?”
“I don’t know what that means,” she says.
“I do crosswords. Let me see that curse.” I pull the book to me and read aloud. “An overabundance of something. Requirements are the symbol and a sample of what you need to create.” The symbol is a series of overlaid triangles. Easy enough to reproduce. “Do you have a permanent marker?”
⟦“What are you going to do?”⟧ Biblo asks. ⟦“You can’t fight the end of the world by producing more of something. Just ask Noah.”⟧ He’s still muffled because I’m holding the book open, trying to memorize the symbol.
Mrs. Paraday runs from the room and returns with a large marker. The kitchen nook is sizable and I move the table to draw on the floor.
I finish and it’s not perfect, but it will have to do. Whatever I place in the empty space between triangles should be reproduced. I don’t know how many times, but I’m hoping there will be enough to destroy the Sovereign and his heralds.
⟦“What destroys a world-destroyer?”⟧ Biblio asks. ⟦“Don’t tell me you’ve had a stick of dynamite in your pocket this entire time.”⟧
I reach out my hand to Mrs. Paraday. “We have something better than dynamite. We have a Madame Mystic.”
She steps into the symbol, and the lines on the floor turn bright blue. “What’s happening?” she asks.
Lights flash outside the penthouse windows, painting the sunrise in violet and turquoise.
⟦“They’re coming,”⟧ Biblio says. Explosions sound in the distance. ⟦“Most of them are pissed.”⟧
Mrs. Paraday sways, electric sparks highlighting her hair and running up and down her robe. She turns to me and smiles. “They’re here. We should get to the police station.”
“I’ll drive.” I tuck Biblio under my arm.
“That won’t be necessary,” she says, and her eyes flash amethyst.
Biblio, I, and Mrs. Paraday—still in her silk bathrobe—stand in the parking lot of the police station. The symbol I drew comes with us and lies around us on the asphalt. Sirens are going off, and officers are yelling. But they’re hardly noticeable as small white-haired ladies float from the morning sky. Most of them are older than Mrs. Paraday. They’re wearing suits, dresses, and armor, all in purple. Doors and tunnels appear, depositing more Madame Mystics.
“What the hell have you done?” my Madame Mystic stomps up. She holds her duffle bag and gets up on her toes to shout in my face. Behind her, a Mystic wearing large purple spectacles lands and heads toward the police station with the others.
“It’s the only thing I could think of,” I say. “A surfeitancy of Mystics. There must be hundreds of you. More than enough to handle the Sovereign.”
Madame Mystic shakes her head. “Ripped from universes everywhere. Who knows what chaos your little stunt has caused.”
⟦“Hey, Mystic,”⟧ Biblio says.
“Don’t talk to me.”
“But will it work?” I ask. “Can you and your copies defeat this guy?”
“We’re not copies.” The ground shakes as explosions rip apart the police station. “We’re about to find out if we can stop one of the most powerful beings in all the universes. His minions aren’t far behind.”
She holds out her hand to Mrs. Paraday. “Get out of that thing and come with me. Amos, stay here.”
Mrs. Paraday steps out of the symbol and it vanishes. Madame Mystic and Mrs. Paraday join the dozens of other Mystics at the foot of the stairs as the Sovereign and his eleven heralds float out of the demolished building.
They pause in mid-air as if confused at the Mystics’ appearance.
The Sovereign lands. “Interesting, but it will have little impact on this world’s destruction.”
Mrs. Paraday moves to the front. “Andrew, I want a divorce.”
“Granted.” He waves his hand, and a herald’s eyes flash crimson. Beams tear up the ground and edge toward Mrs. Paraday.
Our Madame Mystic steps forward. A bubble—purple of course—encloses her and Mrs. Paraday. One of the Mystics, clad in a mechanized suit of armor, fires a weapon at the herald and blasts him backward.
Shields spring up around the Mystics as the other heralds fire eye lasers at them. The Mystics are pressed back but do not scatter.
What can I do to help? I duck behind a police car and consult Biblio. “What symbol would be deadly to the Sovereign?”
⟦“The symbol of avoiding being burned to a crisp. We need to run and hide until this is over.”⟧
The Sovereign raises his hands and blasts erupt from his palms and strike the witches. Mystics fly through the sky. One in a hat carrying a parrot umbrella hits the hood of the police car and slides onto the ground. Dusting herself off, she opens the umbrella and flies back into the fray.
“Boils, comets, centaurs,” I read the book quickly. Nothing to help us. The Mystics split apart and purple lightning strikes the heralds, but it looks like the witches are losing. Mystics lie around us, some stunned and some not moving.
But there are fewer heralds. The half-dozen remaining gather behind their master, letting him fight the Mystics.
The Sovereign smiles and raises his hands at the clump of Mystics remaining, our Madame Mystic and Mrs. Paraday among them. I run from my hiding place, unsure of what I can do to help the situation. The Sovereign is aglow with magic flames. Whatever he’s going to throw at the ladies is a big one.
“Biblio, how indestructible are you?” I pant as I run.
⟦“What are you talking about?”⟧
“I guess we’re going to see.”
I leap in front of the remaining group of Mystics, holding Biblio close to my chest. The blast, when it hits, sends fire though my muscles and bones, but the book absorbs the blast and sends it back to the Sovereign. He screams as his spell rebounds into him. He disintegrates with a scream.
The remaining heralds vanish like smoke before I pass out.
“Well,” Madame Mystic says, “that’s one approach we’ve never tried.”
“True,” another one says. “Too risky. Look how many of us were killed or injured. Some have gotten noticeably younger as they burned up their magics. It’ll take them years to regain their spells.”
I try to sit up. I’m lying on the asphalt. The sun has risen and the parking lot looks like a battlefield. EMTs are helping injured Mystics and police officers into ambulances.
“What’s happening?” I ask.
“You’re awake!” Mrs. Paraday exclaims from beside me. “How do you feel?”
“Like I’ve been electrocuted and put through a meat grinder. How are you? Where’s Biblio?”
My Madame Mystic enters my field of vision. She’s holding the burnt husk of a book. “Your little friend didn’t make it. Clever idea to sacrifice him as a shield. I didn’t know he had it in him.”
“Neither did he.” I grunt as I sit up. “What about the Sovereign? Is he gone?”
Mystic nodded. “We don’t know for how long, but he won’t be using that body for a while. Good work, Amos.”
She helps me to my feet. “Now we have to get all these Mystics healed and home again. Too many of us in one place causes a problem.”
“You’re not mad at me for calling you back?” My legs shake and Mrs. Paraday supports me.
Mystic looks at the police building, now a pile of smoking rubble, and her dead and wounded sisters. “A little. But you’ve shown us Madame Mystics can unite and save a world.”
“Let’s get you checked out,” Mrs. Paraday says. “The authorities are claiming this was a freak lightning storm.”
Madame Mystic tucks the burnt remains of Biblio in her bag.
“I’m going to miss the little pyromaniac,” I say and mean it.
She moves to help a green-skinned version find her broom.
“Are you going to be all right?” I ask Mrs. Paraday.
“As a Madame Mystic or a widow?”
“Both.”
She considers it as she helps me limp to the ambulance. “I’m looking forward to seeing what adventures I get into next.”
I’ll miss her, but I’m looking forward to taking pictures of adulterers who aren’t trying to destroy the planet.