Dyna stood, stretching her back until a series of snaps ran up her spine. The drive hadn’t been that long, but it had forced her to sit roughly in one position in a rather small electric car for half the day.

And she had insisted on driving. Ruby could drive, in a technical sense. Dyna wasn’t quite sure how many rules of the road she actually knew. Let her handle the high-stress situations if they came. For just a calm drive across some flat, relatively empty roads, Dyna was more than qualified.

Unless Ruby had a growth spurt on the trip over, Dyna was also the only one qualified to get them a room at the Casper Supreme Nine. Luckily, she didn’t have to pay for it from her own pocket. Walter had kindly provided a card with a few thousand dollar limit on it. She was to use it for just about every expense, from food to the motel.

His approval apparently made this an institute sanctioned mission.

“Your room key,” Dyna said, handing over a simple card bearing the inn’s logo. “Room seven.”

Ruby, slumped against the car door, looked up from her phone with an exaggerated groan. “Do you know what the population of this dump is?” she asked, wiggling the screen back and forth.

“Sign on the way in said nearly sixty thousand.”

“Yeah, well, guess nobody went out and updated it. Since the oil fields and coal mines shut down, population has dropped to half that. Walter wants us to have fun here? What are we supposed to do? Does Casper even have a movie theater?”

“I’m sure they do, but we can watch movies back home.”

“Oh great,” Ruby said, tone flat. “The one source of entertainment this hovel is likely to have and we’re not doing it?” Ruby hummed in thought. Her eyes lit up in just the sort of way that made Dyna grimace. “Hey, half those buildings we passed are probably abandoned. Do you think we could—”

“We’re not blowing up a building for fun,” Dyna said, tone flat.

“Oh come on. If not fun, then I’m sure we could get paid from the city. We’ll give them a huge discount. They’ll love us and it will count as a job. We even brought our own C4.”

“No, Ruby.” Dyna let out a long sigh. “There’s a nice river and trees everywhere. And the mountain looming over the town. Maybe we could go on a hike…”

“Eh.”

“Or rent a boat and fish.”

Ruby stared over at Dyna with narrowed eyes. “Did someone overwrite your electrochemical patterns with those of an old man?”

“How about we rent scuba gear or jet skis?” It was honestly probably a bit too cold for that. Assuming this town even had a place to rent such equipment. Dyna wasn’t too optimistic.

But Ruby actually straightened her back at that. “Really—”

“More importantly, we have a job to do here first. Remember?”

Ruby dismissed the notion with a wave of her hand. “Finding your crazy friend? That’s like an afternoon of work.” She paused, only to narrow her eyes. “Though I do have to wonder who would come here for their mental health. I see nothing in the database promoting therapists or psychologists in the area.”

“Maybe he just wants open air and nature. And less people than in California.”

“Seems like he could do better with a good doctor. What’s nature going to tell him to get him over his issues?”

Dyna raised an eyebrow. “Have you seen a therapist, Ruby? It might do you some good.”

“Unless I’m out on a mission, I have twice weekly sessions with Doctor Zaius. He’s like… okay.”

Dyna opened her mouth, about to ask just what Ruby meant by that. Was this doctor actually earning some approval from her? That was surprising. Ruby… was Ruby. The poor doctor.

Instead of commenting, however, she just nodded her head and started the car. “Good. I guess. We’re going to drive around before going into our room. Keep an eye out for anything suspicious, alternate escape routes, or…” Dyna trailed off at a hefty sniffle coming from Ruby. “Are you getting sick?”

“No. Just… so proud. You’ve grown up so quickly.” Ruby promptly wiped a very real tear away from her eyes.

Which, despite being a real tear, had to be faked. Dyna knew well just how good of an actor Ruby could be when she wanted. Sometimes she wondered if she had ever seen the actual Ruby, only to dismiss the notion as ridiculous.

Ruby was too… Ruby to fake it when she didn’t have to.

“Yeah, yeah. Just keep an eye out.”

Despite having claimed to Walter that she was in charge of the mission, Ruby had been fairly passive. At least once Dyna insisted on being the driver. After that, she had acted mostly as a child should. Namely, she took a big long nap, woke up to grumble about fast food, and then went back to sleep almost immediately after getting a hamburger.

Dyna didn’t mind in the slightest. If this were a stressful situation, she would be happy to hand over control to the more experienced Ruby. At least so long as she retained the right to veto any plans that involved explosives. But the fact was that it wasn’t stressful.

Leaving the Carroll Institute had made Dyna’s palms sweat. She had kept her head on a swivel, both checking with her mirror as well as looking about with her own eyes for any sign of Id or her crew. But nothing happened. They got out of Idaho Falls, on the road, into Wyoming, and all the way here to the city of Casper. All without encountering a single troublesome incident. And unless that changed, Dyna was happy to be in charge.

Even now, driving around what was to be their home for the next week, Dyna didn’t see anything alarming. Certainly no sign that they had been maliciously drawn out here as Walter theorized.

Maybe they would be able to have a nice relaxing week.

Then again, there was more than just one inn in the city. It could be that whoever drew her out here would be watching Matt rather than any one of a dozen inns and motels. That was assuming that this, coming out here to find him, was their intended action for Dyna to take. It was entirely possible that some idiots were sitting around in California, waiting to kidnap her there.

They’d be waiting an awfully long time.

“Anything?”

“Nothing too special,” Ruby said. “Walls are probably thin. We could knock down side walls if we need a second door for whatever reason, or the back wall for a quick exit into the alley. From there, we could—”

“Maybe… we try to avoid blowing up the motel. Especially with us inside it. It isn’t even abandoned.”

“You asked.”

“I did. I’m sorry.”

“Back to the motel? We should check out the interior as well. I’m not expecting much.”

“Me neither. But before that, I think I want to do a quick drive around town.”

“Going to be a really quick drive.”

“Yes, yes,” Dyna said. “I get it. It’s a small city. But I mostly want to check in on the address we got. ‘Case the joint,’ is the phrase, I believe.”

Ruby regarded Dyna for a long moment. “You really are all grown up, aren’t you?”

Dyna rolled her eyes. “I just want to make sure that it isn’t surrounded by suspicious people. I’ll feel a whole lot better about properly visiting later having indulged in my paranoia beforehand.”

“Understandable.”

Pulling off to the side of the road, Dyna fished out her phone and copied the address given for Matt onto the car’s computer. The GPS did its calculation and a route popped up. It was clear on the opposite side of the city, which was only a mere ten minutes away.

Following the fastest available route, Dyna quickly realized that they were not heading to the good side of town. Not in terms of danger. It wasn’t gang ridden territory or filled with supremacists. It was just… abandoned.

On the way into town, they had passed a few larger buildings that had likely been involved in the oil or mining industry. All had had dark windows and crumbling walls. But those had been… not exactly expected, but Dyna didn’t blink an eye at their presence.

Here?

There was something unnerving about driving through what had likely been a homely little suburb at one time and seeing nothing but shattered windows, planks of plywood in the windows’ place, overgrown yards, and graffiti-covered walls. More than one home looked like it had been the victim of a fire that went ignored, leaving little more than a skeletal husk of charred wooden beams in an otherwise overgrown lot.

“Your guy still lives here, right?”

“I don’t know,” Dyna said, drive slowed to a crawl as she slowly looked around at all the houses. Not a one looked lived in. A consequence of fifty percent of the population up and leaving. “The institute gave me the address. If he’s not here…”

“Could be anywhere,” Ruby said, removing a pistol from her holster. “I don’t like this.”

“I’m going to be upset if you shoot my friend.”

“Don’t get your panties in a twist. I’m not going to shoot anyone I don’t want to shoot.”

“That doesn’t make me feel better. The institute didn’t provide a picture, but from my memories and some pictures my mother sent, I do know that he had a short mop of curly blond hair. Even if other things changed, I imagine that is mostly the same.”

“Unless he shaved his head.” Ruby slowly looked over to Dyna. Her eyes roamed from the top of Dyna’s head down her back. “Or dyed his hair.”

“Obviously,” Dyna said, running a hand down her own hair. “Silver or black?” she asked.

“What?”

“I thought the silver was super cool when I first got it done. Ethereal and mysterious.”

“Uh huh.”

Dyna took her eyes off the road for just a moment, frowning at Ruby. “Wrong person to ask, I suppose.”

“I feel like someone is watching us. Get your mirror out.”

“I don’t feel anything,” Dyna said, complying with Ruby’s request anyway. “And I would appreciate if you didn’t steal the one thing that makes me special.”

“Intuition counts for a lot. No psychic powers here.”

“Right,” Dyna said as she flipped open the mirror. They were driving slow enough that she didn’t feel a need to pull over. Two perfectly normal lenses reflected her own face. She snapped it back shut. “Nothing. Is that intuition or imagination?”

Ruby let out a small, annoyed grunt. “Something’s wrong here.”

“That I can believe. I’d be surprised if this place isn’t filled with squatters. But hopefully none upset with us enough to trigger my artifact.”

“I’m not worried about squatters, but… What is it?”

A chill ran down Dyna’s spine. She immediately flipped open the mirror once again.

“One point of view. Watching from an elevated position. Window, not a roof. It’s to our—”

The very robotic voice of the car’s navigator casually piped up. “You have arrived at your destination.”

Ruby snorted, looking out the passenger window with narrowed eyes. “Your friend already hates us and we haven’t even gotten out of the car yet.”

The home was, much like most other homes in this section of town, looking rather abandoned. Nobody had tended to the yard in years and the pale yellow paint was peeling off the siding. All the windows on the ground floor had been boarded up, though the upper floor looked more or less normal. Dyna saw a curtain move as the perspective on her mirror shifted away and blanked out.

“Well… dang. I only wanted to drive by then maybe take a nap.”

“If he hates us this much already just seeing someone stop at his house, he might run.”

Dyna clicked her tongue in annoyance. “I shouldn’t have stopped. I would have just been a random car driving around. Now… Let me get my vest on.”

“He could be sneaking out the back right now. I should—”

“Not leave my sight,” Dyna grunted as she reached into the back seat and pulled on a ballistic vest. “You heard Walter.”

“Inconvenient.”

“Maybe,” Dyna said, slapping the velcro down. “Those were the conditions.”

“You ready?”

Dyna adjusted the gun on her belt, making sure it was ready to be drawn. “Let’s go. And please don’t shoot him.”

“If it is actually him. Could be whoever set this trap.”

“In that case, we should get information from them.”

Dyna could hear Ruby’s teeth grinding together, but the younger girl still nodded her head.

“I know you’re skilled enough to get this done without killing whoever is in there. I’m not. I need your help, Ruby.”

Those few words actually got Ruby to straighten her back in pride. “Don’t worry,” she said, grinning. “I’ll show you how breaking and entering goes.”

“We’re not breaking and—”

Dyna didn’t get a chance to finish. Ruby was already outside the car, scanning the neighborhood in a slow turn, looking for anything suspicious in the windows or on the rooftops. Apparently not finding anything, she waved Dyna out of the car and started heading up the flagstone path to the front door of the home.

Consulting with her mirror, black lenses but no eyes on her, Dyna stepped out and rounded the car. The entire time she moved, she kept coiled and ready to dodge bullets if any sights popped up on her mirror.

“The first thing you have to worry about with a hostile subject holed up in a house they’ve been in for a while is traps,” Ruby said as they crossed the yard.

“Like bowling balls swinging down the stairs?”

Ruby paused as her brain visibly processed the image. “I… was thinking something more like a claymore strung up to the door or a grenade tapped to the frame with a nail ready to pull its pin if the door is opened. That’s the stuff I would do.”

“Most people don’t have access to claymores or grenades. Probably.”

“But bowling balls? Where did you get that idea from?”

“Oh boy. Have I got a treat for you. Remind me to…” Dyna stopped abruptly and shook her head. “No. Wait. This is a bad idea. Forget I said anything.”

“If you’re done, we do have a job to do,” Ruby said, pointing a thumb toward the door from her position to its side, back to the wall. “Now the front door is the most likely place for traps, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find a strip of spikes in front of the larger windows. Windows make a lot of noise when breaking, so it is generally less needed to have a lethal trap there as the noise will alert you.”

“He already saw us.”

“True. And these windows are boarded up anyway. Probably harder to get into than the door.”

“Should we just knock? Maybe he’ll answer.”

Ruby, lips pressed together, stretched her arm out to the oval cutout in the door that had once had a window, but now only had a plank of plywood in its place. She tapped her knuckle three times.

On the third strike, the plywood exploded outward along with the clap of a shotgun.

Dyna sucked in a sharp breath. She had been around the other side of the door frame, out of the line of fire. Now she pressed herself up against the wall as hard as she could. She glanced at her mirror as she drew her pistol. The lenses were still blank. He didn’t have eyes on them.

“Great idea,” Ruby said, tone dripping. Two of her fingers snapped back into place with a sickening and wet crack. “Any other bright ideas?”

“No ma’am. Lenses are dark. No eyes on us. At least we know he is still in there.”

“At least,” Ruby ground out. She pulled out a thick little gun. Something Dyna had never seen before. It looked like a cross between a revolver and a flare gun. “I’m breaking down the door.”

“You’re shooting down the door? What if you hit him?”

“Shots are coming from up high,” Ruby said, pointing at the porch where a few planks of wood had turned into splinters. “Probably on the stairs. Now get down.”

Dyna didn’t argue. She slipped on some fancy ear protection, ear buds that would automatically mute themselves when a noise was too loud but let quieter sound, such as voices, through.

Ruby didn’t bother with any kind of ear protection. For better or worse, her ability let her effectively repair any damage to her body, including hearing damage, instantly. She just pressed the thick gun right up to the door and pulled the trigger.

A heavy slug went straight through deadbolt, ripping it apart along with a significant portion of the door around it. She immediately moved down to the handle and, pressing the gun against the wood between the handle and the frame, pulled the trigger again. The door creaked open simply with the force of the gun. Ruby gave it a helpful push with the flat of her foot in a hard kick.

She immediately ducked around the side of the home, just in time to avoid a scattering of buckshot.

“Matt!” Dyna called out. “I’m Dyna Graves. We went to elementary school together! We’re not here to—”

Splinters exploded around Dyna as bits of the door frame got taken away by another shot. Buckshot had better penetrating power than most people thought. Luckily, either he didn’t know that or he was deliberately not aiming directly for her, but for the side of the open door instead. Either way, Dyna ducked down and repositioned just underneath the front window, not wanting to remain where she had already revealed herself.

“Not sure he’s listening.” Ruby peered around the side, pulling back only seconds before another blast of pellets flew through where her head had been. “Pump action. No way of telling how many shells he’s got. He’s on the stair landing. It’s dark inside. Couldn’t see his hair. I can disarm him if I take a hit. Buckshot is a bitch, but I can do it.”

“Ruby… You don’t—”

“Keeping within mission parameters, and without Emerald around to think for twenty minutes inside the span of a second, this is the best I’ve got. You got a better idea?”

Dyna’s mind raced. She considered as many things as she could. From peeking their heads around the corner until he ran out of ammunition to going around back and somehow making the situation better from that side of things.

But before she could make any decision, Ruby peered around the corner. She ducked a shot again. This time, instead of pressing her back to the wall, she kicked off and charged, firing her gun twice.

“Weapon down!” she barked out. “Now!”

Their opponent answered with another blast from the shotgun.

“What the—”

Dyna grit her teeth and leaned around the corner, just in time to see a surprised Ruby let out a yelp.

A heavy ball, swinging on a long rope attached somewhere high up in the stairwell, came down and caught Ruby directly in the face despite her best attempts at ducking. Her tiny body went flying down the stairs, face visibly mangled. The ball hit what should have been the apex of its swing, only for the rope to snap. Ruby’s body hit the ground at the bottom of the stairs and the bowling ball crashed down, crushing her skull completely.

Their assailant skidded down the stairs, jumping the first few from the landing. He stopped at Ruby, aiming his gun only to turn off to the side and projectile vomit across what might have once been the living room.

He had curly hair. Long, ragged, curly hair with a matching beard. With the way it was matted down, he likely hadn’t cleaned it in at least a few weeks if not longer. Judging by the state of things, he might have been out here for months if not years.

But it was him. Matthew Quincy. The one all her friends said went clinically insane. Based on his actions over the last few minutes, Dyna could believe it. Dyna couldn’t remember him being even mildly violent as a child.

He was sick and distracted. The shotgun hung limp from a single hand.

Dyna moved around the side of the door, intending to relieve him of his weapon before he could recover.

He snapped up the shotgun far faster than Dyna expected, aiming it her center mass. He didn’t fire. Not right away. He squinted with a bit of slime running down his chin, staring at her.

“Matt,” Dyna said, trying to keep her voice soft and calm while keeping her gun arm tense. She wasn’t going to die here. She didn’t want to shoot him, but if it looked like he was going to fire… “It’s me. Dyna? Remember? We were friends with El. Went to his birthday party.”

He took a step back, eyes frantically dancing around, gaunt skin giving him a skeletal look. With every word she spoke, he took a step further away from her. Not aiming up the stairs, but rather toward the kitchen in the back of the ground floor.

“I know about the Hatman,” Dyna said before waving to the lifeless corpse of her companion. “We know about the Hatman. We can help. We can… No, Matt!”

Matt turned and swung open the sliding glass door hard enough to shatter it. Not that he cared. He rushed out, moving in a full sprint toward the chain link fence in the back. It wasn’t quite a full-height fence, allowing him to easily vault over it and continue sprinting away.

Dyna started to follow, moving into the kitchen, only to step on a small wire. She didn’t hesitate to throw herself to the floor. A nail covered plank swung down from the ceiling, propelled as if spring loaded. It would have hit her square in the chest had she not taken a dive.

“Damn it,” she hissed, slamming a fist into the ground. Their one lead, now on the run. He probably wouldn’t be back here. “Damn it.”

Picking herself up off the floor once she was sure there weren’t any other surprises attached to that string, Dyna stared out the shattered sliding door. There was no sign of him.

Teeth grinding, Dyna moved back to the entryway where Ruby remained limp on the floor. The ball had apparently maintained enough momentum to roll off her face, which really didn’t make things better. Grimacing, Dyna pressed the back of her hand up against her nose.

Ruby was alive despite her head being crushed. Dyna could see the slow movement of flesh and bone as it stitched itself back together and the gemstone in the center of her throat burned a bright red. It went slow, the knitting of flesh. Far slower than any other time Dyna had seen Ruby use her artifact. And it wasn’t pretty. Her whole frontal lobe had been caved in and the bone of her skull shattered.

Anyone else would be dead.

Moving a few steps away, Dyna pulled out her phone and checked the time before making a call.

“White oh-one-six.”

“Temp dash five-five-three-two. There’s been an incident.”