Last week, dear reader, Ginger Snap defeated the vile HeadHunter in a test of endurance. She did not escape unscathed, however, as the wounds on her feet can attest. Although Eldritch was unable to participate, her magic was instrumental to the first half of the fight and the defeat of the other Queens. Now, bereft of guardians, the prize awaits.

Pausing outside the door, the two girls trade apprehensive glances. Inside sits a police informant, Rabbit, with vital information on a stolen magical artifact. While defeating The Deck is a laudable goal, keeping the mystic curio out of nefarious hands might be more important-as Eldritch’s experience with Belladonna proved!

Bracing herself for a trap, Eldritch eases open the door. Seeing nothing in the room but a man trussed up like a turkey and gagged, she relaxes and walks in. Then, with a quick spell, she removes the gag.

“You’re Rabbit, right?” she asks.

The man nods, then adds in a nervous voice, “You’re the two superheroines right? The ones on the news?”

Behind Eldritch, Ginger preens. “So you’ve heard of me, have you?” she asks.

“Well,” vacillates Rabbit, “mostly just Eldritch. But I think some of the fellas in The Deck mentioned you, Ginger Snapper right?”

Underneath her mask, Ginny’s face screws up into an expression of annoyance. “Ginger Snap,” she corrects through gritted teeth.

Underneath her cowl, Eldritch shoots her an apologetic look before shrugging helplessly and turning back toward Rabbit. “Your police file says they captured you to take control of some kind of magic artifact. What is it?”

Then she starts to walk toward Rabbit and work on the chains and ropes binding him. Her dagger takes care of the ropes but the chains require a more mystic touch that she applies slowly as Rabbit begins to speak.

“You remember that fight between you and the Belladonna girl?”

Eldritch nods as she whispers out a quick incantation. Seeing her work, Rabbit continues, “Well while they were repairing the place apparently the work crew found an old altar that broke in the fighting. Inside was a blank book.” Rabbit pauses, and then adds in a grim tone, “Or so they thought until one of the guys had an accident and cut his hand with a saw. Some of the blood got on the book and all kinds of strange writing started to appear. The police got involved soon as they got word of a potentially dangerous artifact but before they got ahold of it someone else did.”

“Someone else?”

Rabbit nods before continuing, “Yes, a low life criminal who paid off one of the workers to look the other way stole it. He brought it to me hoping I could sell it to The Deck.”

“Where is it now?” interrupts Ginger Snap impatiently.

Rabbit shakes his head, then says, “Nope, not gonna tell you. You could be some crazy hallucination or something. I don’t know what insane powers are out there, so this information stays locked in my head until I meet someone I know.”

Eldritch shrugs and interjects calmly, “I can live with that. Let’s focus on getting you out of here instead, deal?”

“Deal.”

“Alright,” Ginger says as she forms a blade out of the metal in her suit and moves over to help Eldritch with the bindings.

As the pair work through the chains, Rabbit’s eyes suddenly widen and he says, “Oh shi-”

Spinning around Eldritch reaches for her dagger only to find a different one at her throat.

“Now, now,” says a smooth baritone in a lazy tone, “I would hate to get blood on my nice carpet.”

Ginger, reacting to the same warning, spins her own weapon around in a fast motion that strikes at the attacker, only to encounter shadow and darkness!

“What?!” Ginger says in surprise for an instant before she too has a dagger at her throat.

“Calm down sweet lady,” the voice says. Then, after a short pause, it adds, “You are a sweet, aren’t you?” A short chuckle later, the twin daggers vanish into dark mist and a face begins to form.

The face of a smiling black man forms out of the darkness, his white teeth gleaming against the black. With a grin, he continues to speak. “Now ladies, I’m happy to play all night but if you don’t mind I’d much rather take a moment to talk. Would that be alright?”

Cautiously, Ginger and Eldritch nod to one another. Then Eldritch says, “Alright, we can talk. Who are you?”

Spreading his shadowy-clad hands wide, the man asks, “You came into my house, and you don’t recognize me?” Then he throws back his head and says in a magnificent tone, “I run this place, I own this place, I AM this place. My name is Carver and I am the King of Spades. I run The Deck.”

Tensing up the two girls both ready their weapons, only to find the black mist forming into hands that lift up in a classic sign of surrender.

“Whoa there little momma. I’m not in the mood for war just yet,” interjects the King.

“Then what are you in the mood for?” snaps Ginger.

“A little bit of parley baby,” answers Spade with a rakish grin. “You’ve got something I want, and I’ve got something you want. So let’s make a deal.”

“What on Earth could you have that we would possibly want?” Ginger cuts back waspishly.

The playfulness vanishing from his voice, Carver replies in an iron tone, “How about your lives?” Then he smiles again and says with a laugh, “Just kidding baby doll. I would never do anything to mess up those fine features of yours.” Carver pauses and deliberately runs his eyes up and down Ginger’s suit before continuing with, “See, I know you heroic types think all criminals are the same but you gotta understand that I’m not half bad as the rest.”

“What do you mean?” Eldritch interrupts.

Raising his hands, Carver answers, “Whoa there, slow down now. I’m getting there darling. See, you got two types of criminals in the world. Some people are like that bad momma we had a hot minute ago, Becca. Those are the crazies who just wanna see some bodies drop. Then you got people like me. I got a code. I got honor.” The shadows twirl and form into a sharply dressed black man with a military cut to his black hair. Spreading his corporeal arms wide, Spade says, “I got priorities, and one of those priorities is keeping the other kind of criminal out of my city. It’s bad for business.”

“If that’s how you feel, how come you have something like HeadHunter working for you?” Ginger says as she crosses her arms in disagreement.

“Well the poor girl had nowhere else to go!” replies Spade in an innocent tone. “Besides, I do have to defend myself somehow, why you wouldn’t believe the number of heroes this city’s seen over the past few months.” Spade chuckles at his joke before adding, “And if you’re gonna need a gun for self-defense, you might as well make sure it’s in a safe when you aren’t using it, which is exactly what I did with my darling queen until you came along.”

“Right,” replies Eldritch sarcastically, “because playing host to a murdering beast like that is just good business planning.”

“Don’t hate the player baby, hate the game,” Carver answers with a slick smile. Then he claps his hands together and adds, “Now then, shall we negotiate?”

“Over what?” asks Ginger in an annoyed tone, “You still haven’t told us what you want.”

Waving her concerns away, Carver pulls a table from the corner of the room and takes a seat. He then steeples his fingers and fixes his gaze on Eldritch and says in a deep voice full of authority, “You need to cut loose those magical bindings on the queens.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because if you don’t the police will collect them. And if the police take them into custody I’ll have to break them out. If I have to break them out…” Carver forms a black knife and runs it along his throat in a suggestive fashion.

Ginger snorts and interjects, “Puh-leaze. The police are equipped to handle people like you.”

“Baby, nobody is equipped to handle me,” Carver cuts back with a jaunty smile. Then he sobers up and continues to speak without mirth. “Your faith in the pigs, however misplaced, means I’ll have to appeal to a different kind of empathy huh? Well no need to sweat love, I can dig it. I never really expected you to give me the girls back but you can’t blame a brother for trying now can you?”

Carver pauses as if waiting for an answer before chuckling lightly and shrugging. Then he says, “Well here’s the rub little darlings. I can’t let you take the book, and I can’t let Rabbit here sell it to anyone else.”

Frowning, Ginger starts to say, “He wouldn’t he’s-” and then, realizing the King must not know Rabbit is an informant for the police, she stops.

“Oh I think he would,” the King of Spades retorts, waving his dagger in Rabbit’s direction. “I know snitches when I see em, and that boy is a snitch. A cop puts him behind bars and offers freedom in exchange for the book he’ll take it without a second look.”

“What if we promised not to use the book, just keep it safe?” asks Eldritch slowly, her head cocked slightly to the side as if listening to something the others cannot hear.

“I told you,” Spade replies, “I like a certain class of criminal in my city, and that book not the kind of thing my kind of bad uses. It’s something worse,” his tone darkens as he visibly shudders, “something like Becca.”

“Both of us already have powers, we wouldn’t use it so you wouldn’t need to worry if we take it,” interjects Eldritch hurriedly.

Turning to face Rabbit, Carver smiles wide and says, “I got a better idea. The best way to deal with a snitch is to shut it up for good. I carve this little hare here into pieces and nobody will know where the book is, then it’ll be gone and none of us have to trust each other.”

“NO!” shouts Ginger with a scowl, “we won’t let you kill an innocent man just to keep a secret.”

Fixing her with a patronizing look, Carver replies, “I’ve seen a lot worse in the name of the greater good. Hell I’ve done a lot worse for the greater good.”

“Ha!” Ginger cuts back, “as if! You’re a thug, not a hero.”

“But I used to be, I was one of the good guys for a long time honey. The only thing it got me was an all-expenses paid trip to Germany and a front row ticket to watch what somebody like Ash does to the people in his way.”

Cowed, Ginger sits back in her chair. Visibly deflated, she says in a stubborn tone, “I don’t believe you.”

Carver shrugs, little wisps of black flicking off his shoulders as he does. “It’s no skin off my back if you don’t.” Then he turns to face Eldritch and says with a smile, “But you can ask your buddy Beacon next time he’s in town if he recognizes the name Carver, and he’ll tell you all about me.”

Carver then leans back, glancing up at the celling before saying, “But it ain’t nothing but a thang momma, past is in the past and if I get my way it’ll stay there. Cause the kind of thing that book of Rabbit’s makes is another Ash, and I know neither of us wants that. So what’s it gone be? The last one of these psychos got hands on a magic book they tore up a school. You willing to let that happen again?”

“That’s not fair,” interjects Eldritch. “Belladonna was just as much a victim as the people she hurt.”

“Don’t change the facts,” Carver shoots right back, “she hurt a lot of people. The truth is these books are bad business. What are you gone say when the next school is an elementary and you aren’t quite so quick to arrive? What will you tell the parents when it’s the little kids lying face down in the gutter?”

A difficult question indeed, dear reader! Do the girls have an answer? Will this careful impasse turn far more deadly in a few moments? Find out next week in… “We’re All Mad Here!”