Smoke and Shadows (21 page)

“Seven.”

“What?”

“I counted seven shadows.”

“Fine. Whatever. Seven. I'll take them out myself.” He spun on his heel, the rubber screaming against the floor, and headed for the stairs. “I don't need you.”

“Good. Because I have no intention of watching another world die.”

Anger carried him to the top of the stairs, then, hand on the latch, he paused. And turned. He couldn't see the desk, couldn't tell if Arra was still standing where he'd left her but, to borrow a phrase he'd heard too damned many times in the last few minutes, it didn't matter. She could hear him. “What about your cats?”

“What?”

“Your cats. They'll die, too.”

“Grow up, Tony. They're cats.”

“And you took responsibility for their lives.”

As he closed the basement door behind him, he thought he heard her say, “What's two more?” but the words were so quiet and weighted with sorrow, he couldn't be sure.

‘Tony, what the hell are you doing?”

It wasn't quite a scream. The complicated patterns of light and darkness that came with television lighting had been scraping at his nerves. Shadows that were nothing more than patches of blocked light kept moving, changing shape, and disappearing. Crawling out from under the worktable, Tony switched off the beam of the strongest flashlight he'd been able to find and twisted around until he could stare up at Adam. “I thought I saw . . .” A quick glance to either side, an obvious check for eavesdroppers, and a lowering of his voice. “. . . a rat.”

“Jesus.”

“Yeah, well I thought that while I wasn't needed for other stuff, I should have a look and see if I could find droppings and shit.”

“Droppings are shit.”

“Right.”

The 1AD waited a moment then sighed. “And?”

“And what?”

“And did you find any?”

“Not yet, but this place has a billion nooks and crannies.”

“Yeah, it's a regular English muffin.”

“What?”

“Nothing. Forget it. And keep looking. The last thing we need is to be part of
another
remake of
Willard
.”

Official sanction—of a sort—didn't help. By the end of the afternoon, he'd found a dozen pens, a radio, three scripts for two different shows, a rather disturbing number of condom wrappers, and some rodent droppings, but no minions of the Shadowlord.

Seven shadows.

Twenty to thirty people on the soundstage. But not him, or Lee, or Arra. And why not Lee? Because he'd already been taken over and therefore pumped dry of all relevant information? Why not; that theory made as much sense as any of this did. So say, twenty-five minimum. Unless . . . was that why Arra was leaving? Because she was controlled by shadow? Possible, but not likely. After yesterday's adventure in Lee's dressing room, he was about 99% certain that he'd be able to spot the shadow-controlled; so, no easy excuses for the wizard. She was leaving because she was a . . .

“Tony.”

Still not quite a scream but getting closer.

Peter frowned. “Are you all right?”

Any one of the twenty-five could have been taken over by shadow. Peter's looked to be attached to his heels, but they were sneaky. Tricky. “Just a little jumpy.”

“Well, don't be. I get enough overemoting from the actors.” His smile suggested a shared joke. Tony tried to respond and didn't quite manage. “Anyway, good job on the rat thing. Those little bastards can do more damage than a touring fan club. Which reminds me; there'll be one through on Monday. One of Mason's, I think. So, on your way out, tell someone in the office to order some poison.”

“For the fans?”

“Don't tempt me.”

“Not poison. The rats eat poison, then they die in the walls or under a piece of equipment and the whole place stinks more than it usually does. We need traps. And not the sticky traps either because then you've just got a scared, pissed-off rat with his feet stuck to a giant roach motel, I mean it's got to be embarrassing for them. We need the kind of traps that . . .” Amy brought the side of her right hand down on the palm of her left.

Tony jumped.

“Are you all right? Because you're looking a little spooked.”

“Rat traps. You know, things dying,” he continued when she frowned. Amy had been in the soundstage for lunch. He leaned around her desk trying to get a look at her shadow.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“I just . . . nothing. I thought I saw something fall. Off your desk.”

Eyes rolled between dark green lashes. “It had better not be the damned highlighter again. I spend half my life crawling around after it.” Holding a fall of cranberry hair back with one hand, she shoved her chair out from the desk and bent down. Her shadow went with her.

Not Amy, then.

Not unless this lot was cleverer than yesterday's and were lying low until they got away from the people who might identify them. The person. Him. How was he supposed to follow twenty-five people.
No, stupid, you don't need to. You just need to be back here at 11:15 tonight to take them out. One zap of the lamp. A bright idea that'll shed a little light on the matter. Ha! Take that, Shadowlord. We laugh at your darkness!

“Yo! Earth to Tony! Is there like a laser site aimed at my forehead or something because you've been staring at that same spot for a truly uncomfortable amount of time?”

“What?” He blinked and focused on Amy's face. “Sorry. I was thinking.”

“It looked painful.”

“You'd be surprised.”
Oh, man, I'm going to need gallons of that potion.

“What about?”

He dragged his focus back into the production office and away from the thought of trying to get half a liter of warm, green, sparkly vodka down the throats of seven semiconscious people. Next thing to impossible even with Henry's help. “What was I thinking about?”

Amy snorted. “Duh. Are you dehydrated or something because . . .” She spun her chair around and glared at Veronica, seated at the office's third desk, receiver under her ear and an expression of near panic on her pale face. “Are you going to get that?”

The office PA's eyes widened and “near panic” inched closer to losing the word “near.” “I'm already talking to three people, well one person and two on hold, and Barbara wanted me to go through last week's files to find an invoice from Everett and Ruth wants the phone bills entered and filed and . . .”

“Never mind.” She turned back to her desk, mouthed
wuss
at Tony, and picked up the phone. “CB Productions . . .”

Allowing the familiar sound to wash over him, Tony turned away from the desk just as Zev emerged from post. Zev! Zev hadn't been on the soundstage in days. There was no way he could be a minion. Although he
was
clearly a little confused by the way Tony was smiling at him considering how things had been left between them earlier.

Time to fix that. Tony needed to be with someone he knew wasn't possessed and work a little of the twitchy out. Get himself grounded so he could plan. Fill at least some of the time between now and 11:15. Amy would be likely to ask him about his “script” and besides it was Friday night. She probably had a date. Arra—well, he'd had a bellyful of her for one day and he still had to approach her about the potion. Given the cooperation he'd got from her this afternoon, he was definitely going to need Henry for that and Henry wouldn't be awake for another three hours. But Zev! Zev was . . . starting to look just a little nervous.

Ratcheting down the smile, Tony crossed to where the music director was standing.
Hang on. Maybe
he
has a date, it being Friday night and all.
A little late to worry about that now. “Hey. Sorry I was such an ass yesterday. Can I make it up to you?”

“By not being an ass?”

“Well, yeah. That, too, but I was thinking maybe we could go out for coffee or a beer or you know, something.”

Zev's brows rose—arched innuendo.

“No, not that kind of something. I mean, I just thought . . .” He sputtered to a halt and was relieved to see Zev smile.

“Coffee or a beer would be fine. When?”

“Now. Well, as soon as I finish up which should be no more than half an hour. With Lee gone, we're stopping early.”

Zev glanced down at his watch. “I've got to be parked by sunset so that might be cutting it a little close.”

“Sunset's not for
three
hours,” Tony pointed out then added, as Zev's brows rose again. “They list it in the paper. I just happened to remember.” After all those years with Henry, he couldn't stop remembering—no need to mention that.

“Friday night traffic can be a problem, even heading into the city, but I guess half an hour won't make that much difference. It had better be coffee, though. There's a place that carries kosher about four blocks from my apartment; it'd make it a little easier for me if you don't mind.”

“I don't mind.”

They agreed to meet back in the office and as Zev disappeared back into post, Tony turned to see Amy giving him two thumbs up. Fucking great. Now everyone would assume he and Zev were out on a date. And, except for in Amy's tiny little mind, it wasn't a date. He liked Zev and all, but the music director just wasn't . . .

. . . Lee Nicholas.

The clientele in the coffee shop/bakery was mostly the same Gen-X group that hung around in coffee shops all over the city; the main difference being that most of the men wore yarmulkes and the bakery sold hamantaschen, the triangular Purim cookies.

“Oh, man, I love these things,” Tony enthused as the counter staff put two on a paper plate.

“So do a lot of people,” Zev sighed as he moved his tray toward the cash register. “That's why they bake them all year now.”

“Is that a problem?”

He shrugged and smiled a little sheepishly. “No, I just think it makes them less . . .”

“Special?”

“Yeah.”

“Just part of the whole strawberries in February thing. I have a friend who thinks the world went to hell when we started being able to get strawberries in February,” he elaborated as Zev looked confused. “He says we've lost touch with the circle of life.”

“I'll pass on the singing warthogs if it's all the same to you.”

“Okay, I'm paraphrasing a bit. He doesn't actually quote Disney.” Although the thought of Henry facing off against the Mouse was pretty funny. Reaching for his wallet with one hand, he grabbed Zev's arm with the other. “I'll get it. I asked.”