“Apparently my reputation precedes me,” he said.
“Infamy is more like it,” I shot back, then briefly wondered if I should be needling this guy with my snide remarks. He was an Incarnate, after all.
Nevertheless, if he was insulted by my comments, he didn’t show it.
“You didn’t heed my warning,” he remarked.
I shrugged. “I’m on a superhero team. We get threats and warnings with our morning coffee. They’re routine.”
“Then how about something that’s not routine,” the killer proposed. “An offer.”
I frowned. “What kind of offer?”
“Simply do as I requested before: stay out of my way.”
“And what do I win if I play the game by your rules?”
Chuckling, the killer replied, “You mean besides your life? That’s not incentive enough?”
“You’ve got the life of an Incarnate,” I stated, “but you’re running around killing folks. Obviously life, in and of itself, isn’t enough.”
The killer merely stared at me for a few seconds, then remarked, “You understand more than I gave you credit for.”
I didn’t say anything, merely stood there while he gave me an appraising stare. Basically, I had simply intended to keep him talking, hoping that he’d reveal something noteworthy, but apparently I had struck a nerve of some sort.
“Very well,” he finally said. “Do as I ask, and we’ll share in the power of the Incarnates.”
Chapter 38
The killer left immediately after making his offer, and it was truly instantaneous. One moment he was there, and the next, he — along with the roiling darkness — was gone, and my wall was back the way it had always been.
Wasting no time, I telepathically reached out for Rune, locating him in his quarters. Mentally, I told him to meet me in the living room of our suite immediately and then broke the connection. Eager to tell my story, I teleported to the rendezvous spot right away. Much to my surprise, Rune was already there waiting for me.
*****
Using telepathy, it took almost no time to bring Rune up to speed on what had happened. As soon as we were done, he insisted on seeing where it had happened. Thus, we ultimately ended up back in my bedroom, where Rune casually spun around once, his eyes raking over everything in sight.
“Okay,” he said after visually taking in the place, “the first thing I’m going to say — and which is something I’m sure you know — is that the killer doesn’t look like the visitor you had tonight.”
“I know he didn’t look like any of the Incarnates,” I stated.
“Well, he’d have a tough time claiming innocence if he’d shown up sporting his real face.”
“Seemed real enough to me.”
“Hmmm,” Rune droned. “That actually brings me to the second thing I wanted to say about your encounter with the killer: it didn’t actually happen.”
I stared at him in confusion for a moment, then blurted out, “What?”
“It wasn’t real,” Rune explained. “Looking around this room now, I don’t see any indication that what you showed me telepathically truly took place here.”
Stunned into silence, I simply gaped at him. I knew that Incarnates saw the world in a way that even I couldn’t, but in this instance he had to be wrong.
“So what are you saying?” I asked. “That I just made it all up?”
“No,” he insisted. “But I am saying that it was all in your head.”
Chapter 39
“Let me see if I’ve got this straight,” I began. “You’re saying that basically the killer created that entire scene that I saw in my mind?”
“Well, you did say you were sleeping just before it happened, right?” Rune asked.
“Yeah,” I agreed with a nod.
“Trust me, it’s nothing for an Incarnate to enter your mind — especially while you’re asleep or dreaming — and create any illusion they want.”
I let that sink in for a moment. We were back in the living room of our suite, where we had retreated while Rune offered his explanation of what had happened. He and I were now seated in our usual, respective positions on the easy chair and couch, discussing how events had likely unfolded. It went without saying, of course, that his explanation did not sit well with me. The notion of anyone — let alone a killer — running amok inside my mind had zero appeal to me.
“But when it was over, I was on my feet,” I protested, “standing right where I’d been while he and I spoke.”
Rune shrugged. “Maybe you sleepwalked through part of it. Maybe since your mind thought it was real, your body just reacted as it normally would. Or maybe…”
All of a sudden, he stopped speaking, as if something objectionable had occurred to him.
“Or maybe what?” I pressed, not letting him off the hook.
Rune looked pensive for a moment, then said, “Or maybe the killer took control to a certain extent, directing your actions so that the interaction you had was more real to you.”
My eyes went wide in surprise. “He can do that?”
“Unfortunately,” Rune muttered. “But we’re big believers in free will, so it’s not something Incarnates do as a matter of course.”
“And this guy is a stickler for the rules, right?” I blurted out sarcastically, then groaned in agitation. “You know, just when I think this situation can’t get any worse, it actually does. I mean, the last thing on my list of possibilities — even below getting killed — was the murderer getting in my head and puppeteering me.”
Rune responded with a what-do-you-want-me-to-say expression.
“Are you sure that’s what happened?” I pleaded, hoping for a different answer. “Not me being a puppet — I mean that entire conversation taking place in my head.”
“Pretty much,” Rune declared with a nod. “Aside from nothing in the room suggesting that it happened in the real world, I didn’t detect the use of Incarnate power at the level necessary to create what you saw.”
“Could it have escaped your notice?”
“Believe me, I would have felt it,” Rune insisted. “But if it makes you feel better, we can get a second opinion.”
Chapter 40
“I concur with Rune,” Endow said. “As far
