Wearing the Cape 5: Ronin Games Read Online Free PDF Page B

Orb Investigations had become the premier superhuman investigations agency in California since Orb and Rafael Jones “adventured” with us in the Villains Inc. case. Her orb’s sensory powers let her detect and analyze anything physical, while Rafael—now Doctor Cornelius—could do the same for anything metaphysical with his Agrippan magic. They consulted across the country, and I was lucky they were available to see me.
     
    Finally nodding at Ozma and the boys, she pulled the door open and led us through the empty club. Shell popped in beside me, looked around as we crossed the open dance floor. “You’d think they would have upgraded to a better office.”
     
    “Hush,” I whispered automatically; of course Orb didn’t notice—Shell’s body was virtual, after all.
     
    Orb led us to a door at the back of the club, drawing a red curtain aside to usher us into a private room where Doctor Cornelius waited for us beside an ominous and intricately drawn magic circle.
     
    “Astra.” He nodded, smiling. “Good to see you and Shelly again.” He always saw her just fine. “And Ozma, good to finally meet you.”
     
    I tore my eyes from the circle. “The same. You’re looking good.”
     
    He did look good. The first time I’d seen him I’d recognized a strung out meth-head; the last time I’d seen him hadn’t been long after he’d spoken one of the three Deccanic “Words of God” in his head to spontaneously heal Orb’s fatal injury. That spoken Word had also raised Jacky from an undead vampire into a fully alive one and cured my PTSD as a side-effect . The effect had extended to him, and he’d looked a lot better then; now any lingering evidence of his hard years were gone and his eyes sparkled in his darkly handsome patrician face.
     
    Ozma just gave him a regal nod and stepped over to a prepared side table; accepting a box from Grendel—the magic box that looked like an empty ornamental box of made of gem-dusted gold wire filigree—she opened. Riptide watched Doctor Cornelius and Ozma with arms folded and an I’ve seen weirder shit eye.
     
    “Did you ever speak the last Word?” I blurted without thinking as Orb closed the door behind us and Ozma pulled stuff out of her empty box.
     
    His smile turned into a deep laugh. “Have you read about the Everglades Deadzone? All the Words are gone from my head. I am only myself, now.”
     
    Shell started. “Really? What did you kill?” The final Word had been the word for Death .
     
    “Besides many square miles of glades? Something that badly needed to be dead. Shall we get started?” He nodded to the circle.
     
    He had drawn the circle on a single piece of polished black granite that floored the center of the workroom, at least fifteen feet on a side. Russet-red banners had been hung around the circle on eight freestanding frames to give the room an octagonal shape. The room’s walls were purest white.
     
    I swallowed. “What do I do?”
     
    “Change into this. Leave everything else.” He held out a small white bundle. “Then stand inside the circle.”
     
    When I reached out he dropped it into my hand, carefully not touching me. Unfolding it, I found myself holding a plain white cotton shift.
     
    “You can change in any corner,” he said. He was right; there was plenty of room behind the banners.
     
    “What’s this for?”
     
    “I spoke with both Chakra and Ozma after Blackstone called.” He nodded to Ozma. “Since both of them are sensitive, in themselves or in the tools they can use, and neither found traces of psychic or supernatural influences, we’re going to look deeper. This—” he waved at the bewilderingly complex white circle again “—is specifically tuned to you and only to you. Everything you’re wearing brings its own signature and nature with it, and taking any of it into the circle with you will interfere with what we are trying to do.”
     
    “So, you need a clean testing