“We didn’t!” Jonathan protested. He did his best to covertly point at Angelus, who was swinging his new chain mace around. “We can’t control that guy. He’s almost three hundred years old!”

“He’s here with you,” Ripper said, unmoved. “And I won’t let you borrow so much as a pencil from my inventory. This is my life’s work here. I’d rather die with it than give it away to Ethan’s killers.”

“Fine, Smaug,” Andrew jeered at the older man. “Sit on your treasure pile while the world ends! We don’t need your help!”

“That’s not true,” Anya said, inserting herself into the conversation. She clapped the book she was holding down onto the counter. Its title was in Latin. Had Anya actually been able to read it or was she playacting to look busy? She did claim to be over a thousand years old. When had Latin died as a language?

“We absolutely need your help,” Anya told Ripper. “Well, your stuff. But we’re willing to pay for it.” She looked expectantly at Jonathan and Andrew. “What are you waiting for? Hand him money. Lots of it. Money always changes people’s minds. It’s the best thing about it. Other than being exchangeable for goods. And the smell of it. And how safe it makes you feel when you have, like, a lot of it.”

Jonathan reluctantly retrieved the messenger bag, He handed the last of their money over to Ripper, who rubbed one of the twenties over a craggy pink crystal next to the cash register. As the bill passed over it, the crystal glowed orange as though filled with an inner fire.

“Are you taking the piss?” Ripper asked sharply. The bill crunched into a ball in his fist. “You think I’m going to fall for this again?”

Jonathan shied away from the counter, hugging the shrink ray inside the messenger bag like it could save him. He cleared his throat, finding it suddenly very dry.

“Fall for what?” he asked.

“I told your tall friend that I wouldn’t take any more of this counterfeit shit,” Ripper said, pitching the crumpled bill onto the floor and picking up another from the stack. “He’s still got his name written in binary here. W. Mears. What a twat.”

“You read binary?” Andrew said, impressed. “That’s so cool.”

Ripper threw the money off the counter so that it rained down the front of Jonathan’s shirt and onto the blood-encrusted toes of his sneakers. Jonathan stooped to shovel the cash back into the messenger bag, his face and ears burning with embarrassment. Stupid Warren. Always signing his crimes. Always assuming he was the smartest person in the world. The counterfeit machine wasn’t even his. It was Andrew’s. Andrew had done all the programming and building. Warren had just insisted on changing the serial numbers.