“Middleton would have been safe and wealthy. Forever,” Buzz says. “This is why we had to have you all back, Danny. We need you to complete the ritual. I was so goddamn mad at Lonnie and Mike when they tried to scare you off. They don’t understand how you operate the way I do. We had it all planned out. We knew just how to get you here. Because you need to save someone.”

“So you’re the leader of the Followers now? The Good Son?”

“No. But I’ll move up when the time comes.”

Danny laughs and shakes his head.

“What?”

“You sold your soul, and you’re not even in charge,” Danny says. “Jesus, Buzz. I hoped you’d be smarter than this.”

“Hey, eat me, Danny. I’m going to get everything I ever wanted, and you’re tied to a chair.”

“Buzz, they’re going to kill everyone. Everyone.”

“No. Not everyone. A couple hundred. Maybe more. And after that, a couple kids a year. Nobody who will be missed. Small price to pay, really.”

Something breaks loose in Danny. He does not calculate, does not plan his next words. He just shouts at Buzz.

“You’re killing children! Why would you ever do that?”

Buzz leans in close and screams right back. “Because that’s what it costs!”

He draws his fist to punch Danny again, and Danny sees the wedding ring on Buzz’s finger.

He has one of those flashes of insight he gets when he can be bothered to turn his high-powered brain on other people for a change.

“Oh God, Buzz,” he says, and there is such despair in his voice that Buzz actually stops himself from swinging. “Hailey. Your daughter. You married Hailey.”

Buzz looks confused. “We’re divorced. What the fuck do you — ”

“I’m so sorry.” Danny doesn’t feel like he’s using the HEP. None of this feels faked. He feels like there’s a hole inside him, but not the usual hole where nothing happens. This feels like a wound, throbbing with pain.

“What?” Buzz says, stupidly, although he was never stupid. He never had to work at anything, never had to be smart, because he had teachers who’d pass him no matter what he’d actually done in class, but he’s not dumb. He knows what Danny means.

“They killed her. Both of them.”

If Danny expects this to change something — if he expects Buzz to recoil in shock and horror — he’s disappointed.

“You really are an idiot, Danny,” Buzz says. “I told you: it’s all part of the plan.”

He punches Danny in the face. Because of the earlier concussion, Danny goes out like a light again.

Buzz keeps hitting him for a while anyway.

INTERLUDE: What Happened

INTERLUDE

What Happened

MIDDLETON. THEN.

The plan was for Eric and Alana to take Colchester at Snake Hill. Carrie and Danny would stop the Followers at the school.