Smiles do not come naturally to Croucher’s face, its natural ugliness hardened by scars, and blows, and jealousy. “Thank you for believing. It’s important we move quickly, while you still have me here to advise you.”

Few men pick up on fear so fast as Papa. “What’s going to happen to you?”

“Once the Major realizes I’ve betrayed him he’ll kill me, and let’s have no illusions that anything you can do will stop him. Even if he doesn’t, the miracle will wear off in time.”

“Wear off?”

Even Croucher could not suppress a brief half sob. “Bridger has to keep giving us life from time to time, by touch, or the miracle wears off. He can’t create life from nothing. Turning an inanimate thing into another inanimate thing is permanent, turning a living thing into another living thing is permanent, but something like me, life from a toy, it’ll wear off, and I’ll turn back into a lump of plastic unless Bridger keeps me alive. After this, the Major won’t let him.”

Papa frowned, soft. “I’m sorry.”

Croucher is a master of the black chuckle. “Thanks for caring. Few would.”

Papa snorted. “Still, if Bridger’s powers wear off, I wouldn’t quite call that omnipotence. If Bridger’s forcing a war, won’t it wear off once they’re not thinking about war anymore? Or is that what you propose we do? Make them think about peace.”

“I said it’s permanent for everything but toys brought to life. You’re not a toy, Papadelias. Neither are your ten billion fellow humans.”

“Bridger’s still a child,” Thisbe cut in. “They’re too timid to create things consciously without a toy as prop, but they’re really far more powerful than that. I don’t even think they actually need to recharge the toys they’ve animated, like Croucher says, I think they just don’t have the attention span to make creations permanent unless they see and play with them again from time to time. One never stops playing with the world.” The witch stretched as she smiled. “Bridger trusts me. I’m the only one who can talk them down and end this. Find them for me, bring them to me, and I can save the world.” Thisbe signaled her tracker to flash an image up on Papa’s lenses. “Here’s a photo of Bridger. Mycroft probably knows where they are, and if they won’t tell you, you can at least track the kid through the Pets Register. Bridger can’t, or can’t yet, interfere with computer databases.”

Papa perked. “Pets Register?”

Thisbe smirked at her own cunning. “Bridger doesn’t have a tracker ID, but I wanted them to be able to come in and out of my door freely, so we told the computer they’re my dog. Pet registration is automated, and the computer doesn’t have enough common sense to realize that a dog shouldn’t be bipedal and say ‘woof’ instead of barking. All it requires is a silhouette and voice print.”

“A dog?” Hush fell over Papadelias, not a soft hush or a calm hush, but an ocean of trapped activity, like snow’s motionless groan the moment before the avalanche. I swear in the recording I can hear the ticking and clicking of his clockwork thoughts advancing step by step toward their determined end. “A dog… was that Mycroft’s idea?”