Skelly and her share a look. Nora’s not sure it’s a friendly one.

She gives a flip little wave and a tight little smile even though her insides are a tumult of howling winds and breaking trees. Then she disappears down the tunnel and they re-roll the poster behind her.

Werth’s not here and he’s not answering his phone and Mookie’s riding the razor’s edge of this Blazes high – though by now it’s not a razor’s edge so much as it is the jagged teeth of a shattered mirror. By now the high is all coarse-grit sandpaper and hungry teeth.

So, hell with it. He stomps up to the door. Knocks three times. Figures he owes his daughter that much. Best not to come in hard.

Nothing.

Another three.

Goddamnit, Nora, answer the door.

He moves to the side. Peers in yellow-stained windows that are behind iron mesh like the door. Can’t see squat. Goes back to the door. Rattles the chain and padlock. He wonders if they even come out through this door all that often. If they have a hole that takes them down into the Deep Downstairs…

That would let them move beneath the streets. Or even deeper. Hidden the whole time. Some gangs are smart and move that way. Not that the tunnels are safer than the streets – but that’s the price you pay to stay outta sight. Plus, the dead-town of Daisypusher isn’t even a half-day walk, sitting underneath both of the Marble Cemeteries on the East side. Go north and you’d get to Yonder, though the reasons for going there are few and far between. South you could work your way to the Oddments. Still, the tunnels in between are long and dark and full of who-knows-what. Gobbos. Monsters who are half-human but all-mad. Blue addicts. Cultists. Mole Men. Thugs who belong to Mookie and the Organization.

For now, he needs to refocus. He’s up top. The sun’ll be up soon. And he’s got a door with a chain-and-padlock standing between him and his daughter.

He figures the heavy back-end of the cleaver will do the job.

But before he even gets to unsheathe it–

The door behind the cage opens.

He knows the woman. Skelly. Head of the Get-Em-Girls. She’s an OK broad. Smart. Tough. Sassy. Doesn’t take shit from anybody.

Pretty, too. He could stare into those eyes for hours. Not that she’d enjoy that. Having Mookie stare you down doesn’t add up to a “romantic gesture” so much as it does the “piercing stare of a sociopath”.