I've got the Slovakian girl from "Dickinson and the Revivalists" leading me through green-tiled halls, cooing about how good I'm going to feel. The P.A. keeps calling for a Code Blue, and I keep thinking I see Arabella, but it's always some Chinese woman in a pinafore.

Ms. Slovakia has the door to the library open, and I flash to a close-up of her underwear right as she stops; there's one flat "Ah", and I'm being dive-bombed by a thousand winged spiders with legs like electric toothbrushes.

I feel my knees give, feel the bugs breathing against my skin. I see one dead eye peek through a hole in the cloud of bodies, and the breath of the insects forms two huge, warped-cassette words.

"Offer stands."

My eyes snap open.

Nothing is quite so miserable as waking up after a fight; everything is tighter, as your body starts damage assessment and tries to make sure you don't do this again. I'm groaning before I'm even conscious I'm doing it; past the sounds in my own skull is rattling wood from the vicinity of my door, and the throbs in my face that make me wish I could induce my own coma.

"Yeah?" God, is that my voice?

"Watson," Paul sings through the door, "come here. We need you."

I search for a witty comeback. "You sound like Wakko Warner." That's not it.

Paul chuckles and bangs again at the door, catching me right as I start to loll back off. I do a sweep around the room for whatever looks the least wrinkly, and open the door with a glower.

"I'm off-duty," I mumble. "Doctor's orders."

But Paul's nonplussed. "Doctor's repudiating himself. You're back on."

"What?"

That earns me a grade-B scoff. "You heard me, Sleeping Beauty."

I scratch my scalp. There are chunks of something in my hair. "Gimme one good reason."

Paul gives me a simper that could amputate limbs. "Boysenberry Friedman."

"I meant a reason to wake up, not a reason for rising divorce rates."

"We got a face, we need Boys to give a place. But she won't talk to me. Not to the crip either. She's hungry, and gonna get hungrier. We wanted to let you sleep—"

"But you needed my gonads." My soul hurts.

"You make it sound so..."

"So Boys?"

Paul snickers, flashes a peace sign. "Free love?" he squeaks.

I eye Paul sidelong in lieu of a chuckle. "You eaten recently, partner?"

"Just before you woke up."

"Excellent." I pull a musty towel off my floor. "Then you won't say no when I ask to grab a shower."

Paul snaps into a self-effacing grin, and gestures down the hall.

Showering doesn't do a thing to work out the knots. I head back to my room, put on my baggiest clothes, and meet Paul at the bottom of the stairs. The house is a solid block of tension someone carved at with a chainsaw. Dr. Barg's in the office; I don't see any sign of Arabella.

"Randall," Barg calls, as I'm reaching for the door.

I freeze up, let myself slump to attention. "Mornin' Doc?"

"A moment please?"

I let Paul see the disgust on my face; the sallow man chuckles, and heads out the front door with an aura full of laughter. "I'll get the car started."

"I'm driving," I say to the closing door.

Dr. Barg stays bellied up to his usual computer, only his eyes shifting toward me. He gestures to a chair, but I just keep on standing.

"Sleep well?" he asks, pecking at the keyboard.

"You know the answer to that."

"Yes, but I occasionally like to feign normalcy." He doles out half a second of shrug. "I'm sorry to have woken you, it's just—"

"I get it. Don't try to put a pretty dress on it."

Mirth never looks right on Barg's face. He pushes back from the computer, drums his hand on the card table. His brain's projecting that river scene again, with just enough turbulence to let me know I'm being blocked.

"Paul did some research into the Denver incident," he says. He leans forward, makes sure my eyes meet his.

"Did he now?" Maybe I do want to sit down. "Informative, I hope?"

"Not yet. He'd just finished kicking over stones when Boysenberry made her demands. He's still waiting for word back from the other side."

"Well, you know how slow those damn thoughts are. Tortoises of the body, I like to call 'em."

I'd be more satisfied by Dr. Barg's chuckle if it didn't sound so full of razors. "Check in with Paul, will you? See what he learned? He's more liable to play it straight with you."

"You've got a funny definition of 'straight'." Quipping doesn't get keep the marching band out of my stomach.

"Nevertheless, Randall, he trusts you."

In an ideal world, the bass would have gone up for that statement. I nod, and stuff my angst down into the middle of me.

"Oh." Dr. Barg wheels over to the office's one actual desk, pulls open the top drawer. "You might want this." He holds up a velvet bag with a shape like a brick in the bottom.

"I've got Tarot cards in the car," I mutter.

Barg's eyebrows shoot up. "In the car." He wheels back to me, pulls out the deck. "You might still want this."

With a head full of heating coils, I slip the top card off the deck, and thrill to the sudden image of a man sobbing into my pillow. Nine of Swords; coincidence just gave me the finger.

"Thanks," I grunt, and slip it into my pocket.

Dr. Barg tries for a mirror of Paul's earlier smile. "Just be careful with it, yeah? And remember to talk to Paul, it's vital we get that info from him."

"Yeah," I say. "Imperative."

I break eye contact, and keep it broken. Dr. Barg's questions swim around my skull as I walk out into the burgundy haze of sunset, every turn of cadence bobbing up to the surface. Of course, no matter what I do with the subtext, any psychic who comes after me will read it as my own conjecture. If they can get through that Tarot card I "needed".

I make a mental note never to piss Dr. Barg off.

Paul points the Cavalier down Fair Oaks and from there to Tasman, weaving past the morose suburbs and trailer parks. His topic du jour is the human obsession with fire, with a special focus on our apparent love of burning women at the stake. Luckily being tired prevents me from getting riled enough to satisfy.

"So," he says, once he's sure I'm staying inert. "Hear you're gonna try to trap the guy gave you that pretty makeup job."

I stare at the ceiling and keep my hand on the Tarot card. "Yep."

He gives me a half-block's worth of silence, as the suburbs turn into business parks; I don't need to look to know he's making faces.

"You got a plan for what to do once we catch this fella? If we catch him?"

His tone makes my knuckles itch. "I was thinking we'd bribe him with invasive chiropractic work until he's just so flattered he tells us the whole story."

Paul snorts like every nerd in every movie, loud and wet and just for me. "I love you Randy, man. Seriously, this is a murderer in the know, what are we going to do?"

"I dunno. You're the one who can make his head tapdance, you think of something."

"Make his head—yeah, and risk him needing a sippy cup for the rest of his life. Randy, we need a plan, man, or this is goin' to go south on us."

"We're dealing with a murderer with enough faith that his crucifix blocks out his thoughts, who knows exactly what we are. Explain how this can go any farther south."

Paul answers that with joyful silence. "Randy...consider who you're asking to be pessimistic, man."

"Touché."

Fever Dream is a neon sore at the farthest, most decayed end of the business parks; the terra cotta posts outside the buildings are mostly blank, and the few businesses left have names that smack of niche marketing and tax shelters. The Dream used to be a brother in arms before its conversion, but now there's pink lights strung along the edge of the roof, a silk-and-airbrush sign that a pornographer would probably call psychedelic. Three small skinny men in big chubby hats are having a tailgate party just outside the door—Sprite bottles, because that's clever—and I can see the little thought bubbles pop up as Paul and I hustle through the door: "Fags?"

The place has its usual midday crowd with its usual midday stench, Jack Daniels and ranch dressing with a pearly sheen of desperation. There's a bottle-blonde on the stage, with the internal spark granted by two years of high school and a Ritalin habit, but only half the clientele are watching her; the other four are busy belting back Tecate and making eyes at the buxom blonde chatting with the bartender.

Boysenberry is dressed for trawling, tanktop and lowriders and a ponytail that gives a perfect view of her neck. She's a step past zaftig, Marilyn Monroe after the third kid; but if you're unprepared, she hits you like Aphrodite. Fortunately, I am prepared, which is why I'm able to look at her without getting vertigo; seeing the blue snake of compressed thought nuzzled up against the woman's spine really helps.

We come up alongside her, grab two of the seats she's got cleared for her potential suitors, and try not to get mired in the grease-puddles of rejection staining the floor. She looks at Paul, then over at me, and I see something like happiness squirm through her.

"Heard you were down for the count," she says. She's got a voice you expect to either tell you to undress or start teaching you arithmetic.

"I was wrong," Paul says.

"He was hoping he could have you all to himself." I smirk like it's a game; she prefers it when I pretend I'm in control.

Boysenberry sighs, and takes another slurp of her daiquiri. "What a kidder." Her dance is off tonight; I'm guessing she's already heard the news.

Paul hops off his barstool, leaving nothing between Boys and I. I sidle over, and feel the jealousy roil up from the four guys watching us. Thick lashes shade green eyes as I lean in closer.

"Been a while," she breathes, with just a dollop of double entendre.

"For you, maybe," I fire back.

A spoiled grin, and the light flares up around me. I block just enough of her signal to keep from abrading myself on my zipper. The bartender comes by, and doesn't bother even trying to get an order; he just steals a look at the breasts and moves on to Paul.

"I hear Dr. Barg's got you helming this little sideshow," she says. By her body language she has an unnatural fondness for sideshows.

"Just the trained animal act," I say, with a nod toward Paul.

She giggles her approval, and leans forward to give me a quick taste of her cleavage. "But you're the one with the real information. You know who hit the birthday girl."

"Sure do, but putting a face to the name is tough." I shift an inch closer. "What do you know about it, any calls on the Vaginaphone?"

Her lip quirks, but there's too much upset in the mix. "Nothing solid yet, but the rumor mill isn't sitting pretty. It's all ugly, Randy, nothing you want to—"

"Want to hear?" I cut in. "No. Need to hear? Yes. Get paid to hear? Definitely."

"Paid? You barely get room and board."

I try on my second-place smile. "Beats grad school."

Boys laughs at that, a sound like ashes, and looks at me like I'm the bravest, most forthright of all drooling morons. She looks into her drink, the universal signal for terrible things, and someone in her aura dims the lights.

"It's bad, Randy." All the smarm goes out of her; all the heat turns hollow. "I'm hearing about a dust-up in Denver, and some birthday boy in Chicago who had a handler commit suicide, and a couple mambos in Florida who got hit with a home invasion...none of it's for sure, none of it's positive, but it's shit from Baltimore, shit from New York, shit shit shit..." She looks at me with a cornered rat's eyes. "People are saying Inquisition. People are always saying Inquisition, but important people are saying it now, people with some logic in their brains, people..." She takes a deep breath for the benefit of onlookers, and slugs back a third of her drink.

"It's not Inquisition," I say, now quite thankful for the Tarot card in my pocket. "Inquisition wouldn't be going surreptitious like this, you know that. And they wouldn't be going after small-timers and birthday girls, they'd hit old haunts, cults that got cocky. People they were sure could get—"

"Faith." She scoffs, aura pure black. "Who says our little community doesn't have faith enough, huh?"

My skin is too tight. "Point." I shake my head. "Point. But still...no evidence yet."

She acknowledges that with a sigh and a nod. "Just conjecture. The weft of the psychic tapestry."

"You're a real poet." I look again at the snake in the middle of her, and look at her eyes when it seems to start looking back. "So what do you say? Why don't we gather ourselves some evidence?"

Boysenberry slithers away from me, regards me from a safe, if not derogatory, distance. "This would be the 'crazy plan' Paul was talking about on the phone?"

"Very same." I lick my lips, review my mental note cards. "Our guy's carrying a mask, something gums him up on readings. But I think I've got a bead on him now, so I want you to a deep scan"—just saying it spikes my heart rate—"go out there, see if you can nail the guy's mental signal."

"His mental signal?" Mischief flares up in her, hotter than the fear. "And..."—her lips curl—"how precisely would I get a bead on that?"

I flare my nostrils at her, and raise my hand. "It's all in here, Boys. Courtesy of a little face-to-face violence."

I get a purr with my smile. "How very brave of you."

"Call me John the Fearless."

Boysenberry squints at me, pores over the details of my face. I feel her bump against the Tarot card, skim over the popular thoughts blocking my own, and just give her a gentle shove away. Somehow that's hard to get enough for her; she gives me a fretful little smirk, and leans in closer to me. I hear grumbling from her admirers at the tables.

"I think we can come to an arrangement," she murmurs. She slides her arm along the bar, presents a hand, palm up. "Care to share with me?"

My tongue swells up. The hand is large but well-molded, scar on the ring finger, wrist like it's fresh from the sculptor. There's a tectonic upheaval happening in my jeans. I reach out, slide my fingers into hers, and get one oceanic second of relief before the drum-and-bass blur of a million flirtations pours out into my chest.

Boysenberry's mind feels like fire, like humidity; she's refreshment and regret, a question you know you shouldn't answer. I keep my eyes open while I feel her, watch the snake bob and swerve around inside her, and that's all that keeps my free hand from trying to roam. Our connection shatters on an image of her naked belly, and then she's looking down at her hand with satisfaction.

I can't help myself. "Wow."

She smiles at me so hard her eyes shut.

"So we good, then?" Paul asks, strolling over. "You'll come help?"

Boysenberry looks at me through a forest of eyelashes. "Yeah," she breathes. "I think we can work together." She runs a finger through her hair. "Where do we meet up for the real run-through?"

"Neto," I say. "Top of Castro Street, across from the train station. Midnight. We'll do dessert."

"Neto, midnight." She says it like a prayer. "And then we'll get to work."

I scoff at her so she knows I'm playing macho. "Nice seeing you, Boys."

She's already reconnecting with her daiquiri. The spectators fire off wolf-calls as we walk away from the bar.

"She ate you up and spit you out," says one of them, a linebacker who's drunk himself pear-shaped.

"No," I parry, "trust me: you're the ones she was eating."

That makes little enough sense nobody bothers to retort.

"You alright?" Paul asks, once we've stepped outside. There's no sign of our friends with the adult Sprite.

"Yeah." Randall Chatham, Lord of Lies. "She said midnight, right?"

"And so did you. Seriously, you alright?"

I climb into the passenger seat. "Hot succubus chick touched me," I say. "What more could I want?"

"No such thing as succubi," he says.

"Jealousy, life force," I drawl. "Six of one"—a yawn warps all my vowels—"half-dozen of the other."

My head is throbbing, but at least I have nine hours to sleep. I stare out the window, and feel Dr. Barg's words leaching into my shoulder muscles.

"Hey, Paul?"

"Yeah?"

I feign deep interest in the dashboard. "Dr. Barg was tellin' me: while I was off having a coma, you managed to track down a little data on our friend from Denver?"

He leans back, both hands tight on the dashboard. "That what the crip was bugging you about?"

"That and my general difficulty being a hyper-efficient robot." Don't force a chuckle; don't force a chuckle. "So what'd you find out?"

"Exactly what I told Dr. Barg: it's coincidence. Spook-show conjecture."

"Yeah?" My voice just about cracks.

"Yeah." He takes the turn down the Lawrence Expressway, aims us at the 101 on-ramp. "He was a somebody who was also nobody, you know?" There's a glance at me for confirmation. "Some big-time mook from the Denver area."

Somewhere, God presses the mute button, and a wind tunnel sets up in between my ears. Paul doesn't even slow down.

"From what I heard he was probably making some kind of deal with the butcher shop, maybe even the guy who provided them angst-bombs." He snorts, shakes his head. "He just picked a supremely shitty weekend to do the job in."

He's on Full Force Derogation, the usual cadence, the usual face, and his aura's too prismatic for me to even read. I swallow what feels like a mouthful of sand, and tap a finger against Dr. Barg's Tarot card.

"You really think that's it?" I prompt, praying for anything but my expected answer.

Paul clicks his tongue. "I know that's it, Randy. It's border-crossing shit, high-profile, but unrelated except for the part where him and this murderer are both morons. The rest is all conspiracy theory, spook-show conjecture."

There it is. He has more words in his answer, but we're closing this one off in media res; I've already caught him repeating himself.

Paul finishes his answer, goes back to driving. He gives me a glance a couple seconds later, looks at me like I'm playing with a bottle of pills.

"What's eating you, Randy?"

I keep on looking out the window. "Nothin', man." I shake my head. "Nothin'."