"I'm not a spin guy. It is what it is It is what it is-that pretty well sums up my approach."

"And it's an admirable approach, Hank, but the Kicker Evolution has grown too big for that, and it's growing bigger by the day. 'It is what it is' isn't going to work in this case because everyone can see what it is, and what they see isn't good. I'm going to get them looking the other way."

"I was thinking of playing dumb," Hank said. "I mean, I can truthfully say that I don't keep track of every Kicker's every move. They're all free men and women who act on their own, and what led them to become involved in this terrible tragedy is anyone's guess. I'll say I'm just praying the perpetrators will be brought to justice."

"Lack of firsthand knowledge will definitely be part of the game plan, but we need more. We need to play the blame game as well. We must paint your fallen followers as victims. Any idea as to whom we may point to?"

"Well, the Dormentalists and Scientologists have it in for me." In fact, the three groups were waging an Internet war, crashing each other's sites and all. "They're losing members left and right to the Kicker Evolution and-"

McCabe jabbed a finger in his direction. "Perfect! Perfect!"

He started wandering around the room, waving his arms in the air as he riffed about older, more established, more organized belief systems-little more than corporatized cults, really-becoming increasingly jealous and finally desperate as their numbers dwindled...

As Hank listened he remembered how he'd been feeling the need for a right-hand man, a smart, loyal second in command. Darryl fit the loyal part and, despite appearances, was no dummy, but he'd never cut it. He needed someone who was into spin and details. Hank hated details. He was a big-picture guy.

And in walks Terrence McCabe, a detail man and spinmeister if he ever saw one. He had a feeling Terry was going to work out just fine. Not just in spin, but in cleaning up the Kicker image, and maybe getting things in order, getting operations organized. Right now everything was helter-skelter.

Yeah. Terrence McCabe was just what the Kicker Evolution needed.

He glanced at Drexler and found the man's piercing blue gaze fixed on him.

"Excuse me, Terry," Hank said, holding up a hand. "But I'd like to ask Drexler here what's his angle in all this?"

Drexler smiled-sort of. "As I've mentioned in the past, the Order's Council of Seven senses a certain commonality of interests. We wish to explore that further. But to do so we first must remove your organization from the limelight. Once that is done, we shall initiate certain ventures that will be to our mutual benefit."

"Like what?"

"We shall discuss them soon. I a.s.sure you they will be in line with the tenets of the Kicker movement. And they will happen. I shall see to it."

He seemed pretty confident. But then his card said he was an "actuator." Wasn't that what an actuator did-made things happen?

He had awakened with the future looking pretty grim. It had brightened quite a bit in the past few minutes.

Thanks to Drexler... and his bosses in the Septimus Order.

Strange how things happened. Almost as if there was a plan. Daddy had had his Plan, but this seemed bigger. Much bigger.

But who was behind it? The Septimus Order, obviously. But who or what was behind the Order?

22.

Naka Slater was staying at the Grand Hyatt on 42nd. The taxi took the high road and dropped Jack off at the Park Avenue entrance that admitted him onto one of the mezzanine levels. He looked around, spotted some elevators, and headed that way.

"Hey, honey," said a sultry voice. "Is that a sword or are you just glad to see me?"

He stopped and turned to find himself facing a sultry, eye-poppingly proportioned redhead in a scarlet minidress and black stockings. She'd draped a silk scarf over her bare shoulders. The red of her lips matched the scarf and dress. Perfectly.

Jack waved her off. "No time now."

But as he started to turn away he spotted the snow-white miniature poodle peeking from her shoulder bag.

A woman. With a dog.

"Are you her?"

She pivoted and lowered the scarf to reveal the crisscrossing lines and open sores on her back. That clinched it.

He said, "Any particular reason for the Jessica Rabbit look?"

She smiled and shrugged. "It's Forty-second Street, and I remember the good old days." Her smile faded. "We need to talk."

He held up the wrapped katana. "About this, I presume."

A nod. She pointed to the railing overlooking a wide-open s.p.a.ce. "Let's go over there."

She led the way. They leaned on the railing for a moment and watched the comings and goings in the large, bustling lobby one level below. To the right an escalator led down from the lobby to the marble pool-and-fountainlined entrance that opened onto 42nd Street.

The poodle watched from her bag, pink tongue out, panting.

"Before we go any further," he said, "who are you?"

She shook her head. "How many times must I tell you: I am your mother."

"You're not getting off that easy this time. Who or what are you?"

Her green eyes fixed on his. "I think you know. You tell me."

"I..." This sounded so crazy. "I think you're Mother Earth."

She smiled. "Would it were that simple, but it's much more complicated. Too complicated to go into right now."

"But-"

"Some other time." She touched the katana. "This is of more immediate concern."

Something in her tone convinced Jack that arguing would be futile.

"Okay. What about it? In five minutes it's going to be in someone else's hot little hands and probably by tomorrow it will be on its way back to Maui."

"Instead of giving it to this man, it might be better if you took a boat out past the continental ridge and dropped it into the Hudson Canyon."

He glanced at the katana, then back at her.

"You're telling me it's evil?"

"Good and evil are difficult to apply to weapons. They can be a means to either end. But this blade... I sense something significant, something of great import about it... that it will be a means to a momentous end."

"A good end or a bad end?"

"I wish I could say."

"Didn't we have this conversation about a certain unborn baby?"

She nodded. "They are somehow linked. The baby is all potential with no history. But this..." She pointed to the katana. "It has been used for both good and ill throughout its existence. Its last act before the fire was fratricide-a terrible thing, yet done for good reason for a good end. Immediately after that came the fire."

Before the fire...

"The bomb?"

She nodded. "The nuclear fire changed it. It is now something less, in that it has lost some of the steel its fashioner gave it. But it is also something more."

"More how?"

"I wish I knew. It might now be a weapon only for good, or only for evil. Or, like any blade, it might cut either way, depending on who wields it. But it will will be used for something momentous." be used for something momentous."

"So you'd rather have it used for nothing at all."

She shrugged. "Just an instinct. No one can tell the future."

"Trouble is, it's not my decision. Maybe you can talk to Slater, convince him to give it to you or drop it in the ocean off Maui. I'll introduce you..." Her stare stopped him. "What?"

"You're going to return it to him."

"Yeah. We have a deal."

"Even after what I said about its momentous potential."

"Look, he paid me. I said I'd look for his katana and if I found it I'd return it to him. We shook hands on it. I gave my word."

She nodded. "Your code. Is that more important?"

Jack sighed. He didn't like to get all philosophical and look too deeply into these things. He tended to follow his gut. He'd learned to trust it.

He shrugged. "My word is my word."

"And you've never broken it?"

Yes, he had. He thought of his final facedown with Kusum. But Vicky's life had been at stake there. Where Gia and Vicky were concerned, he also listened to his gut, and in that situation his gut had said, f.u.c.k the code, waste him. f.u.c.k the code, waste him.

And he had.

But the odd thing was, despite the unquestionable necessity, it had bothered him for a long time after. Still bothered him.

"It's like being the little kid with his finger in the leak in the dike. If he pulls it out because it starts to feel a little uncomfortable, he may not be able to get it back in. And then more and more of the sea will flow through, widening the hole until the dike fails and drowns him." He hated verbalizing this stuff. He shrugged. "Am I making any sense? Do you see what I'm saying?"

"You're saying you're going to return the blade."

"Well, given a choice between my word and a big fat maybe, yeah, I'm returning the blade."

"I hope it's the right decision."

"As far as I can see, it's the only decision."

But he'd rather someone else be making it.

23.

A smiling Naka Slater opened the door and stepped back, his eyes on the package in Jack's hand.

"At last. The prodigal sword returns to the fold."

Jack figured that mix of metaphors beat his own from the park yesterday, but didn't congratulate him. Instead he added to the mix.

"Wrapped in a coat of many colors." Closing the door behind him, Jack handed it over. "All yours."

And good riddance.

But the Lady's words haunted him.

... it will be used for something momentous it will be used for something momentous...

Was this chubby sixty-something plantation owner going to be the one to wield it? Hard to believe.

"How did you ever track it down?"

"Crack detective work."

"And you didn't have to buy it back? Because I'll reimburse-"

"No need. Reasoned discourse carried the day."

He carried it to the bed where he began to unwind the drop cloth.