Taggart laughed. “In other words, who knows if the short version you got is actually based on truth at all?”
“Yeah. The glorified version is that Maynard and Windwolf met in the woods, just the two of them, and became friends. It’s doubtful because Windwolf always has his bodyguards with him and Maynard would have been with his unit. Whatever. The story goes on to say that the viceroy ran into another unit of American soldiers, this one packing more weapons and under the command of someone totally spooked by all the Elfhome weirdness. The officer in charge tried to use force to corral the elves into some kind of holding area. Next thing you know, Windwolf is totally pissed off and nuking the hell out of the Americans. Maynard stripped off his weapons and walked out to talk to Windwolf. Between them, they made peace. When the UN stepped in, Windwolf insisted that Maynard be put in charge of the UN forces and that’s the way it’s been since year one. Basically most people consider Maynard the god of Pittsburgh in terms of what can and can’t be done.”
“Is he trustworthy?” Nigel asked. “With all these moles, can he be counted to be still on the elves’ side?”
“The expansionists think he spends too much time kissing up to Windwolf, but I think they’re missing the point. Maynard knows that we’re stranded on Elfhome ninety-eight percent of the time and there’s an entire world of elves that could wipe us off the map in the twenty-nine days between one Shutdown and the next. He has several thousands of idiots to mess things up and tens of thousands of innocent people to protect from their stupidity. He operates on zero tolerance and that doesn’t make for a lot of friends.”
And it meant that if he knew that Jane had wreaked havoc at Sandcastle to get back Boo, he would…
Jane wasn’t sure what he would do. And it scared her.
The Sandcastle parking lot was crawling with EIA dressed in combat camo and armed with assault weapons. It unsettled Jane to see them. It was one thing to know that Pittsburgh had a small army made up of outsiders; it was another to witness them out in force, knowing that they’d been infiltrated and couldn’t be trusted.
She slowed to a crawl, scanning the troops through the chain-link fence.
“What is it?” Taggart asked.
She spotted Maynard among his people. He was easy to pick out, as he was a tall, blond man dressed like an elf. “Just making sure it was actually Maynard that called Dmitri and we weren’t walking into a trap.”
She pulled into the Sandcastle parking lot and parked as far as she could from the troop carriers. The Pittsburgh Coroner’s van sat tucked between the military vehicles, indicating that the EIA had found the males that she’d shot.
One of the things that annoyed expansionists the most about Maynard was he always adopted elfin fashion when Viceroy Windwolf was in Pittsburgh. They thought he should wear a business suit or his dress uniform. Despite the elegant clothes, there was no missing the military stamp on him. His long blond hair might be pulled back into a ponytail by a Wind Clan blue ribbon, but he stood at parade rest.
Because Maynard had asked for Hal, they’d gone in the PB&G production truck. Jane flipped on the remote recording as they locked up the truck. Taggart was carrying PB&G’s ancient camera; Jane’s truck couldn’t handle the CBM’s newer cameras. Jane had her pistol in its kidney holster, but she really didn’t want to have to shoot her way out of any mess. She carried the light reflector as a prop. With Hal in the lead, they all walked across the cracked and weed-choked parking lot to where Maynard waited.
Hal’s superpower was his charisma; like most TV personalities, he refined it to megawatt power to reach through the camera and charm the audience no matter where they were. Face to face, it was kind of like being run over by a train. “Director Maynard!” Hal extended his hand, smiling broadly, beaming at full power. “Hal Rogers of Pittsburgh Backyard and Garden. Glad to meet you.”
Maynard did a slight double take as he shook Hal’s hand. Hal had broken his nose just days before and still had the raccoon mask of two black eyes.
“We were filming a segment on strangle vines.” Hal gingerly touched his nose and theatrically winced in pain. “Got a little too close.”
“I see,” Maynard said.
“My studio manager said that you wanted to see me and my crew.” Hal waved to take in Jane and the others to explain the extra bodies. His tone was mildly curious and unconcerned. We’ve done nothing wrong.
“I want you to tell me what happened here,” Maynard said.
Hal managed to appear only mildly confused while Jane’s heart leapt up her throat. “And I could do this—why?”
“You do have a doctorate in biology, do you not?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I do,” Hal beamed with pride. “UC-Davis.” Jane couldn’t tell if the confusion that followed was faked or not. “I don’t understand what that has to do with anything.”
“For reasons I have never understood, the University of Pittsburgh chooses to take its break in the middle of summer instead of the dead of winter.”
“Horace Mann,” Nigel stated. The r of “Horace” was trilled by his Scottish accent.
“What?” Maynard and Jane both asked.
“Horace Mann is why the American schools follow the European standards,” Nigel stated. “In 1843, he toured the schools of Europe and returned to the states to publish a paper on his findings. It was very influential and set many standards that the schools of America follow to this day.”
Jane had no idea why Nigel might know this odd tidbit of information, but she really wished he’d kept his mouth shut as Maynard was now staring at Nigel and Taggart with fierce concentration.
After a minute, Maynard tilted his head slightly and pointed at the naturalist. “You’re Nigel Reid, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I am.” Nigel smiled, turning on his hosting superpowers. “Glad to meet you, Director.”
Maynard pointed at Taggart. “And you’re Keaweaheulu Taggart.”
Taggart’s eyebrows went up with surprise. Probably not very many people tried to pronounce his first name and succeeded. “Yes.”
“Nigel is here to film a new series for NBC,” Hal explained. “We’re showing them the ropes.”
“Very gracious of them.” Nigel didn’t sound at all like a man that had nearly been eaten by a dinosaur only twenty-four hours earlier. Only a slight tightness around his eyes gave away the fact he was in pain from his rough handling. “Wonderful people. It’s only been five days and already we’ve seen amazing things.”
Taggart tried for unconcerned and failed. He covered by bringing up the camera to pan over the wreckage of Sandcastle. By the looks of it, the monster must have chased the oni all over the water park as a path of destruction crossed and re-crossed the midway.
Maynard eyed them with surprise. He took out a mini tablet computer and checked something. “Forgiveness, the last few days have been exceedingly…hectic. Yes, my people have Reid and Taggart entering at Shutdown. Good. Good. As I was saying, the University of Pittsburgh is on summer break and I’m scrambling for biology experts. I have something to show you.”
He led them past the coroner’s van to a line of dead bodies stretched out on the ground. The first three had each taken a bullet to the head. They had the gravitational strength of black holes on Jane’s focus. She’d killed these people. All three were big brutish-looking males, but so had been her father. They wore face paint to look fiercer. What kind of souls had the paint hidden? Did they leave behind wives and children?