Mister Impossible

a shapeless question formed in Ronan’s mouth.
But what could the question be? The answer was always just Bryde.
Bryde asked, “What do you feel?”
Hennessy launched into a dynamite monologue. She was a tape that had always been playing fast, and since they’d gone on the run, she’d shifted into fast-forward. “Feel? Feel? What do I feel? I feel West Virginia. You might be forgiven for thinking you feel Virginia. It’s close, so close, but it’s got a bit more of a leather perfume to it. I’m tasting—what am I tasting?—I’m getting a bit of a banjo mouthfeel. Mm. No. Dulcimer. That’s the one. I knew there were strings involved. Something else is coming through. Is it kudzu? Hold on, let me let it breathe. Is that a note of sulfur?”
Hennessy couldn’t be stopped mid-swing, so Bryde waited ruefully and Ronan got his bag and his sword with the words VEXED TO NIGHTMARE on the hilt. He slung both over his back, adjusting the scabbard so that the blade hung neatly between his shoulder blades. He wasn’t going to bother with this particular game of Bryde’s anyway; he already knew it was one he couldn’t win.
When Bryde asked What do you feel? what he meant was How much ley power can you feel?
And Ronan had never been able to feel the power of the invisible ley lines that fueled his dreams. At least not while he was awake. Adam could. If Ronan and Hennessy hadn’t ditched their phones on the first night to keep the Moderators from using them as tracking devices, Ronan could have texted him for some tips.
Well, maybe.
By the time they’d ditched their phones, Adam still hadn’t answered Ronan’s last text. Tamquam, Ronan had messaged, which was always supposed to be answered by alter idem. But Adam hadn’t replied at all.
The silence sort of made this—the being away—easier.
What do you feel?
Confused.
“If you’re finished,” Bryde said drily. “The ley line. What do you feel?”
“There’s some?” Hennessy guessed. “Bigger than a bread box, smaller than a lawn mower? Enough for Ronan Lynch to make a mess later.”
Ronan flipped her a lazy bird.
“Flip your senses, not your fingers, Ronan,” Bryde told him. “This division between your waking and sleeping selves is artificial, and I promise you, one day soon the space between them will not bring you joy. Get your things, Hennessy. We’re here for the night.”
“Just what I was hoping you’d say.” Hennessy groped around like a zombie. “I’ve lost Burrito. Ronan Lynch, tell me if I’m getting warm—oof, never mind.”
Burrito, the car, wasn’t truly invisible, because Bryde had cautioned against dreaming true invisibility. He didn’t like them to dream anything that was permanent, infinite, repeating, impossible to undo. He didn’t like any creation that left an invulnerable carbon footprint after its maker was gone. So the car wasn’t invisible. It was simply ignorable. Ronan was pretty proud of it. Bryde had specifically asked him for a discreet vehicle, and clearly had no doubts Ronan could deliver. It had felt good to be needed. Trusted. He wished the process of dreaming it into being had gone a little bit more elegantly … but win some, lose some.
As Hennessy shouldered on a sword that matched Ronan’s, apart from having a hilt that read from chaos, Ronan called up, “Chainsaw, we’re going in!”
The raven tunneled down through the air to him. Ronan turned his head just in time to keep from getting a faceful of talons as she landed on his shoulder.
Bryde pushed open the door to the museum.
“Was it locked?” Hennessy asked.
“Was it?” Bryde replied. “After you.”
Inside, the West Virginia Museum of Living History was unkempt and unintentionally hilarious. Cluttered, dim hallways led them past room upon room of life-sized dioramas with vintage props and faded mannequins. Here, students in overalls and/or pigtails gave rapt attention to a mannequin teacher in an old-fashioned schoolroom. There, a sturdy doctor examined a less sturdy patient in a field hospital. Here, women’s rights activists lobbied for votes. There, miners descended into a concrete cave mouth. The mannequins’ faces were cartoonishly simple. It all smelled, even above and beyond what one would expect from a building abandoned since the 1970s.
Ronan said, “This place is looking at me. What is that reek?”
“ ‘The West Virginia Museum of Living History provides an immersive experience through sight, sound, and smell.’ ” Hennessy had found a brochure and she narrated it as she stepped around boxes and furniture pulled out into the hall. “ ‘Over five hundred unique scents are piped into diverse’—Diverse? Really?—‘scenarios. Students fall back through time in a one-of-a-kind outing they’re sure to remember!’ ”
“Give me a hand,” said Bryde.
He had already dragged two mannequins into the hall and was going back for a third. He stood them shoulder to shoulder in the hall. He didn’t have to explain what he was doing. In the dim light, the mannequins looked convincingly and confusingly vital, at least enough to give an intruder pause. A sham army.
Ronan was beginning to understand that Bryde’s first instinct was always to play with his enemies’ heads. He would fight if he must, but he always preferred having his opponents defeat themselves.
“You just gonna stand there?” Ronan asked Hennessy as he and Bryde dragged out a snazzy executive in a three-piece suit, a wartime housewife in a flowered dress, and three cadets in dusty uniforms.
“I can’t touch bad art.” Hennessy gestured to a sailor with unevenly painted eyes. “It will rub off on me. What a way to lose my powers.”
Without malice, Bryde observed, “If I had the same policy about dreamers, you wouldn’t be here.”
Ronan made a sizzling sound as he touched a train conductor’s cheek. “That burned so hot this guy’s face melted. In fact—”
“ ‘The West Virginia Museum of Living History is also’ ”—Hennessy raised her voice to drown Ronan out, the brochure held in front of her face—“ ‘available for overnight birthday parties and weekend home-school outings. Discounts available for groups over three.’ Shit. If only we had one more dreamer, the money we would save.