“Handy and the Triplets would at least help confirm this,” Seer agreed.
“Something else,” Bishop remembered. “Remember that drawing Maggie drew? The anamorphic one?”
“Yes,” Seer said.”
Bishop looked at him then at his brothers then back at Seer. “I think my son is a Quantum Anamorphic Architect.”
“The hell is that?” Hurricane wondered.
“It means he can makeonething that ismanythings at the same time,” Bishop said.
“Like those dots,” Seer marveled. “Maggie drew something and to me, it was a paper of dots. To Bishop it was a bunch of tiny ravens, and to Beth it was words that said ‘Leave at midnight tonight’!”
“Wait, Maggie draws things after touching people,” Spook realized, looking at Bishop. “She could be picking him up through Beth.”
“Oui,” Bishop fully agreed. “Beth said he’s always building structures in her dreams. Always different.”
“Everythingis being hidden,” Seer realized. Bishop looked at him, and Seer met his gaze. “The cryptic coins. The anamorphic images. The block when you attempted to look in Sinrik.”
“And don’t forget that slick decoy move,” Shank said. “The Creole Kings being the new Velkratos.”
“All without fucking knowing,” Traps said.
“Butwhyhide it?” Spook wondered.
“Because demons look for the play to foil whatever God’s doing,” Seer said. “The coins are cryptic, shown only to those who are supposed to know at the time they’re supposed to know it and everything else is shown but not known.”
“Not knowing is the protection,” Spook realized.
“Ignorance is bliss, in this case,” Bullets said.
“What about these Dead Kings and their army?” Hurricane whispered. “How the hell we supposed to fight that?”
“While rescuing thousands of fucking people,” Spar added.
“That’s the next conversation we need to have with all the Kings. We have to come up with a plan. Gather every ounce of our resources, get eyes on the field, and strategize. We’ve got what it takes, but our biggest weakness is time. We don’t fucking have enough of it. That means we’ll need to make it.”
“Like a diversion?” Bacon asked.
“Oui,” he said to him. “Controlled opposition. Split the enemy, create an opening, get what’s ours and get out.”
“The refugees,” Nitro doublechecked.
“Oui.”
“Gotta fuckin’ wonder what’s so special about these people,” Bacon said. “Am I right?”
Seer widened his stance and sucked in a deep breath, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s like the drawings said. They’re soul fingerprints. The raw blueprint of humanity.”
“And we need those… for what?” Traps maybe didn’t want to know.
“That’s the scarier question, isn’t it?” Bishop thought, pacing between the walls of the hallway.
“So… what does that make us?” Hurricane wondered, half worried.
Seer clapped his shoulder. “Makes us on the right side of a divine equation, Brother,” he assured.
“What’s wrong?” Nitro asked Bishop as he paced between the hall walls.