They walk away, some to the restroom, some back to the bar, like nothing happened.
“Don’t worry. I wouldn’t ask you to do something boring and normal,” says the marshal.
She smiles at me. I stare into her eyes, looking for Mason. She stops smiling.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I’ve just had too much to drink. I’m going outside.”
“Give me your number before you go.”
I tell her and head back to the bar.
“I’ll call you if something comes through.”
“Do that. Good luck with the agency.”
I go to the bar to get Kasabian, but when he sees me he shakes his head and turns his eyes back to the Lamia chatting him up. I leave him to his succubus and go outside.
I bum a cigarette from a couple of young drunk Valley guys with asymmetrical haircuts and fake IDs in their pockets.
“Are you the guy?” one of them asks.
“Which guy is that?”
“The Sandman guy. You’re skinny and you’ve got all those scars.”
“So did the neighbor’s kid back home. He had an eating disorder and kept falling off his bike.”
The Valley boy bursts out laughing, the excited nervous laugh of a kid not sure if he’s having a good time or not. The other boy grabs him and whispers something.
“Can we see your knife?”
“We heard it’s really big.”
That cracks them both up.
“Shouldn’t you youngsters be home and in bed? Isn’t it a school night?”
The one who gave me the cigarette says, “The school burned down. We’re doing classes online.”
“I hope it wasn’t one of you bad boys who burned it.”
“I wish. We’d be heroes.”
Neither of the boys notices the small group gathering behind them. Sneaking up silently on civilians is what they do best.
The tallest one, lean and ghostly pale, leans over to one of the boys.
“Excuse me.”
The kid starts and smacks into his friend.
“We’d like a word with Mr. Stark.”
The one with the cigarettes laughs and says, “But he was going to show us his big knife.”
The pale man brings his face down level with the boys. The whites of his eyes flash blood red, and then darken to black. The boys head back inside the bar.