Chapter 9
She bounced off of him like a pinball and stumbled back with an undignified yelp.
“Whoa, Red. Slow down.”
“OhmygodI’msosorry. Wait, no, you shouldn’t stand there, because I was running, but not like jogging running, more like survival running?
There was this guy, only he wasn’t a guy, more like a…
a bad Photoshop of a guy, and he had no face, and then there were teeth, and my phone is haunted, and also the coffee shop is probably cursed now, and wait, is that a real gun? ”
His gaze swept her up and down once, military, clinical, like he was checking for exit wounds or active possession.
“You saw it,” he said flatly.
Katie blinked. “Uh… The teeth? Oh, I saw the teeth. They were very deadly-looking.”
He exhaled through his nose, as if inconvenienced. “Name?”
“Whose?”
He sighed. “Yours.”
“Kaitlyn MacGregor, but everyone calls me Katie. Why?”
“I’m Major Payne. You’re coming with me.”
At first, she chuckled but then cleared her throat. “Okay, but like, can I ask where? Because usually I wait until after the second date to get kidnapped by a guy with authoritarian vibes.”
“You need my help more than you know.” He turned and started walking without further explanation.
She hesitated, because obviously, but then glanced over her shoulder, back toward the coffee shop she’d just fled.
A trash can fell over, seemingly on its own, across the street. Rats scuttled out of it, fleeing in all directions.
She ran to catch up with the Major.
Fort Hamilton didn’t look like a place that housed supernatural secrets. It looked like a government campus that had given up halfway through modernization and just decided to buff up the bricks and call it “historic.”
Payne led her down a set of stairs that screamed “things go missing here,” through a hallway that didn’t see sunlight, and finally into a cramped basement office full of filing cabinets and a conspicuously large stack of inbox folders labeled EMERGENCY RELOCATION PACKETS.
Katie hovered just inside the door, arms crossed. “This feels like ‘witness protection’ with a side of ‘unsanctioned lobotomy.’ Just saying.”
Payne ignored her. He sat at his desk, pressed a button on the ancient landline phone like it was 1998, and said, “Get me Rayna.”
Then he looked up at Katie, his gray-green eyes sharper than she liked.
“You’re not crazy,” he said.
She blinked. “Wow. Not the first time I’ve heard that, but definitely the first time from someone with medals.”
“It sounds like you’re being hunted. You saw the Gray.”
“Is that what it’s called? The Gray? That’s so vague. It’s like naming your ghost Boo.”
Payne didn’t smile. “You’re lucky it hasn’t touched you.”
“Oh, good. There’s a touching stage. That’s awesome.”
The phone crackled. Payne picked it up and spoke with clipped authority. “Rayna. It’s me. I found a civilian, dashing down the streets in Brooklyn. She’s had direct visual contact with the Gray. She’s coherent and not infected.”
A pause. Then he added, “Yes. I’m sure.”
Katie’s eyebrows shot up. “Infected? You’re throwing around horror movie lingo like it’s a brunch menu. Am I gonna start vomiting pea soup or…?”
He put a finger up to silence her. She glared at him, a little insulted.
“Understood,” Payne said, and hung up.
He turned back to Katie. “We’re going to get you protection. But you need to follow instructions. No wandering off. No weird rituals. No journaling in blood.”
Katie stared. “Okay, rude. That was one time, and it wasn’t real blood.”
Payne blinked. “Are you joking?”
Katie smiled sweetly. “Guess you’ll never know.”
He sighed like a man who'd just realized he wasn’t getting nearly enough hazard pay. “I need to brief the team. You stay here.”
“Yeah, no problem. I’ll just hang out with your emergency paperwork and that suspicious filing cabinet that’s humming slightly.”
But Payne was already out the door.
Katie waited exactly six seconds before opening the suspicious cabinet.
Inside the cabinet was… not a bomb, and not a portal to Narnia, which honestly ranked as the top couple of things she’d been expecting.
It was a toaster. A dented, humming, still-warm toaster. Katie stared at it like it might try to talk. Or explode. Or both.
It hummed louder. She reached out, very cautiously, and poked one of the levers.
The toaster growled.
She yanked her hand back. “Okay. Nope. Not touching that again. You do you, weird, haunted toaster.”
A file cabinet on the other side of the room clicked ominously, but nothing moved.
Now that one started humming too. “Not another one,” Katie mumbled. “Oh my god. Is everything in this office possessed?” She backed toward the door, eyeing the room as if it might explode. When she turned to grab the knob, the door didn’t budge.
She jiggled the handle harder.
Still locked.
“Oh no, no, no. You did not just Fort-Hamilton-me into a locked, spooky basement with demon appliances.”
The overhead lights flickered. Once. Twice. And then a sharp buzzing filled the air, like a swarm of angry bees had taken over the fluorescent fixtures. The filing cabinets started to vibrate. Paper began to slide out of the EMERGENCY RELOCATION PACKETS stack and swirl in the air.
Katie ducked instinctively, shielding her face. The humming intensified. The toaster rattled. And then, POP. A slice of bread shot out. It glowed faintly.
She crouched in the corner, arms around her knees, watching it drift gently to the floor like some kind of glutenous prophetic tablet.
“I am losing my mind, and honestly, I feel better about that than the alternative.”
Then the door opened. Payne stood there, flanked by a tall, attractive woman in a stylish, red coat and a Burberry scarf that probably cost more than Katie’s rent.
They both paused, taking in the chaos, the glowing bread, and Katie’s “this-is-fine, I'm fine, Everything-is-fine,” crouch and embarrassed smile.
“Did you touch anything?” Payne asked, voice like gravel wrapped in exasperation.
Katie stood slowly. “Um… Define ‘touch.’”
The woman raised an eyebrow. “She’s going to be fun.”
Payne sighed. “Katie, meet Rayna. She’s going to keep you alive.”
Katie pointed at the bread. “Is that before or after you make me eat the radioactive toast?”
Rayna didn’t smile. But her eyes crinkled just a little. “Before,” she said.
Then Payne shook his head and muttered, “Redheads.” Payne reached into his jacket, pulled out a silver remote that looked like it should launch missiles, and pointed it at the wall. A perfectly normal-looking electrical panel slid aside to reveal a glowing circle etched into the concrete.
Katie blinked. “Please tell me that’s a teleporter and not, like, a branding iron.”
Rayna stepped up to the circle. “Close enough.”
Katie looked at Payne. “You’re not coming?”
“I’ve got cleanup to handle,” he said, eyeing the haphazard papers and the still-glowing bread. “And someone’s going to have to explain this to procurement.”
Then Rayna grabbed Katie’s wrist, and the basement disappeared in a snap of magic and motion.
They rematerialized in what Katie could only describe as “rich witch chic.” The L.A.W.
mansion looked like Martha Stewart had hosted a coven refresh and then left mid-modernization.
High ceilings, magical artifacts that looked both antique and ready for a Sotheby's auction, and a vague smell of cedar, citrus, and ominous potions.
“Holy shit,” Katie whispered. “You guys have a base?”
Rayna was already striding down the hallway, issuing orders into a sleek headset like she was late to a coup. A black cat joined the procession and followed closely behind them.
“Get me Victoria on the monitor. Magda and Sahara, too. I’ll round up Joell, Crystal, and Lioness. I think they’re still here. In five. Full briefing.”
She looked back at Katie. “You’re going to meet the others.”
Katie’s stomach did a complicated flip-flop. “Others?”
Rayna stopped at a wide wooden door with intricate carvings that pulsed faintly when her hand hovered near the handle. She glanced at Katie. “You’re not the only one who’s seen the Gray. But you are the only civilian we know of who is still alive and uninfected.”
“What’s all this ‘uninfected’ talk? I’m not an antivaxer, if that’s what you’re thinking. I’ve had all my shots.”
The door swung open, revealing a massive war room with a long oval table, chairs made of something far too regal for IKEA, and several magical screens already flickering to life.
Victoria’s face appeared first, sharp and elegant, her Montreal living room a neutral minimalist backdrop.
Then Magda blinked onto another monitor, upside down. “Sorry, tech’s acting a bit weird down here,” she muttered in an Australian accent as she flipped her camera.
Sahara’s screen lit up last, the glow of ancient runes reflecting off some kind of stone with golden light. “I’m here. What’s the emergency?”
A couple of other witches entered the room and sat quietly.
Joell sat at the head of the table. “We have a civilian. Dream bleed, graffiti pattern recognition, visual contact with the Gray. She’s stable. She’s snarky. And she might be the key to figuring out what’s coming next.”
All eyes turned to Katie.
She waved awkwardly. “Hi. Um. I brought toaster chaos?”
Magda leaned toward the camera. “I don’t know what that means, but I like her.”