For once, Diane actually wanted to go to the abandoned church.

Jason had infiltrated her dreams again. She had awoken that morning with a wet and aching pussy that would not relent. She had been forced to let her slave persona take over, whereupon she moaned and writhed through an extended masturbation session, all the while imagining Jason's nice hard cock slow-fucking her.

She had had her feelings largely under control until Richie's comment about her boots, then all her slave ego could think of was how sexy Jason would think they looked. Her pussy simmered on a higher heat than it had the day before, renewing her fears that the potion would wear off before Monday.

Debby took the shortcut after all, as old Fairview had yet to be plowed at all. Diane was sure the minivan would get stuck in the snow which had accumulated over the course of the season. The wheels did spin uselessly a few times, but Debby showed great aplomb at recovering without having to get out to throw down sand or use the shovel, both of which she had piled in the back before leaving the house.

"I just hate having to mar this pristine picture with tire tracks," was the only real concern Debby ever voiced.

When they finally reached Old Fairview, Debby went straight through the intersection and stopped just off the road on the other side. "I'm impressed, Mrs. Radson," Diane said after the engine shut off. "You really handled it as good as my mother on those awful foothill roads."

Debby turned far enough to smile at Diane. "Thank you, dear. I was concerned that I was a bit out of practice. Hopefully I'm far enough off the road that I won't interfere with the snowplow if it does come through while we're gone." Debby glanced at Richie. "I do wish you had brought a pair of boots or galoshes, Richie. Had I known you had none, I would have brought a spare set."

Richie shrugged. "I'm fine, don't worry about it." He reached for the door handle. "Let's just get it done."

Nevertheless, the first thing Diane heard was a string of curses when his feet sank into snow halfway up his calves. Diane followed him out, an icy breeze stinging her face. After closing the door behind her, she took a few steps away from the van and was momentarily awestruck.

What Debby had told her mother had been no lie. Diane had indeed mentioned to Debby her love of such picturesque landscapes. The snow field which stretched between them and the abandoned church rolled gently with the land, gathering in fluffy drifts at the base of trees and boulders. In places where the rocks were the right size to be barely covered, they stood out as smooth bumps, reminding her of frosted cream puffs.

The snow was not completely untouched. Dozens of little tracks criss-crossed it near the trees. She recognized most of them as bunny tracks, with a few squirrel tracks twined with them. She spotted a much larger track and uttered a delighted gasp as she pointed. "Look! I think that was from a fox!"

"I think you're right, Diane," Debby said in a sunny voice as she stepped into view.

Diane smiled. She was grateful for enjoying this bit of natural beauty before setting about business she had hoped not to have to do.

They walked slowly through the thick blanket of snow. Diane distracted herself by identifying more tracks and gazing at the snow falling from the limbs of the firs as sunlight touched them.

Diane's heart pounded as they reached the church. Despite the light filtering through the holes in the roof, Debby snapped on her flashlight as they entered. Diane found it strange to see snow inside despite the condition of the roof. Most of the center aisle was snow-free, and they stomped their feet as they reached the center of the building.

"Now I'm not so keen about this for other reasons," Debby said as she looked up at the ceiling. "This place is not long for this world."

"It wasn't this bad on Halloween," Diane said.

"It must have been that nasty windstorm we had a week later," Debby said as she ran her flashlight beam along the edges of the larger of the openings. "It looks like the wind just peeled the roof off." Her flashlight beam suddenly snapped back. "Look, you can see where some of the wood up there is newer. Someone's been shoring this place up."

"Not anymore," Richie said.

"I hope you're right about that." Debby snapped off her flashlight and turned to the others. "I hate to hurry you, dears, but I don't want us staying in here too long given this state of disrepair."

Diane nodded and reached into her pocket. She pulled out the pendant and steeled herself in case she saw Victor again as she clasped her hand to Richie's.

Reality shifted, and the light became attenuated. Diane flinched as she heard a muffled thud. She turned towards the sound and saw Jo straightening up, standing behind the altar, staring at the church entrance.

"Fuck, she must've seen her!" Richie suddenly exclaimed. "She had to!"

Diane looked towards the entrance, where Penny stood in silhouette against the sunlight. She was wearing denim shorts and a blue pullover shirt. She looked no different from the Penny of the present; she had abandoned the red dye and let her natural rusty tinge show.

In the pregnant pause which followed, Penny did indeed stare at her sister as if trying to comprehend, yet it was Jo who hurtled the first accusation. "What the hell are you doing here again, Penny?"

Penny rushed forward, her face a mask of fear. Diane and Richie scrambled out of the way as she surged towards the center of the church. "I'm not really sure, Jo. I thought maybe I'd get some answers, some insight."

Diane's eyes widened. Penny's voice sounded like she was on the verge of tears.

Jo paused, then slowly came around the side of the altar, her feet crunching over detritus. "What insight? I never know what you're talking about half the time anymore."

"Everything I've told you that's happened to me!" Penny exploded. "It's all come to a head now, a-and ... I ... I-I fear for my children, Jo."

Jo's lips drew to a thin line. "Oh, here we go again."

Penny's hands clenched into fists. "Stop it. I know for a fact you believe the cult is real. I've seen you and Victor together. I've--"

Jo threw up her hands. "All right, all right! Fine, yes, I know it's real. What of it?"

"Fuck, she still doesn't get it?" Richie cried.

"--week since Heather's birthday, complete strangers have approached her, trying to talk to her ... th-they had Auras, Jo. Every last one!"

"Oh God," Diane murmured, eyes wide.

Jo shrugged. "So?"

"I have to know if the cult is behind it!" Penny cried. "I hope to God they're not, because I can't fight two battles at once!"

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Haven't you been listening to me for the past five years?! Something else is happening in Haven. Some sort of force or entity is behind the Auras, and now it's trying to get at Heather."

Jo shook her head. "You're getting paranoid, Penny."

"Jo, I brought Heather shopping with me the other day. She wandered off, and when I found her, a man with an Aura was talking to her." Penny shuddered. "He was asking her rather ... rather personal questions. Sexual questions. She resisted answering him, but it looked like she was struggling, like he was trying to mentally influence her."

"Really, for someone who's fucking her way through the townfolk, you have rather prudish notions about your daughter."

"She's only fourteen!" Penny screamed.

Jo smirked. "Then you can rest easy. She's too young for the cult."

"Yeah, right, you lying bitch," Richie grumbled.

"No, she's right, Richie, at least at the time," Diane said. "Melinda was sort of a special case."

Diane's words ended in complete silence. Penny stared at Jo, eyes blazing. What had just happened? She went over in her head what she had heard while talking to Richie. She remembered only the words "how would," and her mind filled in the rest with "you know that."

Penny's eyes darted towards the altar, and the rest of her followed.

"Penny, what are you doing?" Jo demanded. "Where are you going?"

"It's here, isn't it?" Penny said as she stepped behind the altar.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"I know it's here, dammit, I saw you when I came in!"

"It's under a loose floorboard!" Diane cried.

"She can't hear you," Richie said.

"I know, it was just ... wait, look!"

Penny had stomped her foot on the floor, making a hollow sound. She ducked behind the altar, and Jo surged forward but froze just arm's length from the altar as a creaking noise rose from behind it.

Penny slowly stood, staring downward. "This is it," she said in a small voice. "I knew there had to be more to this church. He could never have held it in here." She looked at Jo. "There's a whole other section of the church down there, isn't there? It looks too clean to be just a cellar or a basement. Not with a hidden trapdoor behind the damn altar!"

Jo slowly smiled. "Congratulations. Give yourself a gold star."

Penny's eyes blazed, and she kicked the trap door closed with a resounding slam that rattled the rafters. She marched out from behind the altar. "You don't just know about the cult. You're in the cult."

"Took you long enough to figure it out," Jo said.

"Don't think me so naive, Jo. I've suspected it for over a year."

"Ooo, that long? That supposed to impress me?"

Penny stepped up to her sister, shaking in both fear and rage. "What's happening with Heather? Is she the cult's next target? Are they starting in on her this early? Are they coming after Melinda, too?"

Jo chuckled. "You think I have to tell you anything?"

"You just said Heather is too young for them. Was that true?"

"Maybe. Maybe not."

"Don't do this to me! Not when it comes to the safety of my children."

Jo smirked. "You can't watch them all the time. Eventually, Heather's going to get herself some real sexual experience beyond just some silly questions about whether she would like to shave her pubes or not. Might as well be from someone who can guarantee she'll enjoy it and come back for more."

Penny uttered an incoherent scream of fury. She grabbed Jo's arms and slammed her into the side of a pew.

"Get the bitch!" Richie roared, startling Diane. "Fuck her up good!"

Jo recovered and pushed her sister back, her larger frame giving her an advantage. She tried to wrestle Penny to the floor, but Penny extricated herself from the melee, throwing Jo off balance. Jo's head snapped to the side from the impact of Penny's hand against her cheek. She tripped and fell hard to the floor.

"You're going to tell me what I want to know," Penny said in a deadly voice. "Or I swear to God, Jo, I'll kill you."

Diane swallowed hard, her heart hammering. She did not need Cassie's empathic sense to know it was no idle threat. Even Richie had lapsed into an uneasy silence.

Jo gave her sister an anxious look as she raised a hand to her reddened cheek. She slowly stood, grunting as she staggered and nearly fell after her left ankle failed to support her. She leaned against the end of the pew and let out a sigh. "Fine. You always were one to miss what was right in front of you."

"You were in the cult from the start," Penny said. "Even as far back as '85. You stopped me from trying to find out what really happened to Stephanie."

Jo rolled her eyes. "You still on that kick?" She cringed and ducked her head when Penny raised her fists. "All right, all right. No, not right then, but soon after that."

"But you were already talking to Victor."

Jo's lips twitched into a smile. "Yes."

"That's why you convinced me to leave Haven. That's why you broke up the business. To protect that perverted cult!"

Jo smirked. "Mostly."

Penny clenched her jaw. "Give me a fucking direct answer. Does the cult want Heather?"

"I don't know who Victor wants from year to year, but I do know that he doesn't start on them this early," said Jo. "That said, if he wants Heather when she's sixteen, he'll have her, it's as simple as that."

Penny raised her fists again, then dropped them to her sides and turned away. "I-I can't fight that battle yet," she said in a choked voice. "I have to know what's happening now."

"You said it yourself, Penny. There are other forces at work in Haven. Powerful forces."

Penny whirled around. "And just what does the cult have to do with them?"

Jo tested her ankle and limped from the end of the pew.

"Hope your fucking ankle is broken, you cunt," Richie muttered.

"Those forces were here long before the cult," Jo said in a softer voice. "It behooves us to avoid upsetting them."

Penny's eyes widened, and she drew back a half step. Diane understood, and sympathetic fear rose in her as well. The cult was already powerful in its own right, and now Penny was up against something worse than that.

"Those forces," Penny said in a hollow voice. "They're concentrated at the Inn. It's like some sort of hub."

"That's about right."

"So what do you do? You work with the Inn? You appease it?"

"In a way. If it asks a favor of us, we tend to accommodate it." Jo paused, one corner of her mouth turning upwards. "Like if it wants young nubile girls to, ah, serve at the Inn."

Diane shivered hard. She knew that was the Inn's purpose all along, but to hear it confirmed so blatantly and in such a cruelly amused voice chilled her to the bone.

Penny's face was frozen in horror before she could force out the words, "Oh God ... my daughters ... H-Heather ..."

Her eyes suddenly blazed. She seized Jo's shoulders and slammed her against the altar to a whoop from Richie. "YOU HELPED IT!" Penny screamed into her sister's face. "What you said before about Heather ... you knew she had been asked about shaving herself ... you helped it go after my daughter!"

Jo shoved her sister back and stepped away from the altar, rubbing the small of her back. "Did you stop to think for just one second that your little idea of fucking your way through Haven to give people the ability to see its minions just might piss it off?"

"You're changing the subject," Penny said in a shaking voice, tears trickling down her face. "Why did you do it?"

"What the fuck difference does it make?" said Jo. "Really, that's not going to change anything."

"I-I can't let this happen. Why doesn't it go after me? I don't have anything left. I can't protect them. I-I even tried to move us out of Haven, but I can't get that going, either." Penny sobbed once, tears flowing down her cheeks. "W-well, Jo, if your purpose was to totally fuck up my life, you just accomplished it. C-congratulations."

Penny turned away and dropped her face into her hands, crying softly.

"Look at Jo," Diane said, her hands curling into fists. "That's exactly what she wanted. G-God damn her."

Richie did not respond. One look at him suggested he was so furious he was beyond words.

"I still don't understand," Penny said in a choked voice. "Wh-why didn't it just go after me? I d-don't have any special resistance to it. I'm immune to Victor, but this is not the same."

"Maybe it thinks you do," Jo said in a flat voice. "Who knows? Maybe it's yet another stupid power you have."

Richie narrowed his eyes.

Penny lifted her face and wiped her cheeks and eyes. "Is that what it wants? To ... to neutralize me? To get me out of the way?"

"I wouldn't know."

"Bullshit," Richie said.

Diane stepped to the side and plunged her hand through Jo's shoulder, only to whip it back out seconds later with a gasp.

"Well?" Richie said.

Diane shivered. "All I get is her gloating and ... a-and her getting horny over this."

"That has to be it." Penny turned around. "Jo, you ... the cult ... interacts with it all the time. Negotiates with it, so you don't step on each other's toes."

Jo nodded. "Yes, you could say that."

"Then ... then it can be reasoned with ... I can make a deal with it."

"Oh no," Diane said. "Oh God, this is it. This is where--"

Jo gave her a silky smile. "I suppose you could try."

"I have to, Jo!" Penny cried. "You maneuvered me into this! I have no choice! Either I give it what it wants or it will take my daughters!"

Diane's vision blurred. She blinked away the tears and sniffled once.

"This is bullshit!" Richie shouted. "The Dark bitch doesn't fucking make deals!"

Penny swallowed. "I'll give it what it wants," she said in a low, quavering voice. "Me. I'll .... I'll let it ... let it c-control me in exchange for my daughters' safety. Then it won't have to worry about me anymore."

"You know, you could always join the cult," Jo said in a sly voice.

Penny shot an icy look at her sister. "And condemn one girl every year to lifelong sexual slavery? I will not sacrifice someone else when I can sacrifice myself. No, I'll do this. Maybe this is all my fault. Maybe I should've left well enough alone. But you didn't have to help them." She drew herself up straight. "Goodbye, Jo."

She turned and marched out of the church and back into the past.

Diane could not contain herself. As snow shimmered back into existence around her, she dropped her face into her hands and burst into tears.

"Nah, ya caught me jus' as I was about ta leave," Ned said from inside the hall closet under the stairs. That was where he had to take all phone calls on weekend mornings so as not to awaken his parents, who rarely rose before noon. "Wow, yeah, sounds like we've been kinda ignorin' Melinda's plight."

"I think we all assumed that would sort itself out once we freed Jason," said Cassie. "I really feel bad about this."

"Ya can't think of everything. And face it, we kinda expect Melinda ta take care of herself."

"But only because she has a strong-willed older sister who could guide her. I have to warn Diane. She's going to have to be the one to stop Heather from following through."

"Yer likely gonna hafta call her yerself, since I gotta stay at school until Miss Haven Sunshine delivers the goods. Ya gonna be able ta get away from the mansion fer a bit today?"

Cassie sighed. "Not until this afternoon, most likely. First a formal breakfast, which I'm already late for, and a gala luncheon.

Ned's grin suddenly vanished. "Oh crap, all morning? How're yer gonna--"

"It's all right," Cassie said in a softer voice. "At least I think it will be. I'm ... I'm a bit, um, aroused at the moment, but it's not too bad. I might be able to sneak in a quick, well, you know."

"So it's finally slackin' off?"

"It makes sense, doesn't it? There must be some limit to how much energy I can take in. Did Diane tell you what happened yesterday? With the snow coming down, I couldn't get Harry to take me to Diane's house, and I didn't have time to call her."

"Yeah, she gave me the low-down last night." Ned repeated the tale.

"Oh my goodness!" Cassie breathed. "Richie's father?"

"Ayep. And Richie was pretty ticked off about it."

"Certainly it was a shock to him! Oh goodness, poor Mrs. Sovert. The more I learn about her past, the more I feel she's the victim."

"They're still missin' a piece of the puzzle," Ned drawled. "How she got ta be the poster girl fer the Dark Poobah's minion brigade. They're gonna try ta get that last piece today."

"Where are they going for the next vision?"

"Back ta the abandoned church."

Cassie uttered a gasp. "Is that safe?"

"Prolly no safer than last time."

"I really wish you could go with them, Ned."

Ned grinned. "Got that covered already. I talked ta Mrs. R. this morning when I saw how we got dumped on last night with the snow. Figgered no way Diane's overprotective Mom was gonna let her bike in that. Mrs. R. will run 'em around in her minivan. They're prolly already out and about already."

"I really hope this is all worth it," said Cassie.

"Well, we got an out, right?" Ned said. "We don't hafta have all the dirt dug up on Mrs. S. by sundown."

Cassie paused, and Ned tensed. A sudden silence like that was a sure sign she was thinking of something upsetting.

"What's up, babe?" Ned prompted after a few more seconds.

"It's ... maybe it's nothing, but ..."

"I know you. It's something. What is it?"

"It's just that since Mr. Conner mentioned how he wanted to time his action to coincide with ours, it made me start thinking that maybe we don't have enough power to pull this off."

"But we're gonna be givin' it a one-two punch," Ned said. "Yer goin' after Jason while Richie tackles his Mom. And now Jason's father is enterin' the fray, too."

Another pained silence. "Ned ... I had promised I wouldn't mention this but ..."

Ned repressed a sigh and bit back another reminder about not keeping stuff from each other.

"Richie did something," Cassie said in a hollow voice. "Something he needs to admit to Mrs. Radson."

"Aw, shit," Ned said, draping his hand across his eyes. "This have anything to do with that day we got the potion? The one ya couldn't tell me about?"

"Richie poured half his dose into a bottle," Cassie said in a quavering voice.

"Yeah, I shoulda figgered it out myself. I coulda sworn I saw him passin' a bottle ta Melinda on Friday. Oy vey."

"Now I'm afraid that unless both Richie and Melinda help, it won't be enough."

"Shit, yeah, I see the problem. Right now, Melinda's mother is nuthin' less than the Wicked Witch of the West."

"But if Diane and Richie can come up with enough proof that Mrs. Sovert was tricked, or she was maneuvered into it, Melinda might spare her mother enough sympathy and at least make some sort of effort."

Ned uttered a windy sigh. "Yeah, and then there's gettin' all that info ta her. Her family's not 'xactly entertain' visitors anymore, an' there's just not enough time at school ta explain it all."

"I know, it's a mess no matter how we look at it."

Ned rubbed the back of his neck. "I think ya gotta tell Richie, babe. He's gotta know how urgent this is."

"I would think he understands that, given how he's still hurting over how he failed to keep Melinda from the cult. I think he's seeing all this with Melinda and her aunt as partially his fault."

Ned reminded himself that Richie had pulled through for them before. When everyone was up against the wall, he was the first one to push back. What concerned him was how Richie often waited until the last minute to turn things around. A paraphrase of a famous quote he had heard once was entirely apposite when it came to Richie: he could always be counted on to do the right thing -- after exhausting all other possibilities first.

"I'm thinking of letting Richie figure out how to tell Melinda," Cassie said. "They've developed something of a rapport, despite how abrasive they seem with each other."

"I'll trust yer judgment on that, babe."

"Yes, I'm coming, mother!" Cassie said in a distant voice before returning it to the phone with a sigh. "So much for time to sneak in something."

"Sorry I kept ya from that."

"No, it's okay. I have to go. Please, call me later."

"Will do. Love ya."

"I love you, too," Cassie said in a very soft voice before saying in a louder one, "Bye."

"I'm telling you, there's gotta be more!" Richie declared.

He had wanted to say that for the past ten minutes, but he had to wait until all the female waterworks were done. First Diane had to cry her eyes out before she could talk, and then Debby spouted some tears after Diane got the story out.

"What more is there, Richie?" Diane said in a tired voice, her eyes faintly red. "We found out why Penny went over to the Darkness. She really did think she was protecting Heather and Melinda."

"I have always tried to avoid feeling hatred towards someone," Debby said in a shaky voice. "A very basic tenet of my faith is threefold return. But that horrible woman Jo ..."

"Look, will you all fucking listen to me?" Richie cried. "The Darkness doesn't make goddamn deals with anyone! This has to be bogus!"

"But she did make a deal," Diane said. "At least that's what it looked like to me. I mean, she told Jo what she was going to do, and she had already told Heather and Melinda that she was trying to protect them."

"Argh! You're not getting it! Look, I can make a deal with you. I can tell you that if you fork over a hundred bucks right now I'll give you my bike. You hand me the hundred, I go take off and you never get jack shit from me."

"Well, okay, yes, it reneged on it. But--"

"But that's not the whole thing. Fuck, I don't know how to explain it in words. I'm no fucking good at this!"

"Diane, Richie might be on to something," Debby said. "I saw something spike in one of the bands of his psychic aura, the one tied to his touch with the supernatural. He may be feeling some sort of vibe from the past."

"Yeah, fine, we'll go with that."

"You think you have another vision?" Diane asked, her eyes darting between him and Debby.

Richie uttered an exasperated sigh and closed his eyes, waving a hand at the others. "Just give me a second here, okay?"

He had no idea what he was doing. A vibe from the past? He never felt such a thing. Until he started looking for imagery with first Heather and then Diane, all his visions had come by happenstance.

He opened his eyes and looked around. His gaze fell on the altar.

"That place under the church," Richie said. "I want to go there."

"What?!" Diane cried.

Debby sighed. "I could tell you 'no' and you'll just say the same thing you did to me yesterday."

"Fuck yeah, I will," Richie said. "Um, no offense."

"This ... I h-have no idea why you want to go to that awful place again," Diane said.

Debby placed a hand on her shoulder. "You don't have to do this. Richie can get the vision alone and inform the rest of us what he saw."

Diane glanced at Richie and blinked away a fresh tear.

"Diane, I know how emotionally wrenching it may be for you down there," said Debby.

Richie understood what they were talking about only when he remembered that was where Diane had been brought out of her enslavement by Debby.

Diane shook her head. "No, I promised Heather I would do this. If Richie thinks there's one more vision, I have to see it."

"I'm sorry if this upsets anyone," Richie said in a lower voice. "But I'm hoping this is the last vision I'm going to have about this whole fucking mess."

Ned rushed past the school doors, chafing his hands up and down his arms. He advanced far enough for his breath to no longer fog the air before turning around in time to see Seeger close the doors behind them. "Thanks, Mr. S. Boy, it's colder than a Witch's ... ah ..."

Seeger raised an eyebrow.

"Freezer," Ned said with a cheesy grin. "She always keeps the temp knob too cold, ya know."

"You seem rather flippant about such jokes given the self-proclaimed identity of one of your adult cohorts, Mr. Lussander," said Seeger in a flat voice.

Ned waved a hand in dismissal. "Nah, she digs my humor, it's ... hey, wait, how'd ya know about her witchly proclivities?"

Seeger marched past him and bid him to follow. He rubbed his temples and closed his eyes for a moment. "She does not exactly keep it a secret, and I tend to know most of the parents of the students of this school."

"Huh. So what do ya know about the likes of Heather and Melinda's mother? Or Richie's?"

Seeger stiffened. "I have not had much contact with the former and hope to never again with the latter." He scowled. "I should not be telling you such things. I trust you will keep them in confidence."

"No sweat. Anyway, ya deserve ta rant a bit."

"It is not so much ranting as wishing people would focus on what is important." He narrowed his eyes as he looked at Ned. "I have a vague recollection of Mrs. Sovert, Laura, and Terri Hollis meeting in one of the classrooms around Halloween. I do hope that the older Miss Sovert's ... arrangement ... with Laura was not the result of that meeting."

"Ah ... no idea, Mr. S.," Ned lied.

"Because that would speak things about Mrs. Sovert that I dare not contemplate." They stopped before the computer lab, and Seeger unlocked the door. "I will let you get to work. I am in need of more coffee."

"Will do."

"Do you have any idea how long this will take?" Seeger asked in a tired voice. "My wife has already reamed me for coming back to the school with all the snow."

"Can't really say. I gotta wait til the opportunity presents itself."

Seeger nodded and turned away. He paused and looked back. "And what of the matter of getting the webcam placed properly?"

Ned grinned. "In the bag, Mr. S., according ta what Cassie told me on the phone earlier."

Seeger hesitated, then nodded, his eyes looking troubled. He left without another word.

Ned let out a gusty sigh as he sat down before the same computer he had used the day before, as it had all the extra programs he had installed. He glanced at the door where Seeger had stood a moment before. Something was obviously eating the man. He hoped it was just anxiety over whether or not Ned would pull through.

Ned was anxious as well, but he did not want it to show. Anything could go wrong: Cassie may not have gotten through as well as she had thought; Heather may never have opportunity; Laura may see it and order her to shut the lid; Laura might put two and two together and figure out what they were doing.

Ned shook his head. The last one was a long shot. Laura was getting complacent. She thought she held all the cards.

"Unfortunately, the cards she does have means I gotta draw ta the inside straight," he added out loud as he reconnected to Laura's laptop.

Diane was far less frightened than she thought she would be despite the pitch dark of the lower chambers outside the range of Debby's flashlight. Perhaps it was the lack of light itself. It made the place look abandoned, as if no one ever intended to come here again.

They found no evidence anyone had ever used the place since Halloween. The altar was covered in a fine, even layer of dust. Their footsteps echoed from the far walls. Diane's boot brushed against something which gave a metallic rattle. Debby flicked her flashlight beam over and revealed one of the chains still attached to a corner of the altar.

Debby turned her flashlight to far corners of the room, where several robes and hoods lay crumpled on the floor. The gate leading to the rooms where girls like Gina once waited to be prepared for the ceremony lay open. Only the gates which led down other passages were still closed and locked.

"It's like they didn't even bother to clean up," Diane said.

"Hopefully that means we're truly rid of that infernal cult," Debby said. She shone her flashlight on the altar. "That's the only significant object in the room. Do you think you can get anything from it, Richie?"

Richie stepped into the light and shrugged. "Dunno til I try." He looked at Diane and held out his hand. "We're likely going to see Victor."

"I'm okay," Diane lied. She took Richie's proffered hand and braced herself as Richie touched a corner of the altar.

Reality shifted and exploded into light. Diane's heart leapt into her throat when she found herself looking directly into Victor's face, and him at her. Diane panicked when a frown began to crease his face, and she came close to begging Richie to let go of the altar.

Victor shook his head and turned away from Diane. She let out a noisy sigh as he stepped off the dais and confronted Charles. "No, that will not do," Victor said. "Find a way to distract the parents if needed, but make sure Sharon is able to meet me as scheduled."

"Yes, of course," said Charles. "I thought as much myself, but you wanted to be notified of any potential problems."

"Diligent as always, Charles, thank you. I foresee this as the last hurtle. By a month hence, Sharon will be more than ready."

"A month," Diane echoed in a shaky voice. "This must be the beginning of October or the end of September."

"Yeah, but no clue if it's the same year," Richie said.

Charles and Victor were still talking, but none of it had anything to do with Penny. Diane sighed and looked around. A few robed cultists fiddled with the lamps along the periphery of the room. Another carried incense towards the altar. She caught movement past him and saw a cultist step into the church from one of the gated passages which were locked in the present.

"Where do those go?" Diane asked. "There's like a dozen of them all around the--"

"Look, here comes the stupid cunt herself," Richie said, pointing.

Diane looked past Victor and Charles and saw Jo enter from the waiting area. Charles and Victor glanced at her, said some parting words, and Charles left.

"I know what you're here to tell me, Jo," said Victor. "It informed me earlier. I sensed it was quite elated."

Jo smiled. "Yes, indeed. Penny will no longer be such a thorn in your side."

Diane gasped. "This must be after she did it. After she gave herself to the Darkness."

"Fuck," Richie muttered.

Diane understood the sentiment. They both knew this was little more than a recording of the past, but like enthusiastic fans shouting at a movie screen, they could not help but believe they could have affected events somehow.

Victor folded his hands behind his back and stepped towards the altar, Jo following along beside him. "I never saw her as a real threat," said Victor. "Only it did. I merely chose to assuage it."

"But you simply must see her for yourself, Victor," Jo said in a voice of relish which made Diane's stomach turn. "She's lost quite a number of her abilities, save for her touch of your power. I have the merest fraction of yours and I was able to make her lick my pussy, so she will no longer be resistant to you."

"I will see her if I have time and inclination," said Victor. "At the moment, I have neither. I am simply glad this has been put to bed so I can direct my -- and your -- energies to something more productive." He turned to her. "You have a question."

Victor's statement was not meant to be anything other than unvarnished truth. Even safely ensconced in the past, his ability to read others so easily unnerved Diane.

"Yes, I do, actually," Jo said. "But I am not sure how much you were privy to its reasoning."

"'Reasoning' is sometimes a loaded word when it comes to the entity. But, continue."

"Well, to be honest, Penny was right about one thing. It is indeed confusing as to why it would go after her daughters and not her directly when she was the true threat. She had no resistance to it whatsoever."

Victor turned to face Jo. "What you saw was partially my handiwork."

"What the fuck?!" Richie cried.

"For all its power and ambition, the entity lacks the ability to conceive of a solution which is more than a brute force approach," said Victor. "I supplied it with a plan to work around the inconvenience of her daughters' resistance."

"Wait, what?" Diane said.

Jo looked similarly confused. "Her daughters? Forgive me, Victor, but I'm still lost."

"Her daughters were indeed its target all along, but apparently they were born with some sort of innate resistance to its influence."

"Holy shit," Richie muttered.

Diane was at a complete loss for words.

Jo gave Victor a speculative look. "Did Penny know about this?"

"As far as I am aware, she had no idea. Thus I helped it conceive of a plan to get at her daughters through their mother."

Realization dawned to both Jo and Diane. Diane wanted to cry again, and Jo looked triumphant. "Oh, how perfectly wicked," Jo said in a delighted voice. "She gave it the exact deal it wanted from the start. She thinks she's protecting her daughters, and the reality is it intends to work through her to get them."

"Exactly. The bond between mother and child is very strong, which is why I must often work on my next slave several months in advance to weaken that bond sufficiently. I suspect it will all come to a head once the younger daughter reaches fourteen."

"Now I can hardly wait for the sexual fireworks to start," Jo said in a silky voice. "And I will be more than willing to light some of the fuses myself."

Richie let off an explosive series of curses. He was still cursing when the darkness of the present swallowed them up.

"--GODDAMN FUCKED-UP CUNT! THAT FUCKING HIGH-TONED BITCH! I SWEAR TO GOD I'LL FUCKING KILL HER MYSELF, AND THEN I'LL FIND THAT FUCKING SACK OF SHIT VICTOR AND KILL HIM TOO!"

Debby looked aghast, the flashlight shaking in her hand. "Richie! B-By the Goddess, calm down! Did you mention Victor?! Good heavens!"

"Richie, please!" Diane cried. "Th-this is hard enough!"

Richie grabbed the end of the chain and whipped it against the altar until a piece of the edge chipped off. He threw the chain aside and stalked off into the darkness, still muttering dark curses under his breath.

"Let's get out of here first," Debby said. "You're both in a highly emotional state right now, and I don't want to stay down here any longer than necessary."

Ned sighed as Laura turned away from the camera, and the view swung down until he was staring at the touchpad, just seconds before it went dark and the words "NO SIGNAL" blared at him. Just before the picture had gone askew, he thought he had caught a glimpse of a naked Heather in the background.

He leaned back in his chair and wiped his face with his hand. His heart was actually pounding. Yet if anything had an out, it was this. He did not need to do this. Seeger had brought this on himself, even Cassie could see that. If he had not confronted Laura, he would not be needing the Harbingers' help. He should have thought about what he was getting himself into.

Ned shook his head. No, that was not the way the Harbingers worked, and it was not the way they should see it. Seeger had taken a stand against evil. Laura was an evil which needed to be excised from the school. He did more than the Harbingers had ever done with no special powers of his own (apart from, Ned suspected, a low-level resistance to direct mental influence).

Ned heard footsteps and turned his chair towards the door. "No progress yet," he said before Seeger appeared.

"I figured as much," Seeger rumbled. "I have come to tell you that when lunchtime is upon us, I will order you whatever you want, but I have brought my own." He covered his stomach. "I am still suffering from yesterday's ill-advised fast-food repast."

Ned grinned, and hoped Seeger would not take it the wrong way. "No prob, Mr. S. Sorry, shoulda figgered ya might've gone beyond the staple teen diet."

"Long since beyond, Mr. Lussander. If I never have a night of heartburn like that it will be too soon."

Seeger left, and Ned was struck by something he had not realized before: he had learned more about Seeger in the last day or so than in all his time at the school. It was as if Seeger held no qualms about letting his personal thoughts and feelings show. Perhaps he was still calling the Harbingers by the titles he used for the students, but Ned felt like the relationship had moved beyond that.

Suddenly he wasn't doing this for the Vice Principal; he was doing it for friend.

He turned towards the screen. "Come on, Heather, you can do it," Ned muttered. "Gimme something we can use ta nail the bitch ta the wall."

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