The Last American Wizard Read Online Free

for his shirt, he said, “You mean the apartment?”
    “Obviously.”
    “Yeah, well, it’s usually a mess. I’d have to say that that explosion outside has significantly raised the bar on what I’d describe as a ‘mess.’”
    “Explosion?”
    Buttoning his shirt, Steve gestured out the window with an elbow. “Well, whatever that was that blew the sliding doors in just before you knocked. From that engine, it looks like a major jetliner crash.”
    “Engine?”
    Slipping his feet into the loafers that had taken a good five minutes of banging against the wall, running his hand inside, cursing, sucking on a finger until the bleeding slowed, and then repeating, Steve walked out to the balcony. He pointed at the jet engine still smoking on the parked cars. “Yeah, that big round thing with Boeing and Roll-Royce logos on it that’s sitting where my car used to be.”
    Ace gave him a sharp look, evidently made a decision, and pulled a pair of mirrored aviator shades from where they were hanging on the neck of her T-shirt. Slipping them on, she turned back to the parking lot. She gave a low whistle. “Yeah, that does appear to be a jet engine.”
    “What are those glasses?” Steve asked. “And I don’t mean, ‘Are they Ray-Bans?’”
    Ace pulled off the sunglasses. “It’s easier to show than tell. Here, look through them.”
    She held the glasses up before his eyes. Outside, he could see that the cars were all intact because there was no enormous jet engine on top of them. He pulled the lenses up on his forehead and the smoking jet engine was back. He tested it several times. Down, undamaged cars. Up, lead story on the evening news.
    “In most cases, these allow people to see things that aren’t there.” Ace plucked the glasses out of his fingers and slipped them back in her T-shirt. “In your case, I think you already see what isn’t there, so they work in reverse.”
    “That doesn’t make any sense at all.”
    “Yes, sir. Whatever you say, sir. I’ve been told that they won’t work for much longer, anyway. They were designed for an environment we no longer enjoy.”
    “What environment was that?”
    “Reality,” she answered. “Are you ready? We need to go now.”
    When they reached the door of the apartment, Steve heard his phone start playing the eerie falling minor chords of P!nk’s Please Don’t Leave Me. “Who the hell is calling me?”
    “Your phone is.” Ace looked baffled. “Can’t you hear it?”
    “I know it’s my phone. I also know I never put that song on it.” Steve walked back and picked up the smartphone from the bed where he’d left it. The music stopped instantly. He looked at the face to see who had called, but there was only an animated cartoon of the gloved hand–now wagging a warning forefinger. “Something must be wrong with it. It’s showing me cartoons instead of keeping track of missed calls. Maybe I should just toss it and pick up another one somewhere.”
    The phone vibrated violently and Steve dropped it on the bed in surprise. He felt a presence at his side. Ace was standing right next to him, evidently having crossed the room without a sound.
    “Sir, if you’ll take my advice,” the woman looked at him gravely, “I’d be very careful of that particular unit. It’s already saved your life once today.”
    Steve stared at her.
    “Let me make that a bit clearer for you.” She said in that tone that only drill instructors and the football coach on Friday Night Lights had ever truly mastered. “Pick. Up. That. Phone.”
    Without a word, Steve grabbed the phone and put it in his shirt pocket.
    Ace looked at him critically. “Don’t you have a cover for it?”
    “No. It’s just a phone. For that matter, it’s only a cheap knockoff.”
    “No sir, it’s not ‘just a phone.’” Ace shook her head, wisps of short blond hair emerging from under the baseball cap. “We’ll need to pick up a milspec case: unbreakable, waterproof, and with a battery