Proscenium became a cloud and flew out of the building, content to leave Dr. Critique to whatever miserable fate awaited him. Proscenium rode the winds of the city as fast as he could to the Classicum Theater.
He flowed down into the building, to his home backstage, but he wasn't alone.
Four large men were strewn around the stage floor, dead. Some of them appeared to have fractured arms or legs. They all wore matching red robes, and pools of blood all around them turned red to black as the blood dried.
Curtain was on the floor in the center of them. Her youthful skin was now bruised, purple and blackened. She had several lacerations in her skin, and Proscenium realized most of the blood was hers.
"Boss..." she whispered.
"Slow your breathing," he said. "You could still heal."
"They wanted to know everything."
"Focus on the energy inside of you, the energy of the theater, let it heal you."
"They didn't get a thing out of me," Curtain said. "I took the fight to them."
She coughed, and looked up at Proscenium.
"They wanted to know all our secrets, but I found out theirs."
"Curtain, what..."
"Two degrees north to two degrees south, and sixteen degrees east to twenty degrees west."
"I don't understand."
"The Temple."
"The..." Proscenium's mind reeled. "Curtain, I've been a fool. You told me to listen you U.S. Amy and I didn't. I..."
"No, boss," Curtain said. "You're no fool. You taught me well."
Proscenium held her hand in his.
"I finally got to fight the bad guys," she said, "and I won."
"Yes. You did well. I always knew..."
Proscenium didn't finish the sentence. Curtain was dead.
* * * *
Later that night, a freak lightning storm came out of nowhere and swept across all of Theater City. Dozens of rooftops caught fire, and the city's residents were kept awake all night long as thunder boomed continually, shaking floors and rattling windows everywhere throughout the night.
Years later, many stories and urban myths would circulate about strangeevents that occurred on the "Night of Thunder" as it came to beknown. The strangest among these were sightings of an armor-clad man with along red cape standing atop a theater roof, howling in agony as the lightingstreaked down all around him. Most people, though, considered this merely atrick of light, nothing more.
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END OF CHAPTER 13
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Next: Memories of falling.