"Oh, snap," Ted yells happily. "Did you see that? Right in the ass!"

That gets Drake's attention, all right. He turns…

… and suddenly, I get what they mean about blazing eyes. You know, in Stephen King books, or whatever? I never thought I'd actually see a pair.

But that's exactly what Drake's got, as he stares at us. Eyes that are most definitely blazing.

Come on, I find myself thinking in Drake's direction. That's right. Come on over here, Drake. You wanna fight? I've got a lot more than just ketchup, dude.

Which isn't exactly true. But it doesn't end up mattering, because Drake doesn't come over anyway.

Instead, he disappears.

I don't mean that he turns around and leaves the club.

I mean that one minute he's standing there, and the next he's… well, he's just gone. For a second the fog from the dry ice seems to get thicker-and when it clears, Lila is dancing by herself.

"Here," I say, thrusting the Beretta into Ted's hand.

"What the-" Ted scans the dance floor. "Where'd he go?"

But I've already taken off.

"Grab Lila," I yell back at Ted. "And meet me out front."

Ted utters some pretty choice expletives after that, but no one even notices. The music's too loud, and everyone's having too good a time. I mean, if they didn't notice us shooting at some dude with a ketchup-filled water gun-or a few seconds later, that dude literally vanishing into thin air-they're hardly likely to notice Ted shouting the F word.

I reach the pillar and look down.

She's there, panting as if she's just run a marathon or something. She's got the crossbow clutched to her chest like a kid's security blanket. Her face is as white as notebook paper.

"Hey," I say to her, gently. I don't want to startle her.