Chapter 6: New York

The handler's face on the screen filled the console display, and every person in the control room went still.

He looked like a man who had been sitting in the same chair for three days, reading reports and sipping coffee while the world above him burned. Middle-aged, close-cropped gray hair, wire-rimmed glasses that caught the screen's glow, and a face that gave nothing away. The sort of face that had been trained to reveal nothing.

"My name is irrelevant," the handler said. "What matters is that Mr. Jostar and Ms. Zepelli are now aware of three things: first, the three Stand users are active. Second, I control their activation. Third, you have approximately forty-eight hours before I decide to wake them all at once."

Tony looked at Jarrin. Jarrin looked at Tony.

"Forty-eight hours," Jarrin repeated. "From when?"

"From now."

The screen went black. The handler's face vanished. The feed cut clean, and the glass wall behind which he'd sat was now just a wall. When Jarrin moved to check the room, the chair was empty. The man had walked out through a door in the back of the room that Tony had pointed out earlier, one that led to a stairwell.

"He's gone," Natasha said from the corridor. "I checked. No one came through."

"Then he's still in the facility," Steve said. "The doors were sealed on the outside. He can't have left."

"So he's somewhere in here," Tony said. "With the facility locked down. I'll check the internal cameras."

Jarrin leaned against the console. Jazz stood beside him, and the two of them watched the blank screen where the handler had been. Forty-eight hours. Three users. One man who could wake them all at once. The numbers didn't add up to much, but the timeline was clear enough.

Jazz pulled a card from her jacket and pressed it against her side again. The wound was healing. Poker Face pulsed faintly against the fabric. "We need to move on the first user."

"Steve's right," Tony said, already pulling up camera feeds on his laptop. "The three users are the priority. This man behind the glass can't do anything if we neutralize the users first."

"Which one?" Jarrin asked.

"Chicago," Tony said. "I had a coordinate ready when Kazir went down. The relay picked up a signal pattern that matches the first user's Stand signature."

Jazz looked at Jarrin. "New York."

"Chicago."

"Tony said Chicago. But the signal pinged wrong. It came from New York. The relay's tracking data is cleaner than Tony's initial sweep. I can feel it."

Jarrin looked at Jazz. The look said: you're sure?. Jazz looked back. The look said: absolutely not, but I'd rather be wrong in New York than wrong everywhere else.

"Fine," Jarrin said. "New York. We take the train."

"You're going to New York?" Steve. He hadn't said anything since the handler disappeared, but now he stepped forward. "We should go together. The Avengers can—"

"No." Jazz put her hand on Steve's arm. "We're not a team, Steve. We're a couple who fights things your way of fighting doesn't know how to fight. You stay here, build the relay, and help us track the other two users. Let us handle this one."

Steve crossed his arms. Something moved behind his eyes, a calculation. "And if you can't handle it?"

"Then you'll have to come. But you're losing time."

They took the train. Jarrin had suggested flying, and Jazz had laughed. The train was fine, actually. More time to think. The car was mostly empty, some commuters scattered around them, and a woman across the aisle who kept glancing at them with the particular kind of attention that came from spotting something unusual but not wanting to be rude about it.

Jazz sat close to Jarrin, with her shoulder pressed against his arm and her hand resting on his knee. The dress was stained with her blood, but Poker Face had done its job. The wound on her side was closed, though the fabric was still discolored. She looked fine. Better than fine. The red leather jacket covered most of the damage, and the fishnet stockings added just enough texture to keep people looking where they should.

"How did you know New York?" Jarrin asked.

"I didn't." Jazz leaned against his shoulder. "The relay ping was wrong. Tony ran the numbers twice. The signal didn't match Chicago. It matched New York. That's all."

"So you're saying you just go with it."

"I always go with it." Jazz smiled. "You're the one who gets us lost."

"Excuse me. I do not get us lost."

"You got us into a military base thinking it was a Bed and Breakfast."

"That was a misread sign. Different thing entirely."

Jazz squeezed his knee. "We're married. I remember the details."

The train rattled through Connecticut, then through the suburbs, then into the city proper. The skyline appeared in the distance, and Jarrin had to admit that the first time he'd seen it. The buildings rose above everything else, steel and glass and ambition stacked high enough to make a man feel small. Jazz had never been, apparently, though she claimed she'd always wanted to.

They got off at Penn Station, and the crowd hit them like a wall. Bodies in every direction, noise at maximum volume, and the particular smell that came from three million people sharing the same space for too long. Jazz pulled her hood up. Jarrin checked his phone and found he'd lost his signal, probably somewhere between the last station and here.

"We need to get to the address Tony gave us," Jazz said. She was reading from a printed map. "Twenty-three blocks north. Should be an easy walk."

It was not an easy walk. Jarrin got them lost immediately, turning left when the street signs clearly said right, and then walking three blocks in the wrong direction before Jazz caught up with him. They were arguing when they bumped into the wrong building anyway.

The building was a jewelry vault. Not a bank, not a hotel, and not a Bed and Breakfast. A sleek black storefront with a glass entrance that advertised something called "Duval & Associates, Gemstone Valuation" in small gold letters above the door. Jarrin would have walked past it if Jazz hadn't stopped him.

"Tony said the first user was placed in New York," she said. "This address matches the relay ping. It matches the Stand signature. Tony's data is wrong, or Tony's data was wrong on the city."

The vault's door was open. Jazz stepped inside. The interior was dim, lit only by the blue glow of display cases arranged in rows along the walls. Velvet-lined shelves stretched from floor to ceiling, and the air smelled like expensive perfume and old metal. At the far end of the room, a man was standing with his hands behind his head, examining a necklace that had been pulled from its display case.

He was thin. Dark hair, sharply dressed, wearing a tailored black suit that cost more than most people made in a year. His posture suggested confidence, and his face was handsome in the same way a man with too much money looked handsome. The kind of beauty that had been purchased rather than inherited.

Jazz stepped forward. "Lucien Duval."

He turned. A smile spread across his face like he'd been expecting her. "I wondered when they'd send someone. I told the Architect it would be a couple."

"Your Stand," Jarrin said. He hadn't moved. He was scanning the room, looking at every surface, every case, every piece of equipment. "What does it do?"

"Gravity manipulation." Lucien picked up the necklace from the display case and turned it in the light. "Specifically, I can increase or decrease gravitational pull within a radius of roughly fifteen meters. I can make things heavier, lighter, drop them, float them. It's quite versatile." He dropped the necklace. It didn't fall. It hovered at waist height, rotating slowly, catching the light from every angle.

Jarrin pulled Jolly Roger out. The white pirate materialized behind his shoulder, and Jolly Roger's hand formed a bubble. The bubble floated toward Lucien, and Jarrin threw it. The bubble hit the hovering necklace, and the necklace dropped to the floor. Jolly Roger's bubble had stolen the gravitational weight. The necklace was now lighter than air, and it floated upward, slowly, toward the ceiling.

Lucien's smile vanished. "Interesting."

The floor around them shifted. Jazz felt it first: her weight doubled, and she went down on one knee. Gravity in the room had spiked. Lucien hadn't moved, hadn't spoken, but the air itself had changed. Jarrin's knees buckled too. The display cases groaned. A glass case three meters away cracked down its center and split open, and diamonds scattered across the floor like rain.

Jazz pulled a card from her jacket and threw it at the ceiling. Card portal. She stepped through it, reappearing on the roof of the room, and dropped back down through another card she'd placed on a wall. The gravity had increased around her landing spot, and she hit the floor hard enough to crack the tile, but she was behind Lucien. Poker Face appeared at her side, gray figure with white hair, and Jazz yanked Lucien's head sideways.

He turned. Bomb Voyage was gone, replaced by something new. A Stand around Lucien's body, a dark figure that looked like a woman made of warped metal, with a face that had no features and arms that were just thick rods of gravity-fused material. Jarrin had only half a second to register it before Lucien raised his hand.

Gravity in the room inverted. Jazz went flying upward, slamming into the ceiling. Jarrin's head hit the floor hard enough to see stars. The display cases broke apart as gravity pulled everything toward the ceiling. Gold, diamonds, and glass filled the air, swirling in a slow, silent storm.

Jarrin pulled himself up. Jolly Roger was already in motion, throwing a bubble at the closest floating object. The bubble hit a chunk of ceiling, and the chunk stopped falling, caught in the bubble's field. Jolly Roger's kinetic burst knocked a display case sideways, and it rolled across the ceiling like it was on a track.

"Tony!" Jarrin shouted. "Are you watching?!"

His phone had no signal, but Tony's relay was active, and Tony was monitoring the Stand frequencies remotely. Jarrin couldn't hear the response, but Tony's voice would be in his ear if he was close enough to the relay's coverage. For now, they were on their own.

Jazz was already up. She'd stepped through a card portal that had materialized on the floor near Jarrin's feet, and she appeared above Lucien again, righting herself mid-air through a second card she'd placed on the ceiling before the gravity inverted. Jazz landed on a floating display case and used it as a platform. From there, she threw a card at Lucien.

The card hit him in the chest. Jazz stepped through it, appearing right behind Lucien. Poker Face's hand reached around Lucien's neck. Lucien's eyes went wide. The dark Stand behind him flared, and gravity in the room shifted again, pulling everything toward the center of the room, compressing. The display cases crumpled. The walls buckled. Jarrin felt his ribs creak.

He pulled Jolly Roger out. The white pirate formed behind his shoulder, and Jolly Roger's hand threw a bubble at the dark Stand. The bubble hit the metal figure, and a burst of kinetic force shattered it. The Stand screamed, a sound that Jarrin felt in his own bones, and Lucien staggered. Jazz kicked Lucien in the side, and he hit the wall. The gravity field dropped. Everything that had been floating fell to the floor at once.

Jarrin caught his breath. Jazz pulled another card and pinned it to Lucien's chest. Poker Face's hand closed around Lucien's throat. Lucien gasped.

"The Architect," Jazz said. "Tell us about the Architect."

Lucien laughed. A wet, broken laugh. "You think I know who he is? He communicates through encrypted channels. Through me. Through Kazir. Through the handler. We're all soldiers, and the handler is his general. But the Architect himself? Nobody has seen his face." He coughed blood. Jazz was squeezing the card into his throat. "The third user is in Tokyo. I know that much. The handler will activate him soon."

Jazz pulled the card from his chest and stepped back. Poker Face released him. Lucien collapsed against the wall, breathing hard.

Then his body went rigid. The dark Stand reappeared behind him, and for a moment it looked like Lucien was still in control. Then the Stand's eyes glowed red, and Lucien's body convulsed once and went still. His heart had stopped. The Stand had killed its own user.

Jarrin stepped forward and checked for a pulse. Nothing. Jazz closed Lucien's eyes.

Tony's voice came through a device Jarrin hadn't noticed. Tony had synced a tracking beacon to Jarrin's phone earlier, and the relay's signal was finally reaching them through what must have been a secondary frequency. "You got him?"

"We got him," Jarrin said.

"The third user. Tokyo. I'm getting coordinates now. The encrypted transmission just came through. The handler sent it after Lucien died." Tony paused. "The timeline just changed. The Architect's contingency triggered. Instead of forty-eight hours, we have twenty-four."

Jarrin looked at Lucien's body. Dead. A soldier who'd been ordered to die. Twenty-four hours. Tokyo.

"We need a flight," Jazz said. "New York to Tokyo is fourteen hours. Give or take."

"Yeah." Jarrin leaned against a broken display case. "Twenty-four hours. Fourteen for the flight. Ten to find them."

"And we still have the handler."

"We still have the handler," Jarrin agreed. He looked at the vault, at the broken glass and scattered diamonds and the body of a man who'd probably never been anything more than an asset. "Let's go."