Yes, this took two weeks to post since the last chapter, and you guys have never waited long for this story, but I was stuck on how to have Dylan find out they're all soulmates in the same meeting in Central Park and it just didn't flow right, so I just gave up on that and pushed them on the carousel. I may have an omake in the last chapter, but I can't decide. *shrug*

...

Henley paced back and forth in the warehouse they'd had rented for a month, waiting for news of what happened with Jack. They'd seen the news on TV of Jack's demise, but they'd feel a whole lot better after he called and assured them he was alright. They knew he was alive of course, but they still didn't know what injuries he might have sustained in the fight with the FBI agents and getting away. They didn't know if he'd be able to carry a bunch of bags of money in the small window of time they had to do this. It was almost five o' clock now – everything had to be set up and ready to go in two hours and they just needed to know if Jack was okay.

It was Merritt's cell phone that rang, and Henley practically snatched it from his hands when Merritt picked it up and answered it, putting it on speaker.

"Jack?" he said immediately.

"I'm fine," came Jack's instant response. "A little bruised and sore, but I'll be okay to do my part. How are things on your guys' end?"

"We're good here," Danny said. "We got the mirror down on Elkorn – did you get the blow torch and things you needed for the safe?"

"Yup," Jack replied. "I'm ready to go whenever you're ready."

"I'll make the call now then," Merritt said. "See you in a few hours, Jackie-O."

"Stop calling me that!" Jack reprimanded, but they could all hear the smile in his voice that said he wasn't really offended.

"Be careful, Jack!" Henley called.

"Always," Jack said, and hung up the phone.

"Well," Merritt said with a smile, "Let's blow this popsicle stand."

…

Jack watched the Elkorn storage unit as the FBI agents went in, and a few minutes later came running out in a panic after the truck that was just driving away. He laughed softly, noticing that one agent that had gone in hadn't come back out, and supposed that one of Merritt's trigger words must have been activated. He knew from Merritt that Beethoven's Concerto in D Major could go anywhere between a half hour and forty-five minutes, so he knew he should have enough time.

After the Feds had all driven away, he grabbed a couple of the duffle bags he'd brought with him and pulled the hood up on his jacket, walking confidently into the storage room and passing the FBI agent 'playing violin' without care.

Several minutes later, he was glad he'd decided to go with the U-Haul to carry the money, because there was no way in hell he would have been able to get it all, otherwise.

It was about half past six when he found the car he was supposed to stuff all the money in. Working quickly, he tore off the plastic wrap packing the money into cubes and began stuffing it into every space he could find. The car would have to be stuffed to the brim to be able to fit all the money, so he couldn't afford to pass over spaces like the glove box or underneath the seats. He rigged the wires so that as soon as the car was unlocked, all of the doors would pop open and the car would go into panic mode. Just in case.

He shut the door twenty minutes later, checking his watch and seeing he should get out of there, before the show started and the place was crawling with Feds.

On his way out of 5Pointz, he passed the truck they'd used as a misdirection, seeing the agents and Bradley and his team watching just as the safe was opened. He laughed and pressed harder on the gas pedal, getting a bit away before leaving the U-Haul at the side of the road. Someone would pick it up at some point, long after the Four Horsemen had disappeared.

He hopped the fence into Central Park about an hour later, sitting down on a bench and pulling out his phone. Going to a news site broadcasting a repeat of the final performance, he smiled as he saw the three of them wrapping it up.

"Good night, New York!"

"And thank you, for believing in us!"

He couldn't help the grin that appeared on his face as he watched the playback of his three soulmates jumping off the building and disappearing in an explosion of fake hundred dollar bills. Even knowing how they did it still gave him a thrill. And clearly they'd gotten away fine, or there would have been news everywhere of how they'd at last been arrested.

He chuckled to himself and put the phone away, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees while he waited for the other three to show up.

Yes, they were very good. He would have to thank whoever gave them the cards that made it possible for them to meet, because it sure had been one hell of a ride.

…

Dylan had to work to keep the satisfaction off his face as he stepped inside the cell Bradley was held in, and the guards locked the door behind him. Bradley had of course insisted he was innocent, which he technically was, but Dylan had practiced long at playing the fool, at being underestimated, so he was going to draw out Bradley's confusion.

Bradley was smug in his assumed superiority as he began explaining exactly what he'd figured out about how the Horsemen did their tricks. Dylan would have been pissed off at how Bradley kept enunciating how the FBI and he specifically had been fooled, but he knew that it would only make it so much sweeter when Bradley crashed back down to Earth and realized how truly ignorant he was.

He protested exactly where he was expected to, letting Bradley have his moment of thinking he knew everything that Dylan didn't, and waited for that perfect moment.

And finally, it came.

"See, I finally got a chance to really look into Lionel Shrike," he said. "His comeback attempt, his accident. The insurer who denied the family's claim? Tressler Insurance." He felt that regular spike of anger when he remembered Arthur Tressler, but now it was accompanied by the triumphant feel from getting back at him and avenging the wrongs committed to him and his mother.

He continued, "The bank that carried the note? Credit Republican of Paris." If Bradley really was as smart as he claimed, it would be moments until it finally hit him. "What do you make of that?"

Bradley sighed and rolled his eyes away from him. "A sucker is born every minute," he said s though scolding him.

"So, here's my new theory," Dylan said, coaching the pretense and the act along further. "The legend is that the Eye is everywhere – waiting, for thetruly great magicians to distinguish themselves from the mediocre ones. Maybe that was you." He looked Bradley in the eyes, somewhat surprised that Bradley couldn't see the hateful venom he was sure would show in his eyes. He'd had a long time thinking about this, and he was fairly certain his assumptions about this were right.

"Deep down inside, you wanted nothing more than to be a part of the Eye but you were never invited." He pressed on, a trace of anger leaking into his voice. "So you try to destroy them. But instead, what happens? You pissed them off."

Oh, he was certainly pissed off. He wasn't part of every facet of the Eye, but he'd had the go-ahead from the people who did have more say, who'd been there longer, and it was this that let him know the rest of the Eye was upset one of their own had been destroyed by a charlatan as well.

Bradley had that condescending look on his face again as he spoke, getting closer to him with folded arms. "The Eye – isn't – real."

"Okay, then explain then," Dylan shot back. "Who's behind all this?"

"Somebody with an obsession – meticulous!" Bradley said, looking frustrated and cornered.

"Who?" Dylan pressed, knowing that the man would get there eventually.

"Somebody prepared to sacrifice everything," Bradley said, and Dylan couldn't help his satisfaction beginning to creep onto his face, but he quickly tamped it back down. He wanted the older man to come to the realization on his own. "Somebody so prepared to lose, that they wouldn't even be a suspect until the trick was done."

"I don't need a profile – I need a name," Dylan insisted, leaning in closer. "Who? Who?"

"I don't know 'who'!" Bradley said, even more frustrated than before, and Dylan relished in it. "But they had to have access to the warehouse – plant the mirrors." He turned away and went to the bars, resting a fist on one, and Dylan knew it was time to get out of the cell, because he was almost there. "Always a step ahead of me." After a moment, he added in remembrance, "And the FBI. Got past them not once – not twice! – but consistently. Almost as if they were on the in…"

Dylan watched with a vindictive smile on his face as he saw Bradley's profile, saw from the side as the man finally connected all the dots. As the man turned to look back into the cell, where he'd been standing just moments before, he moved to stand right on the other side of the bars, right behind Bradley.

"The inside," Dylan said softly, his voice echoing around the empty space as he finally let his mask drop, letting Bradley see his satisfaction and pleasure as he turned back around at the sound of his voice.

Bradley took a couple of steps closer, his expression helpless as he realized what he was truly up against. "You," he breathed in realization. Dylan hummed slightly in affirmation, nodding his head ever so slightly. After a moment of continuing to gaze at him, Bradley followed up with, "Why?"

"That is the question, isn't it?" Dylan said, because he wasn't going to prod him along with this one. He didn't care whether or not Bradley knew who he was, so he wasn't going to waste his time.

"You're right," he said of his earlier comments. "I can't tell you how long I've waited to see the look on your face."

Bradley's expression was completely lost, and Dylan couldn't help his small smile at his confusion. "Who are you?" the man asked him, because Dylan looked more like his mother than his father, so of course Bradley would never recognize him on facial features alone. "What do you want from me?"

"What do I want?" Dylan repeated, ignoring the first question. "I want you to spend the rest of your life in this cell, staring at four walls and wondering how you missed it." Of course, he meant 'this cell' metaphorically – this was just a holding area, but it would be to a real jail cell for him soon.

He continued driving the nail in deeper with, "How you let yourself be so blinded by your ego that you convinced yourself that you were one step ahead when you were always two steps behind."

He stepped back from the cell, away and to the hall again. He didn't need to say anymore – he'd gotten his revenge, and he'd seen Bradley broken down just how he'd always had nightmares about his father being broken after his career was destroyed and he'd felt the need to pull that trick that killed him in the end.

"Dylan?" Bradley's voice was confused behind him, and he ignored it. He needed no more. "Wait a minute…"

He began loosening his tie, because this was it. He had finished his revenge plot, and while he was still technically an FBI agent, he didn't have to play the fool at this moment. He didn't have to be the sloppily dressed, bumbling federal employee – he could be more than just Dylan Rhodes now.

"Dylan! How did this happen?!"

He dropped his tie to the ground, remembering how he'd left the cards with the four people he'd expected to be able to pull off the instructions – the people he'd watched for months before dropping the cards where they'd be sure to find them.

"Dylan!" Bradley sounded angry now, and he could only smile as he heard the desperation in his voice. "Why? Why?!"

He was proud of his Horsemen. And he would be telling them just that in a couple of hours in Central Park.

And then… He looked down at his wrist, where the edge of a 'Y' peeked out from underneath his watch. Then he would make a trip to Paris.

…

It was almost two o' clock when Jack heard voices approaching, and he grinned when he heard Merritt's voice above the others. He rose to his feet and moved toward the gate, just in time to hear Henley say, "It's locked."

"Weren't you guys listening?" Jack teased, because they clearly hadn't seen him. "Nothing's ever locked."

Henley began clapping as a grin formed on her face, the light of the flashlight going everywhere with her movements. "Well done, Mr. Wilder!" she congratulated, "Good work!" He huffed a little laugh as he pulled out his lock picking tools from his jacket to get rid of the lock.

"You're a big boy now, Jack!" Merritt said humorously, and was the first to reach over and tug him into a kiss when the gate had been opened.

"Well, I'd certainly hope so," Jack huffed as though put upon, but he was still grinning. "Otherwise our bedroom activities would be a huge cause for concern. Took you guys long enough to get here, by the way – I was starting to wonder if you'd been caught!"

"Oh, ye of little faith," Henley teased, leaning over for her own kiss.

"Here – we got some food," Danny said, handing over a protein bar.

"Thank god – I'm starving," Jack said gratefully, taking the bar and unwrapping it quickly.

"Yeah, we didn't think through the whole food thing," Henley admitted with a shrug. "Honestly, I was too excited to feel hungry."

"Yeah – we can finally find out what the hell all of this was for," Jack agreed through his mouthful of food as they began walking down the sidewalk.

"Well, we know it's something to do with Lionel Shrike," Danny reminded them. "But as far as who is behind that…"

"I don't see anyone here, though," Henley said, glancing around as though someone would pop out of the bushes and reveal themselves as the mastermind behind it all. "And the blueprints said to meet here at two…"

"Well, it's technically still five minutes till two," Jack said, though even he was uncertain as they saw no evidence of life anywhere around them. "So we've still got time."

"What if all of this was just leading up to us getting mugged in Central Park at 2 am?" Merritt drawled pessimistically.

"No, I'm telling you, we're right where we need to be," Danny said with utter conviction, shining his flashlight about. "We just need to find…"

"That?"

They all turned to see what Henley was pointing her flashlight at, and they all felt relief at finally finding some evidence that this wasn't all just a scam.

"The Lionel Shrike tree," Danny said.

"And the card encased in glass," Henley said with a smile, her voice filled with awe.

After a moment, Merritt was the one to voice what they were all thinking. "What do we do now?"

They'd found the tree. Clearly it held some importance, because they'd stopped believing in coincidences long ago. But the instructions in their blueprints had ended with the directive to be in Central Park after the New York show. They didn't know what was expected of them now – an odd feeling, after they'd had instructions for every part of this plan for the past year.

Henley was the one to get the right idea – and on the first try. She pulled out her tarot card, because even after being handled and kept in her pocket almost every day for the past year, it didn't look worn down. It was more like a computer chip of some sorts than a playing card.

The rest of them pulled out their own cards, and some sort of magnet inside them all joined them together, and became a new card entirely. As she was the one holding the pile of cards that was clearly a type of key, Henley followed her instinct and waved the Eye the pictures created over the card encased in glass.

They were startled away from their awe of the card lighting up when they heard music suddenly start up in the distance – odd music, like it belonged at a carnival.

"Yeah, because that's not creepy as hell," Merritt muttered, but he walked with the rest of them toward the music, anyway.

And then, they rounded the corner, and the carousel blaring the music came into view, along with a very familiar form standing in front of it.

"Oh, my god," Merritt was the one to say, his voice stunned as Dylan Rhodes' face became visible in the lighting. "I did not see that coming. That's impossible!"

Henley only laughed, but she couldn't say anything, so great was her surprise. She noticed how Rhodes looked different now – he carried himself differently, with a bit more confidence rather than the usual bumbling foolishness. She thought his hair might even be a bit different, but that could just be the late hour – or early, depending on how one looked at it. It was immediately clear that the blundering FBI agent act was just that – an act. In an instant, her mind was going through all of the times they'd crossed paths, looking for something that would have clued to his involvement with this, but she could think of nothing. He was way too good, and none of them had had any idea.

"No way," Jack was the next one able to speak through his astonishment.

"That was actually, uh…pretty good," Danny conceded, his voice letting on just enough that they could all tell he was admiring as he turned off his flashlight.

"Thank you," Rhodes said with a smile, and Henley noticed how even his voice was different. It may have been because he was usually annoyed or panicking when she heard him speak, but she thought it was mostly that for the moment he had dropped his FBI agent persona.

"When I said to always be the smartest guy in the room…" Danny trailed off, and the other three snorted at the comment, because it was something Danny would say.

"We were in agreement," Rhodes said amusedly. Danny nodded thoughtfully, and Rhodes turned his gaze to Henley.

"Henley," he greeted, and she could only look at him, still astonished at how well he'd pulled all this off that none had suspected it.

"I have never seen her speechless," she heard Danny say, and she was about to slap him when she saw Rhodes only smiled at the comment.

"I take that as a huge compliment," he said, reaching out a hand, and she shook it, deciding to not even bother trying to speak at this point.

"Hey, man," Jack said, voice a little nervous, and she looked at him curiously, wondering what he was worried about. "I am so sorry for kicking your ass – really."

Rhodes laughed a bit at the apology, looking unbothered at the memory and the evidence on one cheek and his neck of Jack's throwing cards at his face. So at least they knew he wasn't upset about what they'd gotten up to with him.

"So, what happens now?" Merritt was the one to ask what they were all thinking.

"Now, you're in," Rhodes said, and no one could miss the proud look on his face as he nodded his head toward the carousel, directing them to follow him. "The real magic is taking four strong solo acts and making them all work together." He opened the gate to the carousel and went in, still with that proud look on his face. "And that's exactly what you did.

"So…welcome to the Eye."

He hopped onto the carousel, looking at them as a wordless directive to follow, and they all smiled at each other; Merritt took Henley's hand and Jack took Danny's and Danny took Henley's, and they all reveled in their togetherness and success for a moment before they jumped on behind him, ready for their next adventure.

...

This is not the end! There will be at least one more chapter, with a possible additional epilogue where Dylan will find out about them, but I haven't decided. But Dylan's going to Paris now! :)