A/N: Chapter title is a reference to 'Midnight in Paris', a Woody Allen movie that's pretty decent if you can tolerate the stylings of Woody Allen...
Hope you enjoy! Things are about to get a little...dark...
Chapter 16: Midnight in Papen County
The only thing that could have made this day practically perfect in every way was the presence of Ned and Olive and Emerson. Lily and Vivian were good company, but everywhere Chuck went she could not help imagining how her Papen County family might react to everything…
Olive would play the tourist at first, buying scarves and collecting postcards and zooming around on a bicycle with a baguette in its basket. Then she would meet a group of circus acrobats or stage actors and embark on her own adventure. Emerson would dust off his art school roots and take to sketching the facade of some crumbling church, or the gardens in Giverny. Then he would go on a tour of every eatery in the vicinity, where he could sample all things French. As for Ned…well, he would mostly stay at her side. And that would be just fine by her…
All of a sudden, Chuck felt compelled to phone home. Right away, before the city had a chance to distract her with more of its charms…
"Where you goin', kiddo?"
Gwen and Gene had brought them to a little jewelry box of a jazz club, filled with smoke and hazy light and exuberant dancing.
"Phone booth round the corner," Chuck answered. "I have a long-distance date with a Pie Maker."
Lily smiled and waved her away. She was more fond of Ned, and more accepting of their relationship than Charles Charles had ever been. But Chuck hoped with all her heart that they could all be a family one day...
The sun was just starting to set as she stepped outside, which meant it was long past dark in Papen County. Chuck's kitten heels click-clacked along the pavement as she hurried to the end of the street. She might be able to reach him before bed…
"Where's the fire, sweetheart?"
Chuck leapt about a foot in the air and whipped round. She felt a brief flash of anger at being startled, before the man responsible appeared. His face was wrapped in bandages; his eyes shrouded by sunglasses. To anyone else he would have been an alarming apparition, but to her he was merely...
"Dad?"
XXX
Making small talk with the man who just abducted him was not ideal. But the Pie Maker had no idea what else to do as he strained against a sturdy chair, hands and legs held down with zip ties. He was equally clueless about his location, having been blindfolded before Treadwell shoved him into the trunk of his car…
Ned had kept himself calm by trying to search for the emergency release he knew to be installed in all vehicles after a certain year. But he was too tall for the cramped space, and could barely maneuver his zip-tied limbs...
They traveled for so long that he lost track of time, only gaining some sense of distance when they eventually turned off onto a gravel road, which gave way to an expanse of dust and rubble. Hopelessness swelled within the Pie Maker as he realized how far from home they must be…
"So…what kind of doctor are you again?"
The room he had been brought to was dusty and sparse, with a single boarded up window and an exposed light bulb swinging from the ceiling. Ned stared at the wide open door in front of him; it seemingly led into a hallway. If he could just get up out of this chair…
"Military."
"…is that how you met the Blue Berets?"
Treadwell looked up from the dossier he had been perusing.
"Your friends debriefed you, I see."
Ned nodded, eyes flickering to the door every now and then.
"Well, I find them a little slow on the uptake, but at least they led me to you."
The Pie Maker looked back at the undead doctor, fully paying attention to him again. "How?"
"I gave Emerson Cod that picture of the Blue Berets. I was reliably informed that he, and only he, could lead me to what I was looking for."
"Informed by who?"
"An anonymous tipster," he answered. "I tried to trace the call but-"
"You set up a tip line to find me?"
"I set up an entire network of people, to find someone like you."
"Why?"
For the first time since Ned encountered him, Treadwell allowed the ghost of a smile to show through.
"Why?" he repeated, almost mockingly. "Because you happen to be the Eighth Wonder of the World. Do you consider it a normal, unremarkable thing to be able to bring back the dead?"
"I can't bring back the dead," Ned lied reflexively.
Treadwell closed the folder, all traces of humor leaving his face. "Not without killing someone else after sixty seconds?"
"No, I mean I can't. You've got the wrong-"
The man sighed and checked his watch, before looking to the rotary phone in the corner. Then he walked over to a musty armchair under the window, took off his jacket and sat down. Without another word, he resumed his reading.
Ned's eyes were drawn to the dim doorway once more, as desperation crept in on him. Maybe he could talk his way out of this…whatever this was…
"You probably already know, what with your creepy network of spies...but Dwight Dixon is still alive."
Treadwell looked up with only mild interest. "I'm aware."
"…you are."
"Curiosity killed the cult," he said. When Ned showed no sign of comprehension he continued: "You dug him up, didn't you? After you got the picture. You went to Dwight Dixon for answers, apparently unaware of the fact that he is still a skilled fighter, despite his age. And he got away."
Ned's mind was reeling from the effort of computing this. "Did you plan-?"
"Of course not. I could only dream of being so Machiavellian. No…I just wanted Cod to lead me to you. I had no idea you already knew each other. I had no idea you 'worked' together. My source held out on me there, but never mind. That old photo caused a Domino effect leading to your humble abode. What was it called again?"
"The Pie Hole," Ned muttered. "As in 'shut your'..."
His wrists were starting to sting from the cable ties, and his heart was starting to ache with the thought of home. Of Olive sound asleep inside, of Digby barking wildly outside…
They had no way to help him now. And he had no idea how to save himself…
XXX
Emerson had barely pulled the covers up over himself when his phone rang, shattering the silence of the night. He heaved a mighty sigh and slapped a hand over his eyes. The PI wanted so badly to ignore it. After all, it couldn't possibly be important enough to deprive him of his well-deserved sleep.
He could just get up, take the receiver off the hook…
But of course, he did not.
"You better have a good reason for interrupting my-"
"Emerson! Thank god you're home!"
"What's the problem, Snook?" Her already high voice was bordering on shrill, and cracking from the strain.
"Ned's gone!"
"…he's what now?"
"He's gone. I came downstairs with Pigby and found Digby outside, barking like crazy. He had his leash on, I think they went for a walk, but he came back without Ned."
The PI took a deep breath, steeling himself against her panic. "All right, well-"
"I spent the past two hours looking for him. I don't know where he- I mean it's not like he has a bunch of other friends, right? Maybe Randy. But things got weird between them because of me and anyway he moved a few weeks ago. Unless he didn't? Maybe Eden Prairie was just a cover story. Maybe he kidnapped Ned! I mean it would only be the second craziest thing a guy has ever done for me-"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow your roll, Itty Bitty." Emerson began to move around the apartment, gathering his clothes and his gun. "Doughboy's fine. He's probably experiencing some…dark night o' the soul or somethin'. Just walkin' around with his head down feelin' sorry for himself."
"And you think he left Digby out on the street?"
No. The PI could not honestly say he thought that...
"Hang tight, I'm on my way…"