So…I vanished.

When I wrote the last chapter, I was intending to let that one sit for a week or so, because it was very hard to write, harder to edit, and my heart was just so heavy about it. I never intended to be gone a month. Depression is fun. I also went on a little soul searching trip that was also fun, the non sarcastic kind of fun. But when it's the time of year when your seasonal depression starts dating your clinical depression…well, I'm sure some of you get it, and it's just too hard to explain to those of you that don't. Just take our word for it that it sucks. But enough about me, back to (some of) our favorite geniuses.


"Then something new happened,

And turned my life around entirely,

Oh baby, you happened,

And look what happened to me."

Ralph looked up from his laptop. "Daze, how much longer is this going to be going on? I only have another two hours to submit this code to the Initiative or they're going to go with Duncan. And I don't have to tell you again how much I hate Duncan."

"Ralph, my audition is in three days."

Ralph tapped the tips of his index fingers together. "Okay, but you do see how two hours is much less than three days, right?"

She grabbed her water bottle and took a sip. "The Prom has been my dream show for, like, ever, and now that it's got a revival I finally have a shot and I'm running out of rehearsal time."

"Yes, I know, but again, two hours, three days…"

"I guess I could take a break. Maybe a joke break. Hey Ralph, why did the chicken cross the road?"

Ralph just raised his eyebrows.

"To get to the buzzkill's house," Daisy said.

"Do you mean buzzard? I don't get it."

She sighed, her bangs flying upward. "How about this one. Knock knock."

"Who's there?"

"The chicken."

Ralph rolled his eyes. "Ha – ha."

"How about this. You can code until Patty comes home. But then I want to run through it one more time for her."

"Patty is going to be home in less than twenty minutes."

"Well then, you'd better get cracking, huh?"

Truth be told, Ralph didn't want to 'get cracking.' He wanted to get this done, submitted, and over with, and then on to the next job, the pile of repairs that had to be done by the time the students got back from break. He wanted to finish, but only because he didn't know how not to work with computers. He was good at it. And once up on a time it was his favorite thing to do. Nowadays it felt more like going through the motions, a way to earn a paycheck, but it came so naturally to him that he usually didn't mind.

Tonight, however, he would put it off if he didn't have a deadline. He would close his laptop, stretch out on the couch, and watch Daisy Khan woo Patty Logan all over again with her best Alyssa Greene impression. Sometimes he thought back on the days when he had an intense crush on his best friend. That almost amused him now. He'd watched Patty fall in love, with Daisy and with herself, and there were no deeply repressed pangs of jealousy within him.

It was nice, to love one's friends like this. It was the kind of unconditional affection that movies and books rarely featured.

He didn't know why, but that thought made him suddenly miss his parents and sister. And those were pangs that were real and deeply felt.


"Aunt Paigey, who is Charlie Daniels?"

"He's a singer," Paige said. "Country, Bluegrass music."

"A singer?" Tad used the corner of an envelope he was holding to get dirt out from under one of his nails.

"He has a big song about the devil visiting Georgia," Toby said, continuing in an exaggerated accent. "He was lookin' furra soul to steal…"

"Cute," Paige said sarcastically. She shifted on the couch, uncrossing her left leg over her right and crossing the right leg over. "Your dad is making a mess of Charlie Daniels' most famous song, called The Devil Went Down to Georgia."

"Georgia is a state," Tad said. "Did you know that?"

"I did. It's also a country."

"It's a state and a country?"

"No. There's a state called Georgia and a country called Georgia."

"Hang on," Toby said. "I'm pulling up the song on my phone. You'll see I did the accent perfectly."

"You did not."

"Is it a good song?" Tad asked. "Or is it overrun?"

"If you're trying to quote Mama, you mean overrated," Toby said. "The Devil Went Down to Georgia features a boy who makes a deal with the devil and wins. That's what the kids are calling, uh…" Toby snapped his fingers.

"Big Dick Energy," Walter said. "Though I'm not sure we should be using that phrase in front of the kid."

"You're the one who used it in front of the kid," Paige pointed out, gesturing with her head toward Tad.

"Yes! Right. Oops."

"Also the kids haven't said that since 2019," Paige said.

"Whatever." Walter shrugged. "Either way, you've completely misinterpreted that song."

"There's nothing to interpret," Paige said. "It's one of the most literal ballads."

Walter raised an eyebrow. "Pride is one of what the religious call the seven deadly sins. So is greed. The devil approaches Georgie – "

"Johnny."

"And he says hey, here's an idea, I have this golden fiddle, and I'll give it to you if you play better than me. But if I win, then I get your soul. And Georgie – "

"Johnny."

"His name isn't relevant to this story, Paige," Walter said. "But sure, Johnny is like hey, it might be a sin but I'm the best player ever so I'm going to take you up on this. Kind of like if someone said to me hey, let's computer program together and see who wins."

"So far it sounds like we're all interpreting the song the saaaame way, Walt," Toby said.

"Except that the battle was never really about fiddle skill. It was about if he would let his pride overcome him – which he admits when he says it might be a sin – in order to get the golden fiddle, the desire for which is the second deadly sin, greed. The true test for Johnny's soul was whether or not the battle would commence in the first place. He lost the second he agreed to participate."

Toby and Paige glanced at each other. Then Toby cocked his head, looking back at Walter. "When did you get so…song analyze-y?"

"I'm married to an artist at heart," he said. "Eventually the right side of the old think tank was going to start working."

"I told you he hit his head a few too many times," Paige joked, pressing her lips together because joking about it was not helping her as she hoped it would.

"You know, not to be self – centered here," Sylvester said from his seat in Walter and Paige's recliner, "but the whole point of this lunch was to make me feel better, and all that's happened is hacking security footage of Linda's speed dating event to see if my possibly soon to be ex wife is there and ruining one of the most well known songs in the country. And spending forty minutes to get Amber and Ellie down to nap, but I get that at least. Kids are going to kid."

"And Florence wasn't at the speed dating event," Toby said. "How does that not make you feel better?"

"I don't know." He shifted onto his side. "Maybe because it made me realize that the possibility existed. That we were looking because there was nothing to suggest she wouldn't be there."

"It's only been a week," Paige said. "She'll come around."

"She's checked into a hotel in Long Beach. We've been to Long Beach. What could she be doing in Long Beach that she can't do anywhere else?"

"Isn't that the city where competitive Duck Duck Goose was born?" Toby asked. "She did say she needs space to figure some things out. Maybe she's decided to be a jock after all."

"Aren't you supposed to be a therapist?" Sylvester said. "She's in trouble. She's lost herself; she's shutting people out, our marriage might be over and you aren't helping either of us."

Toby sighed. "I'm sorry, Sly. I'm trying to be more of a friend here, than a professional. To both of you. In the past my…clinical side has done more harm than good. Cabe has surveillance on Florence, you know he won't let her come to any harm. Eventually, she'll look for help and we'll all be there with resources for her. But you of all people know how she's rejecting others initiating that for her right now. And hey, bright side, she was at work yesterday."

"And she left after forty minutes of awkward silences while we worked on opposite sides of the room."

"But it's something."

"It's something," Sylvester repeated, quietly, as if he wasn't fully convinced. "Something."

"Aunt Paigey? Why is the devil guy writing to Scorpion?"

Paige rubbed her temples. "What, Tad?"

Tad handed her the envelope he'd had in his hands, one corner dented. "This letter is to Scorpion, from Charlie Daniels."

"Oh, oh," Paige said. "No, Tad, this isn't that Charlie Daniels. This is a different guy named Charlie Daniels. Like how there's a guy named Charlie Brown who works for a famous retired racehorse farm. Or how there's another Walter O'Brien who claims he caught a bad guy who hurt some people at the Boston Marathon, but that isn't your Uncle Walter. This Charlie Daniels is, oh god, he's this guy who has been looking into the accident with the plane we were in. He's affilia…he works with the science man with the money we were meeting with, do you remember that?"

Paige opened the envelope and pulled out the papers inside. She scanned the contents, then her eyes shot back up to the top to read more thoroughly.

A yelping sound rushed from her throat, and she slapped a hand over her mouth.