“We’dbe exposed to snipers trying that anyway,” Wax said, squinting at the floodlights high atop the Shaw. “We’ll have to go up the inside… Ruin, Wayne. You’re right. It’s going to be rough.”
Wayne’s foot thumped against something from the ammo duffel. He frowned, then knelt and pulled out a wooden box that had been tucked at the bottom. It had Ranette’s symbol on the top.
Wax breathed out softly, almost reverently. “Steris packed it.”
“What?” Wayne said, opening the top.
He revealed a gun. Stocky, with a barrel a goodfour inchesacross. Unlike anything he’dever seen.
“Something special.” Wax took it out, then removed other pieces from the box to assemble something that looked a bit like a single-barrel shotgun, only with a much wider bore. It had a big central ammo wheel—almost like for an oversized revolver—which held slugs bigger than shot glasses.
Wayne whistled.
“We just call it the Big Gun,” Wax said. “I’dhoped I wouldn’t need it. It wasn’t built for a lawman. It was built… for a sword.”
In the distance, the sun finally sank beneath the ocean horizon, like a great big piece a’ dough bein’ dropped in to be fried up nice and toasty. Wayne held his breath. Then mists began to curl in the air. Growing like vines from invisible holes, pouring out into the city.
“Well,” Wax whispered, “that’s a welcome sight.” He glanced at the gun in his hands. “This next part is going to be bloody, Wayne. How much healing do you have left?”
“Not much,” Wayne admitted. “I can handle a bullet or two. That’s it.”
Wax took a deep breath. “I’ll want you to stay back. To let me do what Harmony has decided I need to do.” He cocked the strange gun, chambering an enormous bullet. “We’re going to get to the top of that building and stop the launch.” He paused. “Funny. I don’t know if I could have done this a few years ago. But I know who I am, what I’m fighting for, and why. There’s a certain peace in that, no matter how bad this is likely to get.”
“Rusts,” Wayne said, his stomach in a knot. “Wish I felt the same. Wax, after all this time, it’s still hard for me to sort out. I kill a man, and it ruins my life. Then I join you, and I’ve gotta keep killin’ them. Poor sods. You know?”
Wax shouldered the strange gun, then put his hand on Wayne’s arm. “Yeah. I know. But maybe your ma was right about the bad guy being a mesa. Being theland itself.Maybe that’s what she was saying, Wayne: It’s the world that we have to worry about. Individual men, yes, they can be evil. But we should worrymoreabout the world itself making them so.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well,” Wax said, “do you think you’dhave fallen in with the Plank Boys if your mother hadn’t died in that accident?”
“Absolutely not,” Wayne said.
“Nearly every man I’ve had to shoot? He had a story like yours. It’s the sort of thing Marasi is always talking about. You have to stop the Blatant Barms of the world, yes. But if you can create a world where fewer boys grow up alone… well, maybe you’ll have far fewer Blatant Barms to face in the future. Maybe that was what your mother was saying.”
Huh. “Yeah,” Wayne said. “Yeah, that sounds right.” He stood at the edge of the billboard ledge, the two of them facing the spire. Wax slid the last of those metal vials Harmony had given him into the aluminum-lined sheath at his belt. Wayne downed some himself.
“Wayne,” Wax said, “do you remember how this started? This new life, after the Roughs? I’dgiven up after Lessie’s death. You came to me in Elendel, andyoupulled me out, Wayne. I was content to sit around, stewing in my own self-reflection. Then you showed up and grabbed me. Told me there were train cars being robbed mysteriously. Set me on the path chasing Trell…”
“I suppose,” Wayne said. “Doesn’t mean I’m the hero.”
“Nonsense.” Wax glanced at him. “This is who you are. No amount of complaining, no phantom guilt, no whispering lying voice that saysotherwise is going to change that. ‘You’re meant to be helping people,’ Wayne. ‘It’s what you do.’”
Wayne cocked his head. “Was that… a quote or somethin’?”
“It’s what you said to me seven years ago. When people needed me, but I was too afraid to pick up a gun.”
“Yourememberthat?” Wayne said. “The exact things I said?”
“Of course I do. Those words changed my life.”
Wayne let out a howl of laughter. “Damn, Wax. I justsay things! You’re not supposed to actually payattentionto them!”
“It was meaningful!”
“Ha. Listening tome.Might as well write the stuff I say on a plaque or something. ‘You’re meant to be helping people. Also, remember—ain’t no fellow who regretted giving it one extra shake, but you can bet every guy has regretted giving one too few.’”
They shared a look as the mists began to curl around them, headlights illuminating the roadway beneath like a river of light running toward the Shaw. Then they both nodded.