CHAPTER 14

It was either he or the tuna fish.

That was the way he saw it as he stepped away from the kitchen counter and surveyed the can sitting in front of him. So far, the can of tuna was winning.

Getting home from his job early that day, he had managed to find a can of tuna to make some lunch out of, but no can-opener. He had, however, found a mallet and a screwdriver and was busy trying to puncture a series of slots into the rim of the can so that he could at least bend the lid back far enough to scoop out the tuna inside.

That was the idea at least. Instead he had managed four uneven holes in the can; two divots in the kitchen counter (when the can had bounced away after a couple of blows from the mallet); a small, upturned piece of metal on the can that he had pried open earlier; and a sliced finger, from where his hand had met the small, upturned piece of metal earlier in the battle.

He was just about to test out his theory of smashing the can open with several hard blows directly from the mallet when the phone rang.

Quietly putting down the mallet that he had raised over his head with both hands, he reached for the phone in the kitchen and talked into the receiver.

"Hello," he responded in a smooth, robotic method. "You have reached me. I am unable to come to the phone right now as I am in the middle of committing hari-kari with a mangled tuna-fish can. Please leave your message after the scream."

There was silence on the other end of the line for a split-second and he was about to put the receive back on the hook when someone began speaking on the other end of the line.

"Uh . . . hello. This is Paul. Paul Stanley. Listen, we've talked about your tryout and we've like to give you the job in the band. Come by around 10 tomorrow morning and we'll talk about the costume and how you want the drums' set-up. Good luck with the suicide. Talk to you later!" The line went dead.

Eric pulled the phone away from his ear and looked at the receiver in his hand. The words he heard began to sink in as a smile crept over his face and he placed the receiver back on the hook. After a brief pause, he stood in the middle of the kitchen and started shouting. "All right! Yee-ahh!"

Looking at the damaged can of tuna on the counter, he picked it up and, after hovering it over the sink, dropped it.

"Won't have to eat this junk anymore," Eric said with a laugh as the can hit the sink with a clunk. "Time I got myself some REAL lunch. I need to celebrate!"

Eric strutted out of the kitchen and went straight to the front door. With a swift turn of the knob, he opened the door, glided out and slammed the door behind him.

Within thirty seconds the door opened again and Eric walked back into the front room. Sheepishly, a touch of guilt on his face, he continued from the front room to the kitchen and looked at the can of tuna in the sink. Picking it up, he sat it back down on the counter and, with the screwdriver, managed to open up the lid enough to poke a fork inside and pull out some of the tuna.

"Well," he said, looking at the tuna with a sigh. "Waste not, want not." With those words, Eric Carr began eating his lunch.

Eric tried to keep his enthusiasm in mind two weeks later as he walked from the dressing-room area to the stage where the others were waiting.

At least, he was trying to walk. Even though he had worn platform shoes for years, he suddenly had trouble walking in the new ones he was wearing. They just felt wrong. Better yet, Eric thought to himself, the whole costume felt wrong.

"Yellow," he muttered under his breath as he held onto the wall for support. "Why does it have to be yellow?"

It was an ugly costume and when Paul and Bill had seen him put in on the other day, Eric thought that was the last he would have to see of it. After all, Bill immediately started shouting about what a mistake it was, and Paul just walked out of the room dazed and without uttering a word.

Still, Paul had told Gene and Ace about the costumes and both wanted to see what it looked like for himself. Gene, at least, wanted to know precisely what they had wasted the money on; Ace, however, seemed to fledged interest while at the same time trying to keep from laughing. At least Eric thought so. He knew Ace just wanted to see how stupid he looked in the thing and it further embarrassed and upset Eric as he stumbled in the hall.

That mattered little now, though, as he had reached the door leading to the stage. Eric took a couple of deep breaths, then pushed on the door and walked into the hall.

To make matters worse, Gene, Paul and Ace were all in their normal street clothes and sitting in some of the seats of the halls about five rows back from the stage. As he got to the footlights of the stage and stopped, Eric felt like he should start doing a circus act; after all, he was just seconds away from being a full-fledged clown.

"Well," Eric spoke in a monotone. "What do you think?" The three sat motionlessly for several seconds. Finally, Ace got up, walked up the small flight of steps to the stage and circled Eric a couple of times to study his costume. After doing so, he turned to Gene and Paul in the seats below.

"I give up, Paul. What's it supposed to be?"

"It is supposed to be a hawk," Gene said is a slow, even tone while pressing the fingertips of both hands together. Gene's elbows were wedged into the soft vinyl arms of the seat. His emphasis on the word "supposed" actually cheered Eric up, as he could see that Gene was not happy with the outfit.

Ace shook his head in agreement as if finally catching onto the joke. "Seriously, what's it supposed to be?"

"It's stupid, that's what it is," Paul quickly chimed in. "We can't go with that thing. They'll kill us the second Eric shows up on stage."

"Unless we change his name to Tweety Bird," Gene joked, although his face was of stone. "Whose bright idea was it to make it yellow?"

"I thought you did, Gene" Ace smirked.

"No," Gene cut in very quickly. "It should be brown . . . maybe a little bit of yellowish-brown, but not Screamin'-Yellow-Zonkers Yellow."

There was a pause and Gene spoke again. "It just won't do. We'll have to come up with something else."

" -- and fast," Paul said. "The first show is only in two weeks. We need to have time to show off Eric as well for promotion, so that cuts it down to about a week, really."

"Don't worry, Paul," Ace raised his hand as if to get a word in edgewise. "We'll figure something out before then. How's about a dog? Or a goldfish?"

Ace laughed at his joke. He laughed alone.

Feeling left out, Eric spoke for the second time since he hit the stage. "I'll try to come up with a few ideas of my own. I'm sure I can come up with something. But I have to tell you, that hawk makeup was just not working out anyway, so I'm glad we'll have to can the costume."

Everyone shook their heads in agreement, but no one spoke.

"Uh . . ." Eric coughed up after the silence went on for a bit too long. "If you guys are done staring at me, I'm going to change."

"Yeah, sure," Paul said, with a wave of his hand as if to make the costumes disappear.

"Fine," Gene quipped absentmindedly.

"Wait, let me get my camera out!" Ace shouted as he raced down the stairs to his seat where he had a briefcase that he had brought with him that day. It was a briefcase he had purchased after seeing Gene walking around with one in the previous year of being together as a group. The only difference was, while Gene had kept his briefcase full of business paperwork, Ace had rammed anything he wanted into his briefcase, from sandwiches to cameras to toys.

With grunts of disapproval from the others, Ace slowed, smiled and waved Eric onto the dressing-room as well.

Although Eric found the platforms awkward to walk in, he moved in a quick, confident manner back to the dressing room.

"Yellow," he mumbled as the door from the stage was closing shut behind him. "Can you believe it? Yellow."

The door closed with a loud click and Paul blew out a long breath of air as he hung his head down.

"Well, that was a lot of money down the drain," he said, closing his eyes.

"Happens." Gene did not look at Paul, but instead kept staring at the stage. "We've blown that kind of money before on things that didn't work, and we've always come up with something to replace it."

"Maybe we can make him a buzzard?"

Gene and Paul turned in unison to Ace. Ace had sat back down and was busying himself with the briefcase, then stopped as he felt the eyes of the others on him. He looked up and saw the disagreement on their faces.

"Well, buzzards are real big on the radio stations. What about that station in Cleveland?"

"Forget it, Ace. We'll think of something, but I think a bird is going to be the last thing we will attempt again." Gene crossed his arms and turned his head back to the stage.

"Okay," Ace knew he was licked on the issue. "Okay."

"While we're waiting for Eric to get out of that thing," Paul began, as if to change the subject, "we really should talk a bit about this upcoming tour and what we want to do with it. You know, the DYNASTY album did great for us, but the tour didn't quite live up to what we thought it was going to be."

"I think we'll do fine." Gene spoke quietly. "It's been awhile since Europe has seen us and the buzz we're getting about Australia sounds like it'll be a cakewalk. How's that guitar shaped like a star working for you, Paul?"

"It's about as good as Eric's costume. I've been working on it, and I'll take it with me, but if it doesn't give me a good sound on even a semi-regular basis, I'll probably break it in half during a show."

"Guys," Ace asked, his voice etched with seriousness for the first time that day. "If you want to talk about something that will affect the group, I do have a question for you."

"What?" The other two said in unison.

"If Eric is going to be a regular member of the band, when do you think we should tell him about the Talismans? When do you think he will be ready?"

The hall was quiet. Ace had thought that the others had just seen Eric's costume again when they finally responded to his question.

Gene's reaction was to let out a soft groan and he placed his head in his hands. Paul quickly reacted with first a sigh, then a smirk and finally a bit of anger on his face as he looked at the inquisitive Ace.

"Why the hell would you want to do that?"

Ace was taken aback.

"What do you mean, why the -- Morpheus told us that another would come along to replace Peter and now we have someone. I think the sooner we tell Eric about the Talismans and have Morpheus give him Peter's, the sooner we will be ready in case Blackwell strikes at the band again."

Gene shook his head. "Blackwell? We haven't heard anything about him since Morpheus told us about him. When we had a chance to check in and see what he was doing at his management company, he was gone. Everything was gone. There was not even a clue that he had even ever been there. Even his employees fell off the face of the earth."

Paul continued where Gene left off.

"Morpheus and his pals probably figured out where he was and finished him off. Period. As it stands now, there's no need to do anything about Blackwell, the Talismans or any other bits of this mumbo-jumbo."

"How do you know that," Ace snapped back in bewilderment. "He probably found out we figured out who he was and went into hiding. Probably just waiting for the right time to strike back at us. When we're fat and lazy and thinking we're so sure of ourselves."

"Why even bother with us, Ace?" Gene said, trying to steady his tone a bit lower so that the other two would calm down a bit and back off of each other. "He obviously knows about us, knows that we know about him and about the Talismans. It's also obvious that he may not even need the Talismans anyway. Remember what he did to Deveraux and Jameson? I think he's got bigger fish to fry before he would worry again about us."

"Besides, Ace," Paul continued, "we're just a rock and roll band. How much harm can we do to anyone anyway? Even with those powers we never accomplished much. I mean, c'mon, it's been seven, eight months and we haven't heard anything from Blackwell or Morpheus. I say it's probably over with."

"What's wrong with --" Ace cut himself short as he saw from the corner of his eyes that Eric was back in his street clothes and had reentered the hall.

Gene saw Eric as well. "Boy," Gene whispered, "Eric must have hated that costume even more than we did. It took him all of two minutes to change."

Eric walked toward the others, his hands behind his back and a smile on his face.

"Hey, Eric," Paul shouted to the approaching band member, "Come on down, we're talking about what's going to happen during the next tour."

Eric did not speak. He just kept walking until he reached the footlights of the stage and stared down at the threesome below.

"That's funny," Eric said in slow, measured beats. "I was just about to tell you about that's going to happen right now."

"What's that, Eric?" Ace asked.

"Take a guess."

As the words were spoken, Eric swung his arms around to reveal a revolver in his left hand. Without another word, Eric armed it at the quickly-frowning Ace and pulled the trigger.

In reflex, Ace swung his right hand up into a hitchhiker's pose and disappeared. Less than a split-second later he was across the hall and near the exit. Because he had been in a sitting position, he promptly fell on the floor behind the last remaining seats in the hall.

Paul and Gene, however, merely sat in stunned surprise.

Eric, unfazed by Ace's abrupt departure from the chair, slowly turned his body toward the shocked twosome to the right of his vision. He again brought the gun up to take in his new targets.

With those movements, Gene and Paul sprung into action and dived to the floor. In doing so, their bodies were stretched out in opposite direction and their heads almost crashed together as they felt the hard concrete floor below them.

"What the hell?" Gene said more out of reflex than as a genuine question.

"You were right, Gene," Paul said without looking at Gene. "He really did hate that costume more than we did."

Gene ignored Paul's comment. "Where did he get the gun?"

"I don't know! Why don't you ask him?" Paul responded, rather indignant.

"Just shut up for a minute," Gene raised his head slightly to listen for more gunfire.

All he heard as the sound of footsteps on the steps leading to the stage, and then a quick, hollow sound of running on the stage. The next thing he heard was Ace.

"Hey," Ace shouted from somewhere in the distance. "He's got my stuff!"

Both Gene and Paul poked their heads up from behind the seats to see Eric running up the stage toward an exit, Ace's briefcase tucked neatly under his right arm and the gun still in his left hand.

Ace began running down the aisle way toward the stage. Gene and Paul straighten themselves and stood near their seats as they watch Ace race by.

Ace turned long enough while running to shout at Gene and Paul. "My Talisman's in there!"

Without breaking his stride, Ace ran up the stairs to the stage, crashed into an anvil-case, did a somersault, and hit the fire-exit door just moments after Eric had gone through it.

It was just as Ace ran out the exit that the door from the dressing-room area opened and Eric appeared. He seemed a bit startled, although not as much as Gene and Paul were in seeing him.

"Hey, guys," Eric ran to the foot of the stage. "Did you hear a gun go off just a minute ago?"

Paul tried to take a step back and bumped into the row of seats.

"You should know, Eric. You just shot at us!"

"What?" Eric was confused.

"Wait a minute," Gene held both his hands up in a stopping-motion. "Where were you just a minute ago, Eric?"

"Backstage. I was just getting the rest of the costume off when I heard something like a gunshot."

"Where is Ace's briefcase?" Paul asked.

"Where is what?"

Gene looked at Paul. "Don't you get it, Paul? There is no way that Eric could have come out of that other door when we saw him just a second before head out the fire-exit. It couldn't have been Eric."

Realization dawned on Paul. "You mean it was someone pretending to be Eric?"

"Precisely."

They stood looking at each other for a split-second.

"Blackwell," they said in unison.

Without another word, the two began to move. Gene by running out to the aisle; Paul by leaping over the rows of seats. Both reached the stairs at the same time.

Eric watched, then began to follow. "What are you guys talking about?"

Paul was the first to hit the fire-exit door and immediately shut his eyes while adjusting to the bright sunlight outside the hall. Gene nearly ran into him as Paul looked out over the alleyway, then up the fire-escape stairs. He could see Ace several stories above just about to step off the fire-escape in onto the roof of the building.

"They're on the roof," Paul said as he began his ascent up the stairs.

"Oh, great," Gene muttered. "Couldn't they have picked the nice easy-to-get-to alley for this?" With a grunt, he started up the stairs as well.

By the time they had reached the top of the fire-escape, Ace and "Eric" had squared off on the roof. "Eric" was holding the briefcase by the handle, while pointing the gun at Ace. He stood at the far-end of the roof. Ace was near the ladder that led to the fire-escape and he saw Gene and Paul scrambling over the edge to join him, never once completely taking his eyes off of "Eric."

Gene gasped a bit for breath. He took little notice of the makeup that now covered Ace's face, but was surprised to see that Ace was no longer wearing his street clothes. Instead, Ace was wearing his DYNASTY costume. Gene had expected the makeup, although he had never seen the Talismans effect the clothing as well as the faces. Nevertheless, it was a matter for another time.

"What does he want, Ace?"

"I don't know. He's just standing there with the briefcase." Ace kept staring at "Eric."

"Well, why don't you zap him or something, Ace?" Paul asked.

"I can't do that. If I send him to limbo, he'll take the briefcase right with him," Ace tried to whisper the words as best as he could above the roar of the hot, midsummer wind that blew across the rooftop. "Why don't you use your 'psychic-eye' to put him down, Paul?"

"What?" Paul looked at Ace. "Um . . . I don't have my Talisman with me so I can't use my powers."

Ace grimaced. "Why don't you have it with you?"

"Well, why would I need it? Nothing has happened for months."

"Gene? Can you help?" Ace asked, although he felt he knew the answer.

"Uh, Ace, I don't carry that thing around all the time either." Gene was almost hesitant to admit saying what he did, although he kept some of the truth out of his words as he spoke.

"The Talismans don't have to be on you to use some of their powers," Ace was mad enough now that he spoke quite clearly and above the wind. "They remain within you, you just have to call on them and at least a portion of the powers you have should come to you."

"Exactly, Mr. Frehley," the man with the gun finally entered the conversation. "But then again, how often have they had the chance to use their powers?"

The man's image began to change in front of their eyes. Within seconds, instead of Eric holding the briefcase, a larger man appeared before them. He was about a foot taller than Eric, with a balding scalp and a huge scar over the right eye. He wore only a blue, skintight jumpsuit of some type. The only thing that did not change about the band was the briefcase and the gun.

"Well," the man said, smiling. "Here I am. If you want the briefcase -- if you want to make sure your little Talisman is safe -- if you want to know how I know about your Talismans -- come and get it."

Paul spoke, "That's not Blackwell."

"Must be one of his henchmen, like Jameson or Deveraux," Gene replied. "Blackwell must have given him some type of suit to change his appearance, like the Chamaeleon in Spider-Man."

"Gene, this is the worst time to be bringing up comic book trivia."

"Okay, Paul. Never mind. Ace, do you think you can get behind him and grab him with your transportation powers?"

"Possibly, but he could still have time to shoot at one of you guys. Splitting up might help."

"Okay," Gene turned to Ace and Paul slightly, "let's split off. Ace, you stay here. Paul, take the left and I'll take the right."

With a shake of his head in agreement, Paul began to move to the left of Ace and circle the roof, while Gene did the same in the opposite direction. Ace remained where he was, his face fixed upon the still-smiling man in the other corner of the roof.

From the ladder of the fire-escape, Eric watched. It was the only thing he could do.

As Gene and Paul reached the other corners of the roof, the man turned and fired the gun at Paul. Paul tucked, rolled and ran into the ledge of the roof. Gene stopped in his tracks, while Ace began to move into his familiar "hitchhike" position when the man brought the gun back around and pointed it at Ace's head.

" That's far enough. And, no, Mr. Frehley. Not yet."

After the shot rang out, Eric ducked his head back down and slid down the ladder to the top landing of the fire-escape. He could hear the man saying something, but he was too far around to make out the comment.

Eric strained to hear what was being said, but to no use. In anger, he kicked at the brick wall of the building. It was frustrating enough that he had no idea what was going on, but more importantly, he felt frustrated because he knew he wanted to help the guys. And what was this talk about Talismans and powers?

He also did not like how the man kept smiling as if it was a big joke to be shooting out people. If only there was some way to get the better of him. To beat him. To --

"Mr. Carr?"

If Eric could have jumped back ten feet he would have. Instead he twisted his body around to see an old man wearing jeans and a T-shirt. In his hands he held a package toward Eric.

"Who are you," Eric, grabbing at his chest as if he had just suffered a heart attack?

"That matters little right now, Mr. Carr. The only thing that matters is what is happening on the rooftop as we speak. Mr. Carr, in this package is a power. A symbol that will give you a chance to not only turn the tide of events up there, but a power that could be for the benefit of all mankind. Will you take it to be used for the betterment of your race?"

"You mean, if I take this package I will be able to help them?

"Yes," Morpheus said."

"Of course I will," Eric grabbed at the package and immediately began opening it. As he worked on opening the package, a glow began to move not only around it, but around himself as well.

"Look," Gene spoke every word in an even tone, "you may have the briefcase, but you know we can't let you get away with the Talisman. And Blackwell probably would not be entirely pleased if you end up killing one of us."

The man almost laughed. "He doesn't need all of you. Besides, I have my mission. I've never failed."

Gene was about to continue with his line of reasoning when someone bounced onto the rooftop behind Ace. The figure pushed Ace out of the way and cried out to the man across the roof.

"Hey, man, you want to play games, how about a little target-practice."

With that, the person began moving toward the gunman. The person wore clothes that all of the other recognized by now, but his face was now cover in black and white makeup, much like the others would wear. The shape was somewhat different, but it was definitely supposed to be some type of animal.

The voice, as well, was known by all.

"Eric?" Paul questioned the figure as it sidestepped a bullet from the gun.

Eric ignored Paul as he advanced upon the man with the briefcase. "You see, I'm not quite so easy to hit, am I? Pretty tough stuff with a gun when you can't hit a target, huh, buddy?"

The man once again fired the weapon at Eric, who rolled to one side, sprung up and leaped within five feet of the man. The man pulled the gun up to chest-level on Eric and was about to pull the trigger, when he felt a tap on his shoulder.

Surprised, he twisted around to see Ace there. Ace grabbed at the briefcase and pulled it away from the man.

"I believe that belongs to me," Ace said calmly.

The man felt another tug, only this time from his left hand. Looking down at his hand, he saw that the gun was no longer there. Fearing the worst, he raise his head to see Eric holding the gun with the barrel pointing down. With his free hand, Eric pulled back his fist.

"And I believe you used something that belonged to me a few minutes ago."

After the impact of his fist, the man hit the ground in a large clump. He did not move, but his steady breathing conveyed that he was only unconscious and not dead.

Eric had a smile on his face as he looked up from the man to Ace.

"Well, whadayaknow? It worked!"

"What worked?" Gene said as he came up to Eric and Ace.

"I thought if I distracted him long enough, you or Paul or Ace would have a chance to get at him. If he spent all of his time on me, he wouldn't be able to concentrate on the rest of you guys."

"Well, it worked," Paul said, joining in the group. "But that was crazy."

"Yeah," Ace laughed as he pointed at the makeup on Eric's face. "Crazy like a fox."

"What do you mean?" Eric was confused by Ace's laughter.

Gene showed a bit more concern. "Have you seen your face? You've got makeup on it and it looks kinda like a fox."

"Well . . ." Eric scratched the back of his neck and chuckled. "I was thinking about outfoxing the guy when this old guy appeared on the fire-escape with me and handing me this object."

Eric held up what was once Peter's Talisman. Only now, it had changed its shape to that of a fox's head instead of that of a cat.

"Morpheus! He was here?" Ace darted over to the fire-escape as he spoke, but could not see anyone there anymore.

"I guess that's what his name is. But he gave me this and then I felt like something was increasing inside of me. Like I was suddenly stronger and my mind was thinking a bit clearer."

"It's the Talisman from the Elders," Gene said as he looked at the object. "The what from the what?"

"Never mind," Paul said. "We'll explain it later. The thing to do now is to get this guy off of this rooftop and find out what he knows."

Paul pointed to the man, only there was a problem. He was no longer there. The three standing there spread apart slightly and looked around, but he was nowhere to be seen. Ace came running back when he saw the others moved in this manner.

"What's the matter?"

"That guy! The Eric clone! He's gone!"

"Was it another case of Blackwell sending someone to limbo, Ace?" Gene asked.

Ace shook his head. "Negative, Gene. I would have felt that type of presence. He sends them away in a violent kind of action in limbo. The only other way is if he really could move someone like the way I do, but why let this guy live? He didn't succeed in getting what Blackwell wanted."

All four members were silent as the hot wind blew their hair around.

From across the street they were being watched. In the window of another building stood the man they had just fought. On his face was a smile.

He was smiling because he had pleased his master. The teleportation had worked exactly as he was told it would work and he was safe. More importantly, he had gotten exactly what was wanted.

He looked at Eric.

Yes. Exactly what was wanted.

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