Strangers

open it."
        Dom stared at Jack as if the ex-thief had lost his mind. "Me? You serious? What would I know about sophisticated security systems?"
        "Nothing," Jack said. "But you have the power to peel thousands of paper moons off walls and send them dancing through the air all at once, and you can levitate a score of chairs and perform other nitty tricks, so I don't see why you can't… reach into the mechanism of that door and cause it to slide open."
        "But I can't. I don't know how."
        "Think about it, concentrate, do whatever you did to move the salt shaker last night."
        Dom shook his head vigorously. "I can't control the power. You saw how it got out of hand. What if it runs wild here?
        I could hurt you or Ginger. I might inadvertently activate the gas jets and kill us all. No, no. Too risky."
        They stood in silence for a moment, with the wind huffing and whistling eerily at the open outer door.
        Jack said, "Dom, if you don't try, then the only way we'll get inside is as captives."
        Dom remained adamant.
        Jack walked back to the outer door. Ginger started to follow him because she thought he was leaving: But he stopped just inside the mouth of the tunnel and raised his hand over a button on the wall. He said, "This is a heat-sensitive switch, Dom. If you won't try to open that inner door, then I'll touch this switch and close the outer door, trapping us here. That'll start the computer's entry-clearance program, and when the computer discovers the surveillance cameras have been put out of commission, it'll sound an alarm that'll alert the security men."
        "One of the reasons we came here was to be caught," Dom said.
        "We came to have a look around and then get caught, if possible."
        "Well," Dom said, "we'll have to settle for just getting caught."
        The tunnel's heat had escaped into the night. Their breath plumed from them again. Those smoking exhalations heightened the impression that the two men were engaged in a battle, though it was a battle of wills rather than one of physical strength.
        Standing between them, Ginger had no doubt who would win. She liked and admired Dom Corvaisis more than any man she had met in a long time, partly because he seemed to embody both the drive and determination of Anna Weiss and the modest shyness of Jacob. He was good-hearted and, in his own way, wise. She would have trusted him with her life. In fact, she had already trusted him with it. But she knew Jack Twist would win, for he was used to winning, while Dom, by his own admission, had been a winner only since the summer before last.
        Jack said, "If they can't see us, they'll gas us for sure. Maybe they'll just sedate us. But maybe, to be safe, they'll use cyanide gas or some deadly nerve gas that'll penetrate our clothes because, after all, they can't be sure we're not wearing gas masks."
        "You're bluffing," Dom said.
        "Am I?" Jack said.
        "You wouldn't kill us."
        "You're dealing with a professional criminal, remember?"
        "You were. No more."
        "Still got a black heart," Jack said, grinning, and this time there was a disconcertingly maniacal note to his humor and a cold glint in his misaligned eye that made Ginger wonder if he actually might risk killing them all if he didn't get his way.
        "Our dying isn't part of the plan," Dom said. "It'll screw up everything."
        "And your refusal to help - that's not part of the plan, either," Jack said. "For God's sake, Dom, do it!"
        Dom hesitated. He glanced at Ginger. "Step as far out of the way as you can."
        She moved back beside Jack Twist.
        "Dom, if it does come open," Jack said, still keeping one hand raised over the heat-sensitive switch that would close the outer door, "go through fast. There's a guard in there somewhere. He'll be real surprised when the door opens because the entry-clearance program hasn't been run. If you can knock him down quickly, I'll be right behind you to silence him. That'll improve our chances of getting deeper into the installation and seeing what's to see before they nail our asses."
        Dom nodded, faced the inner door again. He looked over the frame, put one hand to the steel, moved his fingertips back and forth in the manner of an old-time safecracker feeling for the telltale vibration of falling tumblers. Then he turned to study the glass