Get Blank (Fill in the Blank) by Justin Robinson

Nadia Comaneci or whoever that I am Oana’s friend. I owe her a lot. I need to see her, so if one of you could tell me where she lives, I’d be grateful.”
    Balance Beam shook her head. “I don’t think so.”
    “Then one of you can come with me!”
    “Get into a car with a strange man?”
    “If Oana taught you anything she knows about jiu-jitsu, I’m about as dangerous to you as a corgi with pillows for teeth.”
    Balance Beam smiled at a memory. Pretty sure it involved her breaking someone in half with her shins. “You have a car, right?”
    I nodded.
    “Three of us will go with you.”
    “Fine. Let’s just go now, please?”
    “Emma K. and Emma R. Let’s go.” The two jiu-jitsu girls hopped out of the ring with disconcerting grace.
    “Wait. All your names are Emma?”
    “My name is Emily,” said Balance Beam.
    “Right. Totally different.” I shook my head and Emily and the two Emmas followed me out the door. Emily got in shotgun, leaving chalky handprints on my door handle. The Emmas were in the back. I felt like the oddest combination of hostage and sex criminal.
    “Where am I going?”
    “Near Dodger Stadium,” Emily said.
    I nodded and got back on the freeway, grateful I wouldn’t be transporting any minors over state lines. “What happened to your nose?” asked one of the Emmas.
    “Headbutted an orc.”
    On the stereo: “I Am the Resurrection” by the Stone Roses.
    Pretty tempting to call it Christian claptrap with a title like that. It sort of is, but the first clue is in the name of the band. See, the term “sub rosa” originally came from the Knights Templar, who would hold their meetings under a stone carving of a rose. When you realize that, it’s a short road to determining the purpose of the song as a not-so-subtle threat to those who thought the Knights Templar were dead and gone.
    I got off the freeway and drove east of downtown up into the short hills at the edge of Chavez Ravine. The houses had a pleasantly ramshackle look to them and apart from the cars on the street, the neighborhood had probably not changed much since the ’40s. Large berms rose on either side of the road and palm trees and cactus sprouted from the yellow dirt. Emily guided me through the winding streets to a modest one-story house poised at the end of a street.
    Right away, it was obvious there was something wrong. The front picture window was shattered, glass in the dirt and stuck amongst the needles of a barrel cactus beneath it. The house was on a small rise, with a decent amount of distance between it and the neighbors. Probably one of the selling points to someone like Oana.
    One of the Emmas gasped and all three were scrabbling at the doors as soon as I stopped. I was a little slower out of the car, trying to take the scene in. Unlikely Oana would still be there in light of that window. There was no police tape, either.
    Emily was one step into a gymnast’s run for the front door when I grabbed her shoulder and said, “Wait.” I’m not sure exactly what she did next, but as soon as conscious thought returned, I found I was on my knees wondering how one finger could cause me so much pain. “Don’t... don’t run in there,” I gasped. “We don’t know what... could you stop hurting me now, please?”
    “Sorry,” Emily said, but I don’t think she was. She let me go and I got to my feet, massaging my finger. “You shouldn’t grab people.”
    “I didn’t want you running in there into who knows what. Just do me a favor and hang back. If someone my age dies, it’s not quite as much of a tragedy.”
    The gymnasts exchanged a look and Emily nodded.
    “One thing,” I said. “When was the last time any of you talked to Oana?”
    “Practice yesterday,” one of the Emmas said. “She was helping me with my leglocks.”
    That was Monday, the same day Mina had been arrested. I looked back at the house. No tape. Nothing over the window. That meant no one had called the police. This wasn’t