Love Is Only an Illusion

Merritt thanked the crowd before the final act began. “Tonight we would like to try something that will, well, set us a bit apart.”

“For our final trick,” Henley announced, “we’re gonna do something never before seen on a Las Vegas stage.”

“Or any stage for that matter,” Jack added.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Sutton called, meeting Danny at the set of stairs. Together, they ran up them.

“Tonight,” Danny continued.

“We are going to rob a bank,” the pair announced in unison, their arms outstretched as to invite the audience to join in their crime. The audience erupted into loud cheers.

“That’s a lot of excitement for a crime, don’t you think, Sutton?” Danny asked, placing a hand on her arm to turn her attention toward him.

Their eyes met, and a smile spread across Sutton’s face. “I’m getting excited! What about you, people?” she asked the audience as she broke from Danny’s hold, the smile never leaving her face.

“One, two, three!” Merritt and Jack counted down on the side of the stage before dramatically high-fiving one another.

“Okay, okay. Now, please, please, settle down,” Danny instructed the crowd, giving Sutton a nod to continue.

“Now who here has a bank they would like us to rob?” she asked the crowd, strolling along the edge of the circle atop the stairs. Thousands of voices cried out as bodies jumped up and down throughout the crowd.

“That’s a lot of people with a vendetta,” Danny inferred. “So, we’ll choose one at random then. My associates will make sure it’s random, right?”

Jack leaned down to a man. “Elvis, help me out, bud,” he said as the man searched for a ping pong ball he hoped was his own.

“In Jack’s bowl are ping pong balls with section numbers,” Sutton informed the crowd. “Jack, could you hand me a section number?” Jack threw her the ball. “Thank you, we are looking at Section B.”

“Where is Section B?” Danny asked the crowd. The section erupted in cheers. “Okay. There. It’s gonna be one of you guys. Get ready.”

“I don’t know why everybody’s happy,” Sutton laughed. “It’s only them.”

“Merritt, can I get a row, please?” Danny called as Merritt threw him the ping pong ball. “Thank you, Merritt. We are looking at row number 5.”

“Where’s that?” Sutton questioned as the row cheered.

“And Henley, could I please have a random seat number?” Danny asked the escape artist. She threw him the ball but Sutton stepped in front and caught it.

“Too slow,” Sutton winked as the crowd laughed. “Oh, lucky number 13!” she announced, tossing Danny the two ping pong balls in her hands.

Danny smiled at her. “B-5-13. Where are you?” He searched the crowd as the spotlight hit the victim. “Sir, please, stand up. There you are. Hi. Could you just confirm for me that this is, in fact, your seat? B-5-13.”

Etienne looked behind him. “Yes,” he confirmed.

“Okay, wonderful,” Danny said, tossing the ping pong balls to the side. “Now, could you please tell us your name and the name of your bank?” he laughed.

“Well, my name is Etienne Forcier,” he announced, “and my bank, it’s, uh, Credit Republican de Paris.”

“French, okay,” Sutton intrigued. “Yeah, I totally know how to speak that.” She turned away from the Frenchman, shaking her head and mouthing “not” to the audience behind her. They laughed.

“We were hoping for something a little more local,” Danny explained, “a kind of mom-and-pop credit union with no security, but that’s fine.”

“A promise is a promise, Daniel,” Sutton smirked with a bite to her lip.

Danny visibly gulped but gave her a side smile. “Could you please come up to the stage and we’ll, uh, rob your bank?”

“And while he does that,” Sutton stepped in, “there is someone here tonight without whom we would just be five magicians working the circuit, trying to get… Well, actually, trying to get here.”

“You probably know this man, if not from one of the many, many companies he puts his name on,” Danny continued. “He is our friend. He is our benefactor. Mr. Arthur Tressler. Please, stand up, Art. Please, stand up.”

“The only man here with the Queen’s cell phone number,” Merritt added, getting a chuckle out of the crowd.

“Actually, please stay standing, Art,” Sutton instructed. “I want to say that when we came to Mr. Tressler, we promised that, as a unit, we could become the biggest name in magic.” As she finished, her and Merritt blew him a kiss and made their way over to Etienne.

“So, we wanted to say thank you,” Henley told him. “And by the way, Art, you notice on the sign out front, we made sure to put your name on top.”

“If you turn out to be as good as you think you are, dear girl,” Tressler replied to Henley, “that won’t be necessary much longer.”

“We haven’t done our closer yet,” Henley reminded him. “Why don’t you keep watching it and then you can decide for yourself. Ladies and gentlemen, Arthur Tressler!”

“Thank you. And, of course, once again, the Cardinals of Clairvoyance, Merritt McKinney and Sutton Reeves,” Danny announced, gesturing to the two mentalists.

“Etienne, what Jack is bringing to the stage now is what we in the magic world call a teleportation helmet,” Sutton explained. Jack showed off the helmet to the audience who awed in its beauty.

“You will need to wear this, as it will allow you to literally fold through space and time to your bank in the… 8th?” Merritt guessed.

“9th arrondissement,” Sutton answered as Etienne gave her a nod of confirmation. “Now, once you are there, we will be able to speak with you through this helmet.”

Jack slipped the helmet on Etienne’s head. “Now if… Oh, my Gosh, that’s beautiful,” Merritt joked. “It has the added attraction of being very stylish.”

“It’s about time the French learned from Americans on that subject, huh, Merritt?” Sutton giggled.

Merritt nodded. “Is that a beautiful piece of headgear?” he asked the crowd who responded with cheers. Etienne thanked them.

“But, before you go anywhere,” Danny called as he and Henley made their way up the stairs, “could you please, pick a card, any card.” Etienne reached for a card and Danny pulled it back. “Not that card. No, that’s an old American joke. You can take that one.” Etienne did. “Show it to your friends in Section B there. B-But not to us.”

“Okay, great,” Sutton smiled, whipping out a Sharpie. “Now if you could just sign your name there.”

“In English, if possible,” Danny laughed. Merritt rewarded Danny for his humor. “Put it in your pocket.”

“And now for one tiny detail,” Henley announced as she threw her hand into the air, black fabric waving and unraveling across center stage.

“Woah,” Danny murmured as he clapped.

“Pretty cool, huh?” Sutton smiled as she clapped along. Danny nodded.

“Now, Etienne, let’s step into this cockamamie contraption,” Merritt instructed the Frenchman. “And I’ll step off of it. Bonne chance.”

“It’s 11:50 p.m. here in Vegas,” Sutton informed the man. “That’s 8:50 a.m. in Paris. Your bank opens in less than 10 minutes.”

Merritt started the countdown. “One, two…”

“Three,” the Reeves girls smiled, pressing the large red button.

The machine before them clamped shut, not a trace of Etienne in sight. The audience gasped.

“What the fuck?” someone whispered.

“Etienne?” the team called.

“It wasn’t supposed to happen like that, was it?” Merritt questioned the girls. They shrugged and called for the man again. “I liked that little French guy. Where’d he go?”

“Wait, there he is!” Danny excitedly announced as Etienne’s picture popped up on the screens around the arena. The audience cheered. “No, no, no, no, please, please, please. This is Daniel Atlas. Can you hear me?”

Sutton shivered. Something about Danny saying his full name made her tingly. She wasn’t about to complain, though.

“Etienne? Are you okay?”

“Yes,” Etienne answered.

“Perfect. What do you see in there?”

“Money. Is this real?” the Frenchman questioned.

“Yes. It looks like three million or so Euros’ worth.”

Sutton leaned on Danny to talk to Etienne through the mic. “Okay, now, here’s what we’re gonna need you to do.”

Danny chuckled and went along with the bit. “I want you to take the card that you signed out of your pocket. And I want you to take the ticket stub from tonight’s show and I want you to put it right there in the middle of the money. Now…”

“Drop it,” Danny and Sutton instructed in unison, their eyes meeting. Smiles spread across both their faces.

“Now on the side of your helmet you should feel a button,” Danny continued. “Don’t press it just yet. That button activates an air duct that connects Paris to Las Vegas. Okay, good. Now you can press it.”

“All right, Etienne, hold on tight,” Jack reminded him. “You might feel a bit of a vacuum.”

“Wait a second,” Sutton acted, holding onto Danny’s arm as a rumbling sound filled the arena.

Danny looked down at Sutton’s fingers wound around his bicep. He raised an eyebrow at the girl who winked, saying, “Gotta make it look real, right?”

Just then, Euros began to fall from the sky. The audience cheered as they tried to catch the money.

“Thank you, Etienne!” Danny yelled as he stayed connected to Sutton. “Thank you, everyone!”

“We are the Horsemen!” the team cried in unison, telling the crowd good night. Sutton took hold of Danny and Jack’s hand as they bowed for the audience.