My Favorite Band Does Not Exist

by Robert T. Jeschonek

  Idea sighed. "You two have a lot in common."

  She cracked her gum and pointed across the table. "Reacher Mirage is sitting right there. What do you want to say to him?"

  Idea frowned thoughtfully. He would feel ridiculous talking to empty space.... But he could not entirely dismiss the possibility that Eurydice was telling the truth. After all, she seemed to be linked with Eunice, and he'd seen for himself that Eunice had some kind of mysterious abilities when she'd switched faces in the mall in Indianapolis.

  Besides, Idea really did have a lot to say to the guy who was pretending to be his creation. He thought of a question and opened his mouth, but Eurydice cut him off.

  "Too late," she said. "He beat you to it. He wants to know why you've been claiming that you made up his band."

  "That got a rise out of him." Eunice laughed as she watched the empty bench across the table. People in the next booth were staring at her as if she were crazy, but she didn't seem to notice.

  She watched and listened attentively to the emptiness, then turned to Reacher. "Idea wants to know why you and your friends have been pretending to be the band that he made up."

  "Tell him I don't know what he's talking about," said Reacher. "I never even heard of him before yesterday, and Youforia's been together for years."

  Eunice told her unseen contact what Reacher had said, then waited for a reply. "He says you stole his idea and are using it to rip people off."

  Reacher folded his arms. By now, he'd forgotten all doubts about carrying on a conversation with someone he couldn't see. "Oh yeah? Well, here's what I want you to tell him ..."

  "I won't repeat what he said." Eurydice looked disgusted. "There's no need for that kind of language."

  "He can curse me out all he wants," said Idea. "But that won't change the fact that he's a thief! He stole my intellectual property!"

  Eurydice relayed Idea's message and waited for a response. "In a nutshell"—she cracked her gum—"Reacher would like to see you prove it."

  "Idea says he can show you computer log files dating back to the beginning of Youforia," said Eunice. "The files detail all activity related to the Youforia website and will verify that his claim predates your own."

  Reacher snorted. "Speaking of websites, ask him where he got all that personal information about my band that he posted on YoFace, Yapper, and his website. While you're at it, ask him why he felt the need to violate our privacy like that."

  "I made it all up!" Idea rubbed the three moles on his left cheek with the tip of his index finger. "You can't violate someone's privacy if he's a fictional character!" As he said it, he felt a twinge of Deity Syndrome—an ache in his stomach, a flicker of dizziness, a quick chill up his spine.

  "Reacher says he's as real as you are," said Eurydice. "So are Wicked, Chick, and Gail."

  "Oh, sure," Idea snapped. "The people claiming to be them are real. The people who stole their identities from my website."

  "What if he's telling the truth?" said Eurydice, asking him a direct question instead of passing along his message to the other side.

  "The truth is, I made up everyone in the band and everything about them," said Idea.

  "Okay." Eurydice nodded. "But what if he's telling the truth, too?"

  "WHAT are they saying over there?" Reacher asked. It had been a few moments since the last response from Idea.

  "She's saying that maybe there are different truths for different people," said Eunice.

  Reacher frowned. "I don't understand."

  "What's true for you isn't necessarily what's true for somebody else, is it?" Eunice reached over and grabbed the ketchup bottle from the condiment rack along the windowsill. "You might say that this ketchup is red. Someone who's colorblind might say it's gray. You'd both be telling the truth based on what you perceived, right?"

  Reacher thought about it. "Sure. What's your point?"

  "What if he didn't steal your ideas for the band?" said Eurydice. "What if he didn't see your website or social networking posts until long after he'd formed his band?"

  "But he must have seen my website first," Idea insisted. "How else could he have come up with a band called Youforia with members who are exact copies of the ones I described on my site?"

  Eurydice cracked her gum. "Maybe the two of you are connected."

  "At the amphitheater, did you think it was odd that four people thought you were Idea?" Eunice asked. "Four people who knew him well?"

  "Sure," said Reacher. "But things happened so fast, I didn't get much of a chance to think about it."

  "Idea had a similar experience," said Eunice. "Your father, brother, and cousin all thought he was you."

  "My parents thought he was me?" Idea asked. "Bulab and Scholar, too?"

  Eurydice nodded. "What do you think the chances are that was just a freak case of mistaken identity?"

  "What are you getting at?" Reacher asked.

  "Has it occurred to you that maybe you're not enemies after all?" said Eunice. "That maybe you're important to each other for a different reason?"

  "Like what?"

  "You tell me." Eurydice blew an orange bubble, then popped it and drew the gum back into her mouth. "What could you do for each other?"

  Idea considered the question, staring at the spot where he imagined invisible Eunice might be sitting. "When Eunice and I asked the digihoroscope what I should do when I met the phony Youforia, it said to 'unite with your enemies.'" He paused to think for a moment. "Eunice said maybe that meant I should team up with the phonies and make them the real Youforia."

  "There's just one problem with that," said Eurydice. "Reacher wants to keep his band a secret."

  "Then why did they set up this big debut concert in Maysville?" Idea asked.

  "What makes you think Reacher did that?"

  "Idea says he didn't set up the Maysville show," said Eunice.

  "Then who did?"

  "Who knows?" Eunice shrugged. "I guess it could have been anyone."

  "It definitely wasn't me," said Reacher. "I'm not ready to take the band public yet."

  Lightly, Eunice laid her fingertips atop Reacher's forearm. The glossy black and white nails gleamed in the sunlight from the window. "You're afraid to take the band public, you mean."

  Reacher met her gaze, then looked away. "Yes."

  "If neither of us set up the concert, I know who did," said Idea. "I know why this is all happening."

  "Tell me." Eurydice cracked her gum twice.

  Idea's heart pounded, and his stomach twisted. "It's him. The same one who makes us do everything."

  "God?"

  Idea shook his head. "I've always had the feeling that someone is pulling our strings. Like we're in a novel, and we have no control over what happens."

  Eurydice placed a hand on his shoulder. "This feeling. Is it fear?"

  Idea flicked his fingertip over the triangle of moles on his left cheek. "Yes."

  "You're afraid you'll let everyone down," said Eunice. "Because your family has always told you that you're a failure. Because they've treated you like one all your life."

  Reacher stared at his clenched fists on the table and nodded.

  "Other people have always run your life, haven't they?" said Eurydice.

  "Right," said Idea.

  "Even when you ran away, you knew they would catch you sooner or later."

  Idea stared out the window. "So what?"

  Eurydice cracked her gum twice. "So what if I told you that you could change everything?"

  "Change everything how?" said Reacher.

  "Make everything right," said Eunice. "The two of you." She gestured at the empty seat across the booth.

  "I don't get it."

  "I can give you the chance," she said. "But the two of you have to agree to do something."

  "Agree to do what?"

  "Work together," said Eurydice. "Agree to work together instead of against each other."

  "Work together on what?"

  "Why
not assume it's something that could do you some good?" Eurydice blew a lemon yellow bubble with her gum, then popped it. "Why not take a chance?"

  Idea stared at her. "What does Eunice say?"

  "Tell him I can't tell him what to do," Eunice said to the empty space across the table. "The same goes for you," she said to Reacher.

  "To be honest," said Reacher, "I really don't know what you're talking about."

  Eunice took his hand. "Do you wish your life was different?" she asked, staring deep into his eyes.

  Idea answered without hesitation. "Yes."

  "And if I offered you the chance to change your life, would you take it?" asked Eurydice.

  Reacher thought it over, then shrugged and nodded. "Sure. Why not?"

  "Even if there are no guarantees?" said Eunice. "Even if the outcome is in your hands?"

  "Nothing in life is guaranteed anyway, right?" said Idea.

  "And will you promise to work with Reacher instead of against him?" Eurydice asked. "No matter what?"

  "How could I promise that if I've never even met him?" said Reacher. "All I know is that he posted personal information about my band on the Internet, and he thinks I ripped him off."

  "You've talked about how what he says and what I say can both be true," said Idea. "And about how maybe we're connected in some way ... but I still don't know for a fact that he didn't steal Youforia from me. I don't even know for a fact that he's here."

  "And how do I know you're telling me the truth?" asked Reacher. "I barely know you."

  "I want to talk to Eunice," said Idea.

  "I want to talk to Eurydice," said Reacher.

  "Ten seconds," said Eunice and Eurydice. "You have ten seconds to tell me yes or no. Yes, you want the chance to change things, and you promise...

  "...to work with Idea...

  "...to work with Reacher...

  "...no matter what happens; or no, you don't want to do it. Maybe I'm full of crap, in which case, what do you have to lose?" Eunice and Eurydice paused, raising their eyebrows. "And maybe I'm telling the truth, in which case, why miss out on such a great opportunity?" They both lifted their hands with all fingers extended.

  "Ten ... nine..." They flicked down one finger at a time to match the count.

  "This is ridiculous." Idea shook his head.

  Reacher rubbed the white stubble on his scalp. "What's with the time limit?"

  "Eight," said Eurydice.

  "Seven," said Eunice.

  "I mean, this is just a hypothetical question, right?" said Idea.

  "Six," said Eunice.

  "Five," said Eurydice.

  "Okay," said Reacher. "I'll play along."

  "Four," said Eunice.

  "If such a thing were possible," said Idea, "I guess I would say..."

  "Three," said Eurydice.

  "Yeah," said Reacher. "Yes. I'll do it."

  "Two," said Eunice.

  "Yes," said Idea.

  "One," said Eurydice, cracking her gum.

  A moment later, when Mixie hurried back to the table, Eunice and Reacher were gone. In the middle of the table, a ketchup bottle sat atop a five-dollar bill.

  "That sweetheart," Mixie said to herself, slipping the money into her apron pocket. "This will go to charity." She patted the pocket, unable to bring herself to keep such a big tip for doing so little work.

  When Mixie finally got around to glancing at the booth, Eurydice and Idea were gone. Pennies, hundreds of them, were spread all over the table.

  "Oh, good." Mixie stuck a fresh cigarette in her crinkled sneer. "A nice tip." Smoking was banned in the diner, but she lit the cigarette, anyway.

  "Thanks a lot, sweetheart." Mixie said "sweetheart" like it meant something nasty. "You'll get yours."

  When she got done counting all the pennies, she found there were exactly five hundred of them.

  WHEN Reacher opened his eyes, he was running full tilt through a forest. His initial shock at leaping suddenly into that situation was compounded when he looked down at himself.

  His legs appeared to be whirling blurs of motion, as if he were churning forward on spinning wheels instead of human appendages. Above the whirling blurs, his torso appeared to consist of a huge coil that expanded and contracted as he ran.

  His hands were just as bizarre. The right one had become a flesh-colored bubble the size of a cabbage. The left looked as if it were formed of solid diamond, with each finger tipped in a gleaming scimitar claw.

  Startled, Reacher stumbled midstep and rolled head over feet through the brush. He came to a stop at the base of a red thick-trunked tree, barely avoiding bashing his skull against it.

  As he sat there for a moment, trying to get his bearings, he saw that his body had changed. Instead of whirling blurs, he had legs again ... although one was two feet shorter than the other and covered in thorns. His coiled torso had become a glowing, molten glob that was oozing onto the forest floor around him. His right hand had changed from bubble to brick, and his left hand had completely disappeared.

  Then, right before his eyes, his body shifted again. It seemed to be in a constant state of metamorphosis, although it never felt other than normal to him.

  He watched his arms become legs, and his legs become spaghetti. He watched his right hand turn to liquid, and his left hand reappear and spontaneously rotate all the way around on his wrist.

  It didn't take long for him to realize why the bizarre phenomena seemed so familiar. He knew whom his new body reminded him of before he heard his pursuer call him by name.

  "I know you're out there," a man said from somewhere nearby. "Surrender or die, Johnny Without."

  WHEN Idea opened his eyes, he was surrounded by leaping flames.

  Fire raged in every direction, flaring bright orange and throwing off intense heat. The flames made a roaring sound like a rough wind, overlaid with a hissing, spitting crackle.

  He spun around but could find no path to freedom through the blaze. Beyond the fiery wall, he saw undamaged trees and brush, just a few feet away, yet unreachable.

  Slowly he extended a hand, hoping to judge his distance from the flames. In the process, he was surprised twice.

  First, his hand grew no warmer as it reached out, though it appeared to be moving within or beyond the curtain of flame.

  Second, his hand looked not at all like he had come to expect it to look. It seemed to be much bigger and was encased in a black metal glove with spikes on the knuckles and wrist.

  He brought the gloved hand back toward him and turned it, flexing his fingers. Raising his other hand, he saw that it, too, was within or beyond the curtain of flame and packed into a spiked metal glove.

  It was then that he remembered the vision he'd had under Planter Mirage's orange ball cap back in the men's room at the gas station. He'd thought at first that he was surrounded by a wall of fire, beyond which he could see sky and a landscape. Then he'd realized the flames were much closer, that they might be part of him.

  Now he knew it for sure. However he moved, the flames moved with him. When he looked at anything—hands, trees, anything—he saw it through the orange, flickering haze of firelight. And when he reached up to scratch his head, there was blistering heat and nothing solid to scratch. When he drew his hand away, he saw that the heavy black glove was smoking.

  Even without looking in a mirror, he knew what had happened. He had become Lord Fireskull.

  And if that was true, he was inside Fireskull's Revenant, just as he'd come to suspect after surviving his brush with death with Daddy Naysayer and the boys. Which meant that maybe he wasn't destined to die as himself after all.

  Instead, he would die as Fireskull.

  AS the wailing crimson-armored soldier charged toward him with sword held high, Reacher wished that he could catch up on his reading.

  He knew without a doubt that he'd become Johnny Without from Fireskull's Revenant. He guessed that he'd landed in the world of that novel, but he didn't recognize the scene in which
he was now immersed. He didn't know what was happening or what was due to happen next, all of which he thought he would've known if only he'd finished reading the book.

  Since he didn't have a copy at hand to consult, Reacher realized he would have to improvise. Maybe as things progressed, he could get a better idea of what was going on and how to deal with it.

  If he survived, that is.

  Fortunately, he knew that inhabiting Johnny Without's funhouse body gave him an advantage. In the last chapter of Fireskull's Revenant that he'd read, Johnny had survived sixteen attempted executions, thanks to his constantly changing form.

  Still, as confident as Reacher was that he could survive the charging soldier's attack, he felt a surge of fear and adrenaline as the gleaming sword swung toward him. Instead of waiting calmly to test his new body's resistance to harm, he rolled out of the way of the sword strike at the last instant, barely dodging the blade.

  Suddenly, although he didn't make a conscious effort, his body compressed widthwise and stretched out lengthwise into the form of a snake. The new form felt perfectly natural and controllable, as if he'd lived in it since birth.

  Grunting, the soldier hauled up his sword for another strike. While the blade was in mid-downswing, Reacher the snake shot out of its path and darted between the soldier's armored legs.

  Before the soldier could turn, Reacher rose up behind him, instantly changing from snake to man and growing to twice his original height, then three times, then four. He was already at ten times his original height by the time the soldier turned.