Destiny gently set Ossie on the floor. “It’s not that easy. TheVampireDragon555 showed up right after you got away, and he was furious. I told the zombies to stay put and he told them to move, and then they started moving. I don’t get it. It’s like they only listen to me when he’s not around.”
“I wonder why that could be,” I mused, thinking hard.
“I don’t know,” she said. “For all I know, he’s coded something weird. I think our best bet to turn the zombie villagers back is to make the Potion of Weakness and get golden apples.”
Maison’s eyebrows went up. “We were thinking the same thing.”
“She was,” I corrected, motioning toward Maison. “But I don’t see what good it will do. Won’t TheVampireDragon555 just turn them all back into zombies? And what about the eternal night thing?”
“The ‘eternal’ night isn’t really eternal night,” Destiny said. “He keeps setting the Overworld to night on his computer. It only lasts so long, and then he goes back through the portal to set it back again.”
“So if we can keep him away from the computer …” Maison began.
“And that’s not all,” Destiny said. “I know what his plans are.”
This time Maison made the gesture that Destiny could fully come into the house. Maison closed the door behind her.
“So his main thing is trolling,” Destiny said. “That’s why he let you get away the first time. He wanted you to see the village and be upset. Once you’d seen the village, he didn’t really care exactly what happened to you, as long as it was bad. That’s why he told the zombies to go after you.”
“What is he trying to accomplish?” Maison asked. “Like, what’s the big picture for him?”
“That’s the thing,” Destiny said. “He likes wreaking havoc online. This is like a playground for him. He gets to use his computer to make real zombies and real night. At least real in this world. His only ‘big picture’ is attacking the Overworld. When I left the village, he was telling the zombies there that he was going to turn them into an army …”
My heart thumped so hard I thought everyone in the room must have heard it.
“… and take them to every part of the Overworld,” she said. “He was starting to assemble them. It’s going to take him some time. So he’s trying to get all the zombie villagers in order, and he’s jumping back and forth between the portals.”
“He can’t keep that up for long,” Maison said.
“No,” Destiny agreed. “Once he gets the zombie villagers in order, he’s going to come here after you, I guarantee it.”
“So we don’t have much time,” I said.
“This is what I’m thinking,” Destiny said. “We need to get someplace high, like the roof of this house, and we’ll make Potions of Weakness. When he leads the zombie villagers here, we’ll start splashing them with the potions and turn them back. If we can keep them all here long enough, he won’t get a chance to run back to the portal. The sun will come back up and we can trap him.”
“The tree house!” Maison said, and I remembered earlier how it had looked like a fort to me. “We’ll go in the tree house with the potions!”
“There’s just one problem,” I said. “We don’t have enough supplies to make all the potions and golden apples we’ll need to save the villagers.”
For the first time, Destiny smiled. “Oh, that’s not a problem at all,” she said. “Because, you see, I know computer codes, too.”
CHAPTER 15
“THEVAMPIREDRAGON555 IS BETTER AT CODES THAN I am,” Destiny said. “He’s got it blocked so I can’t undo what he’s done, like the night thing. But I can go through the portal and make it rain apples. All the apples you need. I can get you gold, too. I know the right codes for whatever ingredients you want.”
Maison and I looked wildly at each other.
“Is that true?” I asked.
“There are codes that can do stuff like that,” Maison acknowledged. “I just don’t know how they work.”
“Tell me what you need,” Destiny said, holding out her green hands.
I took her to the supply shed and showed her what we had. Destiny quickly began doing math in her head of how much we would need. “I’ll make sure we get extra, just in case,” she said.
“How are you going to do the codes?” I wanted to know.
“I’m going to have to go back out through the portal and get on TheVampireDragon555’s computer,” Destiny said.
“Is it safe?” I asked. Who knows how many mobs were out there between the house and the portal?
Maison had a totally different question. “Do we trust her?” she asked.
Destiny looked hurt. “If I’m risking my safety to get to the portal for you, doesn’t that show you can trust me?” she asked.
That was a good point. I looked to Maison.
“Maybe,” Maison said. “Or maybe you’re going to run back to TheVampireDragon555 and tell him we don’t have enough supplies so he might as well come get us now?”
My stomach soured that Maison might be right and I looked back to Destiny.
“I told you what I did was wrong!” Destiny pleaded, her dark red eyes earnest. “I told you why I did it, and I told you I changed.”
“Here’s something else I don’t get,” Maison said. “So TheVampireDragon555 got it so you can’t undo the night thing, but he left it so you’re able to make supplies? Wouldn’t he think through that and block you from doing anything?”
Maison was really thinking through everything.
“He started to block different things, including the night part,” Destiny said. “But then he got anxious and wanted to get going, because he could see from his computer that Stevie’s dad had gone to the village and you and Stevie were alone in the tree house. He thought it was the perfect time to attack.”
Well, that might explain it. But Maison still wasn’t impressed.
“You almost sound too brave, offering to run out like that,” Maison said. “Even if you’re a zombie, you might still get attacked. You don’t even have a weapon. And how come earlier you were so mad at TheVampireDragon555, then as soon as you turned into a zombie, you stopped being angry and just answered his questions?”
Destiny appeared stunned to be asked this. “I was in shock,” she said. “How do you think you’d feel if you suddenly turned into a zombie?”
Destiny looked at Maison for a long moment, and then slowly reached into the pocket of her pants. Maison and I both cringed, expecting her to pull out some kind of weapon. But when her hand came back into view, she was holding a few ratty-looking papers.
“Here are the notes I couldn’t pass to you,” Destiny said softly. I was so used to zombies looking big and scary, but even with her green skin and red eyes, she just looked so lost and sad.
The papers were all wadded and folded and Maison slowly began un-wadding and unfolding them. “‘Dear Maison,’” she read out loud. “‘I’m writing this because I’m too scared to talk to you. I think we should be friends. I don’t think we’d be so lonely anymore.’”
She unfolded another paper and started to read. “‘Dear Maison, how are you today? I noticed some kids pushed you around again. They’ve done the same to me. Maybe we can hang out at lunch and they’ll leave us alone?’”
She started on a third letter. “‘Dear Maison, you’re the most popular girl in school now and everyone says you’re a hero. You know what would make you a hero to me? If you realized I existed. The only person I ever hang out with is my cousin, and he likes to write mean things about people online. You’re starting to remind me of him, though. Instead of saying mean things, you treat me like I’m not here, which hurts just as much. Don’t you understand?’”
The last paper was stained with a few clear drops of dried water. “Was it raining when you wrote that?” I asked.
“No,” Maison said quietly. “Those must be teardrops.”
“There’s a reason I picked the online name I did,”
Destiny said. “My mom used to tell me famous quotes about people’s different opinions on destiny, and one said ‘destiny is choice, not chance’. Other people have said stuff like that. I thought it was stupid because I never chose to have people bully me and ignore me. A lot of things happen to us because of chance, I think, so I still don’t totally agree with the quote. But now I realize it might also mean I can choose what actions I take and my destiny will follow. I choose to help you save the Overworld.”
Maison looked her in the eye. “All right,” she said. “Go.”
CHAPTER 16
WE HAD TO MOVE FAST. I MADE DESTINY A QUICK wooden sword, using two planks of wood and a stick. I knew she needed to have some kind of weapon, just in case, and this was the quickest, easiest sword to make.
It didn’t look like zombies would hurt her, but she could run into a skeleton or spider or a creeper. She might even run into TheVampireDragon555 on her way to the portal, and I didn’t want to think of that. If she was really on his side, she’d lead him to us. If she ran into him and she wasn’t on his side, he’d think she’d betrayed him and who knew what he’d do. I figured she’d be safer running into anything that wasn’t TheVampireDragon555.
But there was another reason I made her a wooden sword. Wooden swords weren’t as strong as a stone sword or a diamond sword. If Destiny did end up betraying us, I didn’t want her to have a weapon that could defeat our weapons.
“Thank you, Stevie,” Destiny said, taking the wooden sword. “Thank you, Maison. I won’t disappoint you.”
I opened the door for her and watched until she disappeared in the night.
I turned back to Maison, who was getting us set up to start making potions. “Do you trust her now?”
“I’ll trust her when she gets us supplies,” Maison said darkly.
I was surprised. “I thought the letters changed your mind,” I said.
“Look, I want to trust her, but I don’t know if I can,” Maison said. “I’ve seen her at school plenty of times and she seemed harmless. The next thing I know, she’s helped someone in a master plan to destroy the whole Overworld. Can you see why I’m a little nervous about her?”
“Yeah,” I said in a low voice. “But Ossie likes her.”
“Ossie is a cat.”
“Ossie is a very smart cat,” I corrected.
Ossie started purring again, as if she knew she was being complimented. “See?” I said.
I stood next to Maison at the crafting table and began setting up supplies with her.
“I know our only chance is if she’s telling the truth,” Maison said. “So we had to let her go. If she’s not telling the truth, then our only hope is going to be to go through the portal and save ourselves. If we can’t get these potions made, we have nothing else.”
I swallowed hard, seeing her point. And then another thought crossed my mind that I hadn’t even thought of before. “What if TheVampireDragon555 starts bringing zombies out through the portal into your world?”
It would be like the time at Maison’s school, only so much worse because he could keep on making more and more zombies.
Maison shuddered. “That already crossed my mind. I hope …” She glanced out the window but all we saw was night. “I hope we can trust her.”
Getting busy with the potions gave us something to do.
“Do you think,” I said, “if you’d talked to Destiny, none of this would have happened?”
As soon as I said it, I realized I’d said it the wrong way. Offended, Maison said, “Are you trying to say this is my fault?”
“No,” I quickly said. Maison had pointed out earlier that even in our wildest dreams we never could have expected this. “I guess it’s kind of what Destiny said earlier. She chose to help TheVampireDragon555 and TheVampireDragon555 chose to unleash the zombies. I guess what I’m saying is what we choose to do really can matter.”
“Yeah, I noticed her at school,” Maison said, hard at work. “She did look pretty miserable and she always kept to herself. Sometimes I wanted to talk to her too, actually.” She wiped her hands on her pants. “But I never did.”
“Why?” I asked. I was really curious. Maison was so brave.
“Sixth graders don’t talk to seventh graders,” Maison said.
“Why?” I asked again. That sounded pretty silly to me.
“Because … I don’t know! I thought if I talked to someone older, it might get me bullied worse. Sometimes the older kids get on the younger kids for even talking to them.”
“Do you think Destiny would have gotten on you?” I wondered.
“Her? No,” Maison said. “But maybe another seventh or eighth grader would have. They would have seen it as a sixth grader getting ‘out of line.’”
“Maybe if you and Destiny talked, you could have banded together and no one would have bugged you,” I said. I didn’t know if that might work, but I figured it was worth pointing out the possibility.
Maison shook her head, but not like she was disagreeing with me. More like she didn’t know what to think. “Talking to a new person is hard sometimes,” she said. “What was I supposed to say?”
I thought about it for a moment. “‘Hello’?” I suggested.
“Yeah,” Maison said softly. She lowered her head over her work. “Yeah,” she said again.
“Maybe TheVampireDragon555 is mean because no one ever showed him how to be nice,” I said.
“Well, we can talk about all that stuff later,” Maison said. “First we just have to stop him from doing anything else.”
That’s when someone or something began pounding on the roof.
Maison and I both leapt under the table, covering our heads with our arms. TheVampireDragon555! I thought. His zombie army was on us.
Maison had been right—Destiny had gone straight back to him and led him to us! She’d played us all for saps!
But when I peered out from under my arms toward the window, I didn’t see TheVamprieDragon555 or a zombie army. In the light of the torches, I saw apples and blocks of gold falling from the sky. Some were hitting the roof as they fell. They puddled up by the house, all the supplies we could ever need to make enough potions to save the villagers.
“Stevie?” Maison said.
“Yes, Maison?”
“I think we made the right choice trusting Destiny.”
CHAPTER 17
AS SOON AS THE SUPPLIES STOPPED RAINING DOWN, Maison and I raced outside and began collecting them in our arms and taking them inside the house.
By now I had it all figured out how to make the potion and Maison and I worked as quickly as we could. Turn glass into bottles. Pull water from the well Dad had out front. Brew. Add the ingredients.
“We need more water,” Maison said.
“I’m on it,” I said, heading back out. When I stepp-
ed out on the porch, I almost dropped the bucket I was going to collect water in. A zombie was approaching the house, and we didn’t have Destiny to keep it at bay! Plus Dad’s sword and all the other weapons were in the house.
But then the zombie raised its hand to wave and I realized it was Destiny. The green skin had thrown me off.
“Did it work?” she asked breathlessly as she approached.
“Work!” I exclaimed. “We got tons of stuff! We are all set to make the potions now.” I was actually starting to feel hopeful.
Destiny smiled shyly. I didn’t think she was used to getting praise and she didn’t know how to take it.
As soon as Destiny stepped into the house, Maison jumped on her. Destiny cringed at first as though she expected this to be an attack, and then her dark red eyes opened when she realized Maison was hugging her.
“You did it!” Maison said. “Thank you!”
I didn’t know zombies could blush, yet it looked as if Destiny’s green cheeks had gotten a little pink in them.
“We don’t have much time, though,” Destiny said seriously when Maison stepped back. “How are the potions comin
g along?”
“We’re working on them,” I said.
Destiny came over and supervised our work. “I don’t want to alarm you guys,” she began, which instantly got us both alarmed, “but I passed by the village on my way back from the portal. TheVampireDragon555 has rows and rows of zombies lined up. They look like soldiers. I don’t think it’s going to take him much longer to get all the zombie villagers in order and ready to attack.”
This was some heavy duty information to take in. “Did you … did you see my dad?” I asked softly. Some part of me was still wishing Dad was strong enough to break the zombie spell on his own.
Destiny hesitated. I could tell she didn’t want to tell me. Then she said, “He’s in the front line, leading the others.”
It took a moment for that to sink in.
“It’s only because TheVampireDragon555 is controlling him,” Destiny assured me. “We know he wouldn’t be like that otherwise.”
It didn’t matter. That was my dad, who had always gone about doing the right thing and protecting others. Now, with one bite, all that was gone. All thanks to TheVampireDragon555. “You heard Destiny,” I said loudly. “Let’s hurry.”
But I was really just saying it to myself. Maison was already hurrying, and now Destiny joined in, helping us work. I had to tell myself to get to work, because I realized it really was the only option now. I couldn’t sit here and worry if TheVampireDragon555 would show up at any minute, or worry about us not stopping him. Or worry that we might have to run through the portal and close off the Overworld forever, because it was the only thing we could do to stop him from destroying more than one world.
I had to make these potions. That’s all there was to it.
“Destiny?” Maison said, startling me out of my thoughts.
“Hmm?” Destiny said, fermenting some spider eyes.
“I’m sorry I never spoke to you. I was scared to talk to you, too. I thought the other seventh and eighth graders might get on me. Plus, well, talking to a new person is kind of … hard.”
Destiny gave her a small smile. “I understand,” she said. “It’s always been really hard for me to talk to new people. I think that’s why I kept hanging out with TheVampireDragon555, even though I knew he was no good for me. But I let him pull me around.”
Attack on the Overworld Page 5
