"Now please, Mikey. Please let me go help Nick."
Suddenly Mikey felt naked and exposed before her, so he stepped back and pulled himself in, folding into his armor shell. Then he bore down and forced his armor to dissolve. It was harder than changing his features, harder than growing an arm or an eye or a tentacle, but he did it, and promised himself he would never grow the armor again.
He turned to his followers who looked at him with shock and surprise.
"Hey-you're not the McGill," said one of them. Mikey considered turning himself horrible just to scare the kid into line, but he decided he didn't want to. He could be whatever he wanted to be, but there were many more parts he wanted to play beyond that of a monster. So instead of fangs, he sprouted himself a pair of tall white ears. "No, I'm the Easter Bunny," he told them. "Now free Allie from that cage!"
And they were all so bewildered that they hopped right to it.
CHAPTER 36 The Intolerable Nexus of Extremes
Graceland had a faint but perpetual smell of peanut butter and bananas.
"Even better now with chocolate," offered Zin, as she and Nick stepped inside.
From the moment Nick arrived, he knew there was something odd about the world-famous tourist attraction. The floors were both soft and solid at the same time, and everywhere he looked Nick saw double. He wanted to chalk it up to his own failing vision, but he knew it was more than that.
"What is this, some sorta funhouse?" asked Zin, but Nick suspected there was no fun to be had for anyone but the tourists. This is a vortex, Nick realized. He sensed it would be wise to leave, but he said he would meet Mary here, and he wouldn't go back on his word.
He had come with a team of Afterlights, but told them to wait outside, as he went in with Zin. They moved through rooms that alternated between elegant and absurd, and the air was filled with the faint echoes of a thousand parties. Of course, all the living heard was "Love Me Tender" pumped in through the speaker system, but they were beginning to notice an uncanny aroma of chocolate.
Toward the back of the mansion, Nick and Zin found the infamous Jungle Room, full of leopard- and zebra-skin furniture and green shag carpeting-not just on the floor, but on the ceiling, too. There they waited for Mary.
Nick didn't feel well at all, and this was troubling, because you couldn't feel sick in Everlost. Yet there was a fever burning within him, rising from the deepest part of his soul, radiating out.
Zin nervously doodled on her prop notepad to pass the time. "What if she don't come?"
"She'll come," said Nick.
When all the clocks in the house struck five, and Mary hadn't arrived, Nick began to worry. Mary was never late, and with each passing minute Nick felt worse.
"She's not comin'" said Zin. "Let's get outta this place, it gives me the creeps."
"She'll be here."
Nick's fever peaked, and then it finally broke. He began to sweat, but as he tried to wipe it away, he realized it wasn't perspiration he was sweating. It was chocolate.
Please let her come soon, he thought.
Nick had arrived twenty minutes early. Mary arrived ten minutes late.
She approached Graceland alone with no outward fear, but she could not deny that inwardly she was terrified. Not fear of Graceland, but fear of her own reaction when she saw Nick. The plan, she thought, stick to the plan. Speedo had his part, Milos and the skinjackers had theirs, and so did she. Mary comforted herself in knowing that she had the moral high ground over Nick, which meant that if there was any justice in the universe, she would be properly rewarded for her efforts today.
Twenty of Nick's Afterlights stood outside the Graceland mansion, looking at the troublesome way it shifted in and out of focus. As Mary approached, they parted, staring at her in awe and in fear, but she only smiled at them.
"Take heart," she told them. "Whatever your worries, I promise things will be better for you from now on." Then she walked into the vortex.
The overall decor of the mansion did not suit Mary's tastes. The last dwindling groups of tourists moved about the place on guided tours. Mary ignored them, and followed the scent of chocolate to a garish African-themed room, where she found Nick waiting. She had to fight the urge to run to him, shake him, hug him, hit him. No! She had to maintain a cool distance, or she would never be able to bear the burden of this critical hour.
Then she realized Nick wasn't alone. A grungy Afterlight in a Confederate uniform stood beside him, notepad in hand, holding the pencil the way a monkey might hold a spoon. Mary wasn't fooled. She knew about the Ripper. In fact, this was one of the reasons Mary had come alone. Nick's sense of honor would put him at a distinct disadvantage, for he would never have the Ripper attack a lone, defenseless girl. She hoped.
Nick stood when he saw her, and she took a good look at him. It was as she suspected: the chocolate had spread, consuming his thoughts, and thus his body. Calling him "the Chocolate Ogre" had done its damage, and now it had become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Most of him was covered in it now. Only an arm and a third of his face remained clear, but the skin was already turning moist and darkening. It was the effect of the vortex. All she had to do was stall and she would defeat him without lifting a finger. You brought this on yourself, Nick, she wanted to say, but couldn't bring herself to do it.
"Hello, Mary."
"Hello, Nick."
She still loved him deeply, but as she looked at him now, she recoiled, feeling her love curdle into pity. Seeing him this decrepit state allowed her to tell herself that Nick was gone, and all that remained was the Chocolate Ogre-a creature that needed to be put out of its misery.
It was easier now to keep her distance. "What shall we say to each other, Nick?"
"How about 'good to see you'?" he said, his voice raspy and thick. Barely human. He coughed a thick, liquid rattle.
"Yes," said Mary. "And it is good to see you. Truly." Mary could feel the effect of the vortex herself, but she knew she would not have to endure it as long as Nick. That's why she came late. Yet its effect was different on her. She did not feel weighed down, but enlightened. She actually felt stronger.
"I've missed you," Nick said.
"Have you? Is that why you continue to be a thorn in my side? Are you a little boy with a crush, seeking attention?" His chocolate oozed a little darker. Mary sighed. "I've missed you, too," she admitted. Nick shrugged, a little bit awkward in the moment. "I'd reach out and hold you, but I might dirty your perfect dress."
Mary sadly shook her head. "It shouldn't be this way between us, Nick. Why must you rally against me so?"
"The same reason you fight me. Just like you, I have to do what I believe is right, and freeing kids from this place is the right thing to do."
"We are here to build Everlost, not to empty it!"
"How can you be so smart, and so wrong?"
Mary closed her eyes, resigned that there would be no last-minute salvation for Nick. He would never see things her way.
"Coming here tonight," she said, "was the first 'right thing' you've done in a long time."
Nick shifted, and she could see his left shoulder sag, beginning to lose human shape. She wanted to look away, but instead she watched it happen, because she knew witnessing this was part of her personal penance for having trusted Nick in the first place.
"If you have a peace proposal, let's hear it," said Nick, his voice sounding less human by the moment.
Mary shook her head. "There is no proposal," she told him. "I will not compromise my integrity for you. Every Afterlight in Everlost deserves the peace and comfort that I have to give. I will not sacrifice a single one for a treaty with you."
"Then why are we here?"
Mary smiled in grim triumph. "To accept your unconditional surrender, of course. Right now my children are storming your train, and taking your army prisoner. There will be no one for you to return to, Nick. I've already won."
From where Nick stood, Mary was just as beautiful, just as powerful as she
ever was-perhaps even more so-for it seemed this place magnified both her beauty and her powerful presence. But in a moment she would deflate. A little boy with a crush-is that what she thought? Now he took guilty pleasure in the look of despair that would soon be filling that beautiful face.
"Your children are going to have a surprise," he told her. "You have two hundred Afterlights, I have four hundred. My army will capture them, hand them coins, and for a second time 'your children' will be set free-but thank you for sending them to the train. It makes it easier that way."
Mary's reaction was not what Nick expected. She tossed back her hair, and shifted her shoulders in proud defiance.
"Oh, but Nick, I think you misunderstood. As I said, I have more than two hundred Afterlights, and I didn't lie." Then she smiled a terrible smile. "I have a thousand. That's certainly more than two hundred, isn't it?"
As the words hit him, and he realized what it meant, his own will began to collapse. She had a thousand souls. She would handily defeat his army. Now the pressure inside of him-the pressure he had been holding back since stepping into the vortex-could no longer be held. He felt a dam inside him rupture. His vision blurred and went dark. He felt everything begin to dissolve as the last bit of him gave in to the sickly-sweet cancer. What began as a small stain on his face was now all that remained of him.
"Now, sir?" asked Zin. "Should I do it now?" Yes, that was it! Although he might not have his victory against her children, maybe he could still have his victory against her.
I give you a gift, Mary, he tried to say, just as he did in his fantasy, but he could no longer speak the words, for his mouth could only make a moaning sound like a cave in the wind. Before his thoughts could become too muddled, he sent Zin forward. "Now," he tried to say-and she must have understood, because Zin lunged toward Mary, grabbed her by the shoulders, and began to push.
Mary had thought she had a contingency for everything.
In her mind the Ripper was a minor threat. A nuisance at best. Let the Ripper steal whatever she wants from me, Mary thought. I'll survive. But the moment the Ripper began to push, Mary realized that she had miscalculated. There was a tingling in the back of her head unlike anything she had ever felt before. It moved down across her face to her shoulders as the ripper pushed her backward. What was happening to her? The Ripper wasn't ripping at all!
Mary opened her mouth and gasped-she actually gasped, drawing in a breath of air like a living, breathing person would, and then it finally dawned on her exactly what the Ripper was doing. She was pushing Mary into the living world! How could that be? Was such a thing possible? She didn't want to find out-so she fought back. Grabbing this horrible child, Mary tried to pull herself back into Everlost.
Zin had never felt so strong.
She knew it was the vortex helping her-the vortex had made opening a portal into the living world as easy as slicing butter, and Mary was sliding on through… until Mary began to fight back. As strong as Graceland made Zin, its effect on Mary was even more intense. Mary's greatest asset had always been the sheer force of her will. Now her will was horribly amplified-and Mary did NOT want to be alive!
"This will not happen," Mary asserted, her voice loud and echoing in both worlds. "I will not be forced out."
The commanding sound of Mary's voice sucked away Zin's strength. Mary was halfway into the real world, but she dug her heels in, and each time she spoke, Zin felt weaker.
"I will not be forced out of Everlost!" Inch by inch Mary pulled herself back through the portal.
'I will not be beaten by a by a sniveling, illiterate fool!"
"Help!" Zin cried to Nick. "Sir! I need your help!"
But Nick was not himself. He was barely anything at all. He was a lumbering boneless mass. His fingers were dissolving until there was not enough of him to reach out, until there was not enough of him to know why he'd even want to.
"Help me!" Zin cried.
What is this all about? thought Nick. Why am I here? What's happening? I have to stop and think. So he crawled away into a corner, leaving bits of him behind as he went.
"I can't do this alone!" yelled Zin
What is that commotion over there? It has to stop so I can think. If only I can clear my mind, I'll know why I'm here. I'll know who I am.
And so the dissolving spirit closed its eyes, and melted into a corner, spiraling down into the bittersweet darkness of its own thoughts, trying to find something to grasp on to that wasn't chocolate. In a moment he was gone, and a layer of chocolate slowly spilled out across the floor like a lava flow, burying the green shag carpet.
Nick had lost. And now Zin was losing, too.
Mary had pulled herself back through the portal into Everlost, and although Zin still grabbed at her, trying to push, it was useless. There was no way she could fight against the monumental force of Mary Hightower's overwhelming presence. Mary pulled the last of her head through, and behind her the portal began to close. She grabbed Zin by the front of her uniform.
"You will be rehabilitated," Mary bellowed, her will still magnified. "You will learn to use your powers for good. You will learn to use them for ME."
Mary took a step forward, but something snagged in her hair. She tried to pull free, but whatever it was pulled back-hard enough make her chin jut upward-and all of a sudden she felt that tingling sensation in her head again. She began to lose her balance, falling backward, and in front of her, the ripper lunged at her once more.
Allie had soul-surfed her way back to Graceland as quickly as she could, but it wasn't fast enough. She arrived too late to save Nick, but she could not let herself mourn what had happened to him. The only way she could help him now was to finish the job he'd begun. She didn't understand what was going on until Mary had pulled herself back into Everlost from the living world. Had Mary been alive? As in flesh-and-blood alive? Well, at least the top half of her had been. This kid in the gray uniform had done it somehow-but now the hole into the living world was closing.
Neither of them had seen Allie lurking there. Good. Quickly she skinjacked a female security guard coming into the room.
From a living world point of view, the Jungle Room seemed perfectly normal-except for an overpowering smell of chocolate, and a shrinking hole in midair the size of a grapefruit. Through that hole Allie could see the back of Mary's head. So Allie took her fleshie and reached through the hole into Everlost, grabbing Mary's hair, and she began to tug with all her might.
As she pulled, Mary fought like a shark on the end of a line, but she had lost her balance. Allie pulled again.
"Let me GO!" Mary demanded. Her will was almost strong enough to send Allie flying away from her, so Allie twisted her hand, making sure her fingers were snagged and knotted in Mary's long copper hair, unable to be freed no matter how Mary worked against her. Then Allie added her other hand as well, pulling on her hair like it was a tug-ofwar.
There were two of them working against Mary now, Allie pulling, and Zin pushing, but it still wasn't enough. Then suddenly there was a third hand in Mary's hair, and a hand pulling on her chin, and two hands grabbed her by the armpits-yet somehow all those hands were Allie's. She had skinjacked a guard-but two tourists had come into the room as well, and Allie was now seeing things through three different sets of eyes.
The Intolerable Nexus of Extremes had a different effect on every Afterlight, and now Allie wasn't just skinjacking a single person, she was skinjacking three at the same time-and all three of them had a single purpose: to pull Mary Hightower out of Everlost, and into the world of the living!
"This will not happen!"
But for all her will, for all her fury, Mary could not fight that many foes. As the tingling passed through her chest, her waist, and down her legs, she knew that there was no stopping this. But if she was going, she was not going alone! She grabbed onto the Ripper, with hands as tight as claws, and pulled on her. Both of them slid through into the living world.
Zin was so focused on pushing
Mary, she had no idea what had happened to her until she finally let go and looked around. The strange double-vision view of Graceland was gone. The chocolate flood was gone. Mary stood across the room in shock. One tourist suddenly fainted, and the other tourist screamed at the top of her lungs and ran up the stairs. The guard who had first helped Zin, now stared at Mary in disbelief.
Zin turned around to see the portal shrink down to nothing and vanish. She reached out a hand and tried to create a fresh portal back to Everlost, but the living have no such powers. She was no longer a ripper, she was just a living human girl. She knew, not just because of what she saw-and not just because it hurt when she pinched herself. She knew, because, for the first time in a hundred and fifty years, her cap fell off her head, and tumbled to the ground.
"What have you done?" Mary glared at her with such raw hatred, it chilled Zin's newly formed blood. So Zin ran, and didn't stop running until she was far from Graceland.
Allie had released two of her fleshies, one fainting in shock, the other screaming as she ran, but Allie held on to the guard, keeping a close eye on Mary. Mary's hair was wild, her green dress wrinkled, and she was out of breath from the ordeal. Mary Hightower, out of breath! What a wonderful concept! Allie couldn't contain her smile.
A tour guide raced down, responding to all the commotion. He didn't even see the tourist who had passed out behind a zebra-skin couch. "What's going on here, Candace?"
"Don't worry," said Allie, feeling authoritative in her guard uniform. "I'll take care of this. Go find out what that woman was screaming about."
"Who are you?" Mary demanded once the tour guide was gone.
"Don't you recognize me, Mary? It's your good friend Allie the Outcast-although it looks like you're the one who's out-cast now." Then Allie realized something with far too much glee. "Now that you're here-alive and all- there's something I've wanted to do for a very long time." Then Allie reached back, curled her fleshie's right hand into a fist, and swung it toward Mary with all her might.
This was one strong fleshie!
The punch connected with Mary's eye so hard, that Mary's entire body spun around, and she collapsed into a leopard chair. Allie's knuckles hurt, but it was a good kind of pain.
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