by Andy Mientus
“Uh-oh,” Sasha said.
Suddenly, a row of torches dotting the perimeter of the chamber flicked on several stories above their heads. Then another the same distance above those. Then another, lighting the tall chamber, floor by floor, until finally, the Backstagers could see the domed ceiling of the room hundreds of feet above them. It was dark and textured, as if it were covered in deep black velvet.
“What in the world?” Beckett began to say, before Sasha let out a piercing scream.
The ceiling had eyes. First one pair, glowing yellow against the murky darkness of the dome, then several more, then hundreds, all looking down at the Backstagers.
That’s when the first creature descended, dripping away from the dome like a thick drop of oil. It fell for a moment before it extended two leathery wings and began to fly around the space, the torchlight revealing its pointed ears and turned-up snout. One by one, these winged things took to the air until the tall chamber was a cacophony of flapping wings and high-pitched screeches. Then, a jazzy tune began to play.
“Oh my gosh, I know this one.” Aziz groaned. “It was the one show my family saw when we went to New York when I was a kid. We’re in that dance show, BATS.”
“What’s it about?” Sasha asked, gazing upward in wonder.
“It’s about . . . frickin’ bats. Whoa!”
One of the twirling, human-sized bats swooped down and grabbed Aziz by the shoulders with two taloned feet. With a thrust of its wings, it soared upward toward the domed ceiling with Aziz in tow.
“Aziz!” Sasha cried.
But they weren’t separated for long, because a moment later, another bat dove, grabbed Sasha by the shoulders, and took flight.
Hunter looked to Jory, Beckett, and Reo. Without needing to say a word, they all made a break for it, sprinting back toward the rocky passageway they entered from, but they made it only a few strides before they too were picked up and taken aloft.
As Aziz was carried higher and higher in the chamber, he tried to look down to make sure his friends were okay, but looking to the ground hundreds of feet below him made his stomach turn.
“Please don’t hurt us!” he cried in terror. He was surprised when his winged captor spoke back.
“We would never hurt you!” the bat said in a strange, nasally voice. “In fact, we are presenting you with a great honor! An audience with the ancient one!”
“With the . . . what?!”
“Tonight is the night we might reach the great beyond! You’ve come on a most celestial, angelical night!”
Looking to the top of the chamber, Aziz saw that one very large bat still hung upside down from the dome in a deep slumber. He also saw that there was a ledge just below the dome, about the size of a small stage. The bat flew up to the ledge and hovered over it a moment before dropping Aziz.
It took Aziz a moment to get to his feet, but he was relieved that the platform felt solid, even though he was still a dizzying distance from the stone floor below. Soon, bats carrying Sasha, Jory, Hunter, Beckett, and Reo rose up around him and dropped their cargo safely on the platform.
Sasha practically leaped into Aziz’s embrace as the others dusted themselves off and caught their breath.
“Everyone okay?” Aziz asked.
Beckett looked at Aziz quizzically and announced, “I am so very, very far from okay.”
“What do we think the task is?” Jory asked.
“My bat spoke to me,” Aziz said. “It said we’re here to meet the . . . ancient one?”
“I am not an ‘it,’” squealed a voice. The Backstagers turned to see Aziz’s bat flitting around the platform gracefully. “I am Stinklebruiser, the Aromatic Bat!”
“And I am FlippyFlappySpots, the Dandy Bat!” called another, mid–barrel roll.
“I am Charcuterie, the Culinary Bat!”
“Mysterygloves, the Enigmatic Bat!”
“I hate this show,” Aziz whispered.
“I heard that,” Stinklebruiser said. “Celestial bats are very good hearers!”
“What’s a celestial bat?” Sasha asked.
“DON’T answer that,” Aziz cried. “It’s like, a whole thing. We’ll be here all night.”
“Who is the ancient one?” Jory asked.
“I am,” rumbled a voice. The full chamber of diving and spinning bats gasped in unison, which was a sound so high-pitched and piercing, the Backstagers grabbed their ears to dampen it. The bats all took perches around the walls of the chamber, and the room became suddenly still.
The lone bat hanging from the dome opened his glowing eyes at last and spread his wings, displaying an imposing wingspan of several yards. He was larger than the other bats and grayer, too, with a few holes in the leathery skin of his wings and a bite taken out of his right ear. This bat had seen some things.
“Welcome, Backstagers,” he said in an impossibly deep voice.
“You know who we are,” Reo said.
“I know everything,” the bat replied. “I am Old Chiroptera, the ancient one. Ruler of the Kingdom of Night, and Guardian of the Doors to the Great Beyond.”
“Nice to meet you, Citronella!” Sasha called, before he was quietly shushed by Aziz.
“On this night,” Chiroptera said, “the night of the Black Wing Moon, any bat who can impress me sufficiently will be granted entry to the Great Beyond. Fail, and you must wait for the next Black Wing Moon, one hundred years from now.”
“Get all that?” Beckett said.
“It made even less sense onstage,” Aziz replied. “One moment, Your Celestialness.”
He turned in to the group of Backstagers and huddled them up.
“This is the task,” he said. “We have to impress the old guy and then we’ll ascend to the next level.”
“How do we impress him?” Hunter asked.
“Good question,” Aziz said. “In the show, they just, like, did a talent show.”
“YES!” Old Chiroptera bellowed. “A show of your talents!”
“I keep forgetting they have, like, supersonic hearing,” Aziz said. “So . . . who’s first?”
The Backstagers looked at each other wide-eyed. Their talents were designed to be invisible. After all, they were the ones who made magic behind the scenes.
“I can roll my tongue?” Beckett offered meekly.
“I can say hello in, like, at least three languages,” Jory said. “Well, two for sure.”
“I have thumbs,” Sasha said. “What?! They don’t have thumbs! I could, like, open a jar or something.”
“What was the winning talent in the show?” Hunter asked.
Aziz twisted his face up, trying to remember. “Oh! There was a lady bat. And she belted out the famous song from the show.”
A collective look of terror swept the faces of the Backstagers.
“Not it,” Jory said quickly.
“Dude, if I sing, we’ll be bat food,” Beckett said.
“Well, someone has to sing!” Aziz said.
“But who?” Reo asked.
And then, suddenly, a beautiful voice filled the chamber singing a mournful melody.
REMEMBRANCE
I REMEMBER THE OLD DAYS
I WOULD SCREECH IN THE MOONLIGHT
STRETCH MY WINGS TO THE SKY
IF YOU LISTEN
MY SONAR GUIDES YOU BACK TO YOUR DEN
AND REMEMBRANCES LIVE AGAIN.
All of the bats perched on the edges of the chamber squealed in delight and Old Chiroptera shut his eyes in great pleasure.
“Oh crap,” Beckett said.
A single bat rose up from the depth of the cavern, carrying Bailey Brentwood in its talons. She held a look of stoic determination as she sang the most famous song from BATS with perfect vocal execution.
CATCH ME!
BUT YOU NEVER WILL CAGE ME!
FEED ME FRUITS OF REMEMBRANCE!
I’M A PARTY OF ONE.
IF YOU FEED ME
I’LL TELL YOU MY REMEMBRANCES, TOO
&n
bsp; TILL THE MOONRISE HAS BEGUN!
The chamber erupted in shrieks and the exuberant flapping of wings as Bailey’s bat lowered her reverently down onto the platform with the Backstagers.
“Bailey,” Beckett said as he moved toward her.
“Don’t,” she said in a tone of voice that stopped Beckett dead in his tracks. She faced Old Chiroptera.
“Ms. Brentwood, never in all of my Black Wing Moons have I been so moved by a performance. It would be my honor to admit you to the Great Beyond.”
There was a chime of a bell and elevator doors appeared on the wall of the chamber at the back of the platform.
“Thank you, Your Celestialness,” Bailey said. “I would be honored to accept. If I can take my—”
She hesitated for a moment.
“—these Backstagers with me.”
“As you wish,” Old Chiroptera said.
Bailey bowed and walked toward the elevator. The Backstagers just stood there, stunned.
Bailey turned back and said, “Well, come, if you’re coming.”
One by one, the others followed her lead. Beckett turned to Aziz and said, “I think I’m in trouble.”
“I think we’re all in trouble, dude,” Aziz replied. “But for now, we’re moving on to the next level. Come on.”
CHAPTER 18
Bailey stood among the Backstagers in silence as the elevator rose up.
Finally, Jory asked, “How did you find us?”
“Adrienne and Chloe took me backstage . . . all the way backstage, at Penitent,” she said. “They told me everything. All about the ghost during Phantasm, and the artifacts, and where Jory really went during Lease, and why Thiasos bought your school. I could have waited around to see if you guys actually made it back in one piece, but I figured you’d just lie to me—again—about where you’d been, so instead I got Timothy and Jamie to drive me to Forest of Arden. From there, I just had to follow the red cord and make my way up the tower.”
Beckett shouldered his way around the cramped elevator car to look Bailey right in the eye.
“Bailey,” he said. “I am so, so sorry. I never meant to lie to you; this thing is just so big, I didn’t know how to tell you. I know you have no reason to trust me again—”
“I’m glad we agree on that,” Bailey said. “Because it seems like our whole relationship has been based on a lie, and I really don’t know how to move forward from here. Do you?”
“I . . . don’t,” Beckett said, his throat growing tight. “But I want to. I want to figure it out. I feel like I’m going to fall apart right now.”
“Well, save that for later,” Bailey said. “For now, we have an artifact to find.”
“We’re glad you’re here, Bailey,” Hunter said. “You saved us back there. But one question: If you are so furious with us, why did you come all this way?”
Bailey opened her mouth to speak but, in that moment, realized she had no idea. She exhaled, trying to gather herself.
From the corner of the car, Sasha said, “Because it’s our destiny.”
They all turned to diminutive Sasha, whose mind was racing.
“What?” Hunter said.
“We needed an Onstager to solve this tower. The tower wanted us to work together. Haven’t you realized that? We had to dance in the lobby, act in the forest, and sing in the cave. We got lucky the first two challenges, but when we got stuck in the cave, Bailey showed up, because there was no other way.”
“No other way?” Reo said.
“I just have this . . . feeling,” Sasha said, “that we’re all on this path. I think we’ve all been on it our entire lives. Why did we all become Backstagers in the first place? Why did Jory move here? Why did Beckett take tap as a kid or Hunter work on Forest for the Trees or Aziz see BATS or Reo learn to read tarot cards? Why did Rample find the Notebook all those years ago and throw it away, only to have Jory find it again in his first months as a Backstager? It’s like the road has been laid for us, long ago, and no matter what we do, our only choice is to walk down it.”
The doors dinged open. The Backstagers marveled at the scene outside.
There was a galaxy of stars in a great, open void. Comets shot across the sky and glowing beams of light stretched from star to star in the distance, forming crystalline constellations. A pathway of glass stretched directly from the elevator to a flight of stairs, each glowing a different vibrant color. At the top of the stairs, atop a second glass platform, a stone pedestal displayed a shining, golden book.
“The Show Bible!” Hunter exclaimed. “We’ve reached the top!”
He crossed the walkway to the stairs and started to ascend them.
“Hunter, wait,” Jory called.
Hunter easily dashed up the first few steps, but when he set foot on a glowing purple step, the whole staircase suddenly transformed into a slide, sending Hunter careening back toward the platform.
“Hunter!” Jory cried as he ran to the edge of the walkway and caught Hunter by the hand just as he was about to tumble off the edge of the walkway and fall into the starry abyss below. Hunter looked up at Jory, terrified, as Jory struggled to hold on to him. The others ran up to assist them and, with their combined strength, managed to pull Hunter back to safety on the glass walkway.
Jory wrapped his arms around Hunter.
“That was close,” he said. “Too close.”
“Now we’re even,” Hunter said as he squeezed Jory tighter.
They all got back on their feet as the rainbow slide turned back into stairs with a sharp ka-chunk sound.
“There’s a puzzle here,” Reo said.
“Not much to go on,” Beckett said, looking around into the nothingness.
“Maybe something in the stars?” Jory suggested.
They all gazed for a moment into the peaceful, twinkling night sky.
“There!” Sasha said, pointing to one glittering constellation in the distance. “Do you see that?”
“Yes!” Hunter said, gazing at the shape. “Oh wow.”
“But what does it mean?” Sasha said. “Why is there a constellation of a Gamestation Five and a large cheese pizza?”
“What are you talking about?” Hunter said, confused. “That constellation there? It’s a calling desk and a headset. The professional kind, like at Forest of Arden.”
“I see a Tony Award,” Jory said, straining his eyes. “It says . . . my name. I’ve won for costume design.”
“No, it says mine, for scenic design,” Aziz said. “It’s . . . beautiful.”
“We all see different things,” Reo said. “I see a stack of ancient grimoires and a quiet room to be alone in with them.”
“What do you see, Bailey?” Sasha asked.
“I see the sign-in sheet for Sincerely Kevin Sampson on Broadway. My name is on it.”
“What about you, Beckett?” Hunter asked.
“I see . . . Diet Coke. Cases and cases of it,” he said, although he was actually gazing upon an image of himself cuddled up with Bailey on a couch in a New York apartment. They were grown-ups, just spending a lazy Sunday together binging TV. It made him incredibly sad.
“What does it mean?” Jory said. “Is it supposed to hypnotize us? Distract us from other clues?”
“This is the clue,” Bailey said. “We’re seeing our dreams. I know what show this is.”
She let her eyes linger on the image of the Broadway sign-in sheet for one more moment before turning back to the rainbow staircase.
“Funny, it’s the first show I was ever in, Josie’s Entrancing Technicolor Dreamscape.”
“Destiny . . .” Sasha said.
“In the show,” Bailey explained, “a young girl in ancient times deciphers the dreams of a king. She dreams in vibrant . . . colors!” She rushed over to the foot of the stairs and examined their glowing hues.
“And in Josie’s first big number, she lists all of her favorite colors in this catchy tune that I can still sing today. It took me forever to memorize all the
colors. It goes, ‘She loves red . . .’”
Bailey stepped on the first step, which glowed bright red.
“‘. . . and yellow . . .’”
She ascended to the next yellow step.
“‘And green, and brown, and scarlet . . .’”
She continued up the next three steps, which were colored just the same as the lyrics of the song, but stopped on the scarlet step and looked to the Backstagers below.
“Here, something’s off,” she said. “This purple step is the one that sent Hunter back down to the bottom, but in the song, the next color isn’t purple, it’s black. And look! The next step after the purple one is black!”
She took a deep breath and leaped over the purple step entirely to land on the black step. The Backstagers gasped nervously, but the stairs didn’t transform.
“Bailey, that’s it!” Hunter cried. “You’ve got it!”
Bailey continued singing as she climbed, only stepping on stairs which glowed the colors listed in the song.
She finally buttoned the song with, “. . . and BLUE!” as she passed the final blue stair and reached the circular glass platform.
Hunter, Jory, Aziz, Sasha, Reo, and even Beckett cheered from the walkway below.
Bailey approached the gleaming gold tome atop the ancient stone pedestal. She reached out and grabbed it, and it instantly transformed into an unremarkable large, black three-ring binder, filled with modern white paper.
“Don’t worry, they always change like that!” Sasha called up. “We don’t really know why!”
Show Bible in hand, Bailey walked carefully down the stairs to the walkway, where she rejoined the Backstagers.
One by one, each of them gave her a congratulatory hug and told her what a great job she’d done. Though, when Beckett approached, a hug didn’t quite feel right. Instead he just said, “You saved the day. As always.”
Bailey gave a polite smile and nod. “Should we do this?”
They all gathered around her as she opened the binder.
The front page was totally blank.
As was the next page. And every page after that.
“It’s a decoy!” Bailey cried. “This isn’t the real Show Bible!”
“No, it . . . has to be,” Reo said.
