Part 3: Dark Resistless Stream
episode FORTY-THREE
episode FORTY-THREE
Shadow Tools.
He
huddled in the iron cage, returning there and closing himself in when all the bizarre
stuff began with Punchinello’s head flying off and Cyrano reaching out to catch
it as if they were playing some weird game, headball or something. It was absurd,
because he had been dreaming of Stacey when the weirdness began, Punchinello
and Cyrano appearing at the bars of the cage in the middle of the night, and
then things really went haywire. Hadn’t there been screaming, from far away,
that went on and on and on? There had been a few moments, when it seemed he was
out of the cage, that the Puppet Master was letting him go, but then it had all
turned out to have been a taunt, for Punchinello had laughed at him, and the
doors at the top of the stairs had slammed shut. They would let him go, but not
with his Anne. They wanted her, and not him, but he would rather remain here if
they had her. There would be no freedom without Anne. He would not leave her.
At
some point in the nightmare—he could not be certain how much of this was dream,
or if any of it was real—bells rang, pealing, Jack heard bells from everywhere,
Quasimodo was going nuts up in the belfry. But now, huddled in the corner of
the cage, he could not be certain, but it all seemed fever dreams. He shivered.
It was so cold. Interspersed with all the nightmare elements, he and Stacey had
talked, like they used to, just rambling, comparing notes. For a moment Jack
remembered sitting on the beach, sunning, with a cold beer in his hand, and
seagulls screaming above. Had that been the screaming? Seagulls? And what was
all that beach stuff about, it didn’t jibe with anything else, it was just kind
of...out there.
It
made no sense, not any of it. He was sick. He had a fever. And his mind washed
through with the tides of illness and madness. Washing in Stacey, washing out
Punchinello. In the bubbles of the surf were little people, Cyrano flashing his
sword, Anne in her karate stance, Stacey twirling his shillelagh, Michael, the
little meerkat man shooting out sparkles of light, Seven on her horse. Jack
huddled into the tightest ball he could make of his body. When he exhaled it
looked like fog emanating from his body. Fog on the beach, the surf rolling in,
poppling, fizzing on the sand, and the cries of seagulls, and fog. Where was
the foghorn? Oh, there it was, almost on cue.
Outside
the cage there had been some form of struggle, and for a moment Jack could have
sworn that the businessman was there, standing just a few feet away. Was he
glowing? His umbrella outlined in blue, the businessman stood facing the
headless body as it staggered forward like Frankenstein’s monster. Cyrano
standing, holding aloft Punchinello’s head, looking like a grotesque Statue of
Liberty.
Jack
inhaled, something washing over him, and for a few moments he felt warm, and it
seemed he was actually riding in High Vale, on that small, beautiful horse,
with Seven galloping near. He could feel the warm wind in his face, and the
smell of sweaty horse, and Seven was passing him, Seven bent low over the
flashing horse, hooves thundering, it was all exhilarating, and for just a few
short moments he almost seemed free of his cage. He felt freedom wash
throughout his soul. Liberty, ah liberty.
Jack
had laughed with Seven, at first frustrated, but then amused when she assured
him that she had accessed a feature in her Gold Guest Pass, expert
horsemanship, and Jack, as a refugee between worlds, had no such powers. And Jack
was not an expert horseman.
It
was quiet now, outside the cage, Punchinello and Cyrano had departed, yelling,
the swordsman doing his rhymes. But it was about that time of night when the
puppets would stir and begin their strange nocturnal perambulation. Jack could
hear them now, but he did not wish to look. He didn’t like to admit it to
himself, but seeing the puppets out and about, well, it really freaked him out,
and he really could use a little less of that dark stimulation.
The
featureless automatons—they looked like artist’s poseable manikins—strolled as
couples, linked arm in arm, and there were all sizes of these, some wearing the
uniforms of maids, butlers, others wore aprons, but most were nude, naked wood,
but they strolled about in the dark, whispering. Several times during these
short hours, the puppets gathered about the iron cage and stared in at Jack. He
felt like an animal at the zoo. Once or twice during the last few nights, Jack
thought he caught sight of Pinocchio, or different stages of the puppet boy,
various versions, some more boy, some more puppet, some looking rudimentary, a
pine log with faint suggestions of a face. But none of the puppets attempted to
communicate with him.
Oh
no, the dreams are starting again, his fever dreams, nightmares, the gears, so
many gears, gears as thick as ship parts, taller than a house, turning ever so
slowly, right along the tiny, spiraling gears, the metal teeth, movement, ever
in flux, flowing, turning, clanking, oh no, he is inside the vast machine
again, he always dreams this. For some reason he thinks of Old Ben. What was
it, Old Ben and the Machine, and yes, when he is here, Jack always senses Seven
very close, in the machine, a part of the machine, just like him.
“You
have forgotten, dear Jack,” Old Ben says. “Remember, in the cafe? Just before
the Looking Glass?”
“Silly
Jack! Don’t you remember? I told you, you don’t actually have to touch your
shoulder, it’s not like a switch, silly boy!”
Manda?
Was that Manda’s voice?
The
gears, the machine, the levers, Jack a part of the machine, and Seven always
nearby, frantically pulling levers, working the gears and switches.
“Ones
and zeroes,” Jack murmurs, waking himself, and no, no, why couldn’t he remain
asleep, it was so greatly to be desired over this, waking to his world of
shivering.
“What
did Old Ben say?” Jack murmurs, relaxing, feeling some of that imagined warmth
from earlier, when he was talking to Stacey, and then again, when he dreamed of
riding horses with Seven. He had a few moments of peace, and almost warmth.
“You
have forgotten,” Old Ben had said, or had Jack only dreamed that?
“I
get distracted,” Jack murmurs, waking himself again, and the shivering starts.
His
shoulder, he feels it tingling, even now. What had he forgotten? Certainly not
the gears, he always dreams about them. But the tingle in his shoulder, that
tingle in his shoulder—what had Old Ben told him?
“Administrative
control,” Old Ben had said.
Jack
sucked in a shuddering breath. Administrative control. Old Ben had showed him,
in the cafe, just prior to their visit to the Looking Glass. He remembers. It
was as if a door had been closed inside his memory, and now, suddenly, it was
opening up inside his mind. He grabbed his left shoulder with his right hand,
and squeezed. The tingling increased.
“I
am such an idiot,” Jack whispers, grinning.
“Take
little steps,” Old Ben had said.
“Just
little steps,” Manda said, and Jack can almost hear her voice, now, outside of
his head. Manda. His little girl. Manda told him to take little steps. She said
you only need to think, to use your mind—no hand gestures are necessary.
Jack
turned up the heat, just in a little bubble around himself—he didn’t wish to
set off any alarms, firing up some huge furnace, no, just a little heat was
required. Easy as that, twiddling the knob on a thermostat. He sighed. Yes,
thank God, it was warm. He was warm. It was as easy as picturing a little knob,
which his imaginary fingers turned. And he pictured a little bubble about his
body, just extending a few inches, like a halo. Yes, a halo of warmth. That was
good. Keep it like that, just rest here a few moments, the shivering subsiding,
yes, just like that.
Some
of the puppets were gathering outside the cage, peering in. Jack mentally shot
out a curtain, which he drew about the iron bars. The puppets would see a
huddled shape, lying on the far side of the cage. As Jack watched, from his
seated position, the puppets dispersed, many wandering back to their places,
where they went inanimate, turning from the ghostly apparitions of lovers and
friends into nameless automatons.
Jack
reached and plucked a glass of water out of the air. He guzzled it, hardly
considering the wonder of what he had just accomplished. He produced more
water, but halfway through guzzling the liquid, he turned it into orange juice.
He could sure use the vitamins, and all that wonderful sugar. And then he turned
it into a mug of coffee, which he sipped, enjoying the warmth more than
anything else. He drank it black, foregoing his usual doctoring of ginger and
honey and cinnamon.
He
had just met two of his needs. Punchinello had provided no water, and no
warmth, and Jack, from his administrative control, produced those things, now.
It was all part of the simulation, damn it, and it had all been there, while he
huddled, filthy in this cage, starving, relieving himself in a bucket.
He
plucked a bean and cheese burrito from the air and sank his teeth into the
flesh of the tortilla. Oh, lovely. Yes, he thought, chewing slowly. Doing a
quick check, he could actually ensure that none of the ingredients were GMO!
All healthy vegetarian fare.
He
plucked three small white pills from the air. Aspirin. He supposed he was old
enough for aspirin. He had turned eighteen years of age, and he distantly
remembered that he was supposed to be nineteen to take aspirin, Reye’s
Syndrome, and all that, but he was not taking any acetaminophen, Punchinello
and fever couldn’t be any worse than that. He downed the aspirin and then,
experimenting, he sped up the time in his belly, dispersing the aspirin
throughout his body. Sheesh, the things a guy could do, if he only thought
about doing them.
Jack
thought away his filthy clothes. That jerk, Punch, had confiscated his jacket,
and his boots, and his nifty fighting knuckles. But Jack replaced them,
everything, by thinking, first giving himself a quick mental shower (cleaning
out his ears, brushing his teeth, gargling), and then snap-donning thermal
wear, jeans, thick socks, combat boots, a flannel lumberjack shirt that felt
wonderful and warm. Good. He had met his needs, except for his greatest need,
Anne, and he doubted that even with practice with this interactive interface
would he be able to pull her from thin air. He flexed his hands, enjoying the
promise of the fighting knuckles.
He
called up an on-the-fly GPS, keeping it as a translucent window about three
feet in front of his face. Then he pulled an aura of shadows over his head and
sent it down to his feet, mixing it with his aura of heat, and he must be
feeling better, because he had to turn the heat down. Little steps. He set up a
row of indicators. First a motion detector, then a heat detector, then an AI
trap detector, and a few other useful warning lights to keep him from being a
complete idiot.
He
rose, crouching, remembering not to bash his head on the iron. He went to the
cage door and twisted it out, slowly, quietly, turning the iron and squishing
it between his fingers like a sponge. He pried open the door, then plucked the
iron hinges away from the cage, folding up the door as he would do a piece of
paper, until it was no more than a heavy blob of black saltwater taffy, which
he discarded, setting quietly inside the cage, upon the cold floor.
Then,
the thought keyed off, he called up a piece of black saltwater taffy, unwrapped
it, and then really enjoyed consuming it. Mmmm, licorice, very nice, indeed.
Enough goofing off.
Jack
could not allow himself to become punch drunk on his new abilities, because he
understood that Punchinello had these abilities, as well, only far more
powerful tools, and he was far more practiced at using them. Somehow the Puppet
Master had discovered a means to access the shadow tools of reality, and
perhaps understood the nature of this simulation, probably not the same way in
which Jack understood things, but the Puppet Master had practiced and
experimented with these tools, and probably knew them better than Jack. While
Jack massaged and altered data, Punchinello practiced magic, that was the
difference in their perspective. It was the same reality, the same simulation,
but a different viewpoint in interacting with that reality, and certainly a
different method.
He
glanced in the cage and saw himself lying huddled in the corner. Jack adjusted
the curtain over the empty place where the door had been, he tucked and tweaked
with his thoughts, until it again appeared to be an iron cage, undamaged, with
a great locked door on its hinges, a complete iron cage, with requisite
prisoner huddled and shivering. It was surreal, looking at the image of
himself, which gave him an idea.
Jack
opened a small window and attempted to contact Old Ben. He only got static. He
tried Manda, and Seven. But something interfered with any kind of signal. He
created a message, speaking, but only in the window—very uncanny, the height of
surreality, he stood here in his physical body, looking into a window only he
could see, and observed his own head and face, shot selfie-style, saying the
things he only thought. He addressed the message to Old Ben, Manda, and Seven.
He closed the window. The message would travel out as soon as a signal was
available.
He
paused a moment, and called up the selfie-view of himself. Hmmm, could he
actually...might he, just sort of...? He added a bit of heft to his moustache.
Hey, not bad. He darkened the color a bit, and then added a little tweaky below
his lower lip. Should he go for the whole goatee? Nah, he kind of liked this
Errol Flynn look. He saved it. Nice.
He
had to go get Anne, now, or die trying. And he realized that Punchinello,
Puppet Master, could be tracking him at this very moment, that the monster very
well might know exactly where he was, what he was doing, and how he was doing
it, and could conceivably pull the plug on Jack’s new abilities, whenever he
chose to do so. Jack understood that all of this might be a part of Punchinello’s
Theatre, and Jack was just another puppet in said theatre. He didn’t want to
think about that distinct possibility.
What
he needed, he thought, was happy thoughts. Just a few. Just to get him through
this next part. Somehow, he understood that this next part would be bad, very
bad, tremendously bad.
He
remembered in the Looking Glass, standing at the end of the Hall of Heads, and
that small figure charging toward him, that delighted scream she had uttered, as
she came running up the hall toward him like an Olympic sprinter, and then she
threw herself into his arms, and they had tumbled backward, and he remembered
Anne’s face, with the soot marks all about her face, and the white skin about
her eyes where she had worn goggles, and how crazily her hair stood up, and how
her eyes had sparkled as she smiled into him.
That
was a tremendously happy thought. And Jack shivered, although he no longer felt
cold.
He
wouldn’t allow himself to remember how she had—clenched him—up to speed, so to speak, overcoming his shyness as he
attempted to meet her and greet her and fall in love with her again, as they
had done so many times before. No, that memory was a little too sharp, and he
needed to concentrate without a brain stuck full of pins.
Eyes
full of tears, Jack followed the blip on his translucent GPS.
Perhaps
“global positioning system” was not the best term, not here, not when
considering how he received his data, for he was not receiving triangulated
signals from various satellites.
No,
what he was actually doing, although his brain was not powerful enough to fully
understand all the ramifications in the actions of his thought, was
communicating with Manda’s body. He was receiving information from the data
that made up the molecules of her digital biology. Jack was communicating with,
and manipulating, the very essence of Manda. Perhaps MPS was the better acronym,
for Manda Positioning System. Perhaps Manda might even track his passage, like
a beacon bobbing through the tides of her bloodstream. She might be smiling,
right now, thinking of Jack, pinpointing his location, right there, in her
elbow!
He
set the blinking light as Anne’s location. It appeared he was in a great maze
of corridors and chambers, levels, with helter-skelter staircases spiraling up
and down, and crazy angled passages that seemed more like tubes than hallways.
He walked, keeping himself cloaked in shadow. If anyone saw him, he should
appear as no more than that odd shade you perceived flicking through your
peripheral vision, and when you looked, he should be gone, the phantom that your
mind dismissed. Such things did not happen, did they, in reality?
His
body felt weak, but he corrected for that by lightening himself, so that his
feet barely touched the ground. He practically floated, and his boots made no
sound. Just to be safe, Jack pulled down a curtain about himself, to muffle
sounds. If he sneezed, even five feet away from someone with very good ears,
they would hear nothing more than the crinkling of a piece of tissue paper.
Maybe
this is the way ninjas do it, Jack thought, they just access reality and make
themselves quiet and light and shadowed. Because it did seem very much like
magic.
He
paused, and pulled a shillelagh out of the air, ensuring that it was a real blackthorn.
It comforted him, to hold the stick, not because he had any chance of using it
the way that Stacey did, or that this stick was in any way a “magic” artefact,
but hey, wait, he could pull a few tricks like that, couldn’t he? He enhanced
the shillelagh, making in unbreakable (although it was practically
indestructible, to begin with), and he made it much lighter than any heavy
piece of wood had the right to be, and gave it swinging power, blocking power.
He did a quick scan and retrieved the information he required, and opened his
mind, accepting several years’ worth of training in about three seconds. Stick
fighting. That course was a little generic. So he absorbed some karate training
with wooden weapons. Police training with batons and billy clubs.
Jack
inhaled. He felt good. He did a few practice twirls with his new and enhanced
weapon. It felt good in his hand, but he couldn’t seem to be able do what
Stacey did. He searched a bit and then accepted a short download on baton
twirling (as in cheerleading and parades). He smiled. Hey, that was some good
stuff. Fun, although it was hardly martial in implementation. But he found he
was able to merge the various trainings with the karate defensive measures.
He
found a lot of old black and white woodcuts about defending yourself with a
blackthorn, and more about hazelwood, and he downloaded and incorporated it all.
This was his first absorbing information—Seven had explained it to him, when
she demonstrated reading large books in a short period of time, and being able
to call up the information in no time, with better than photographic memory.
His brain busily clumped information into short, pertinent bites, and the
system worked on moving less important information into the background, still
there, but accessible only when required and called upon. Good stuff, Maynard,
yes indeedy do.
He
felt a little whoozy, cramming all that information into his head in about one
minute, and perhaps it would have been a better idea if he would have
accomplished this all back at the iron cage, as opposed to his early-morning
stroll through an enemy headquarters. But he was an on-the-fly kind of guy. He
rarely planned things out as he should, and kind of made it up as he went
along. For instance, he just thought how useful it would be if the shillelagh
returned to his hand like a boomerang, if he threw it, or if the weapon was
knocked from his hand. And he remembered picking up Stacey’s shillelagh and
getting the shock of his life—nice touch, that. Jack incorporated the security
measures into his own shillelagh.
Through
all his system enhancements, Jack had maintained his slow, even walk. He was
able to increase the lighting through his heads-up display, so that wherever he
looked he could increase visibility, and even set a sensor so that any kind of
sensory equipment would highlight, any kind of trap, or living being. Thus far,
it was just puppets lining the walls, and all of these were now in their down
setting, sleeping their dreamless sleep. Jack started, as he perceived Cyrano’s
hulking presence against a wall, but the automaton seemed to be in down state,
like the puppets. Still, Jack crept more stealthily past the scary swordsman,
increasing his shadows.
Jack
got no readings from Cyrano. It seemed when the automaton was down, it was
down. He could probably snap his fingers beneath Cyrano’s great nose, and
challenge him to a duel, and the puppet would not respond.
As
Jack proceeded, and the blip on his MPS increased in strength, he hoped what
was happening was that while Punchinello probably had a veritable army
positioned in defense of his headquarters and lair, that hopefully the Puppet
Master had neglected to establish the same rigorous defenses on the inside,
protecting the inside from the inside. And Punchinello was more than aware that
Jack was locked up in a massive iron cage, so hopefully Jack was proceeding
invisibly, undetected, effective as a ninja.
Of
course, the terrible thought remained, that the master of this world was even
now watching him, chuckling.
Do not think of him. Do
not picture him in your mind. Maintain that positive state, that pleasant state
of happy thoughts. Do not give into despair. Do not be afraid. Relax, and go
with it. Ignore the doubt. Think positive. Think positively.
Jack
paused in his quiet floating through the halls. That last series of thoughts
felt alien, or at least distantly remembered. Déjà vu flooded him. It was
eerie. Haunting.
Okay,
if he broke down the actual words, what a whole load of positivity crap, I mean
come on, come on already! What’s next, daily affirmations? You are handsome and
good, you try hard and do a good job, and people like you! That wasn’t Jack,
never in a thousand years would he pummel himself with such feel-good nonsense.
But
the message, yes, that was Jack, but come on, all that positivity crap, that
was not the way Jack thought. That was not who Jack was, as he was a realist,
and pretty much a skeptic. But it was true that he always tried to maintain a
positive outlook, and apparently, that’s what his distant helper was trying to
get through to him now. Because all of that must be coming from Old Ben, as did
that first note in the book, at the Coffee Dump. Be positive.
Do
not think about Pun—about the master of this place, he quickly corrected. He
thought of Anne, and the happy way she looked at him, that expression of
hopefulness. That needed to be his focus, right there.
“I’m
coming, Anne,” he sent out as a message. “You are not alone. Jack is here. Jack
is coming. I am near, Beloved.”
It
worried him, more than a little, that his memory had been blocked until just
the right moment. The thought just behind that was that Anne had led him
directly to Punchinello’s Theatre in the Park, as soon as they heard the
children pass them, that first night on the Honey Moon, Anne set them following
the children, right into Punchinello’s hands. This was a set up.
Jack
couldn’t reason it out, what was expected of him, and what Anne had to do with
it, but he was having the creeping feeling that he had been programmed, like a
sleeper agent, to be here, at just this moment, armed with these new, freakish
powers, and heading into the dragon’s lair.
He
heard something creak above him. He paused, listening. Then he heard some
fairly discernible footsteps on the floor above. He heard someone strolling, or
pacing, the footsteps heading this way, growing faint, and then coming back,
slow and measured.
Jack
blanked his mind, and flowed forward, he was shadow, a cloud moving into the
next chamber. The blinking beacon was there, just there, he should be right on
top of her, just about...now.
Mr.
Dodgson ducked around his big wingchair, still absurdly clutching his butter
knife, keeping just a few paces ahead of the puppet. The diabolical thing
cackled in delight, Pinocchio’s little boy hands lifted up like claws, as it
pursued the portly old gentleman around the chair. The puppet was evil, pure
evil, if anything can be pure about evil, then the moneymakers should bottle up
this boy and sell him as evil perfume. Then, utterly out of breath, after his
third time around the chair, Mr. Dodgson bellowed laughter. Silly old man! What
was he thinking, running from this puppet? He had all the shadow tools of the
world at his disposal! He might stand up to giants, and here he was fleeing a
puppet boy.
Mr.
Dodgson collected himself, pausing to straighten his bowtie. He clapped his
hands.
“Watch
out, Pinocchio, don’t get caught in the spanking machine!” Mr. Dodgson called,
cupping his hands about his mouth like a megaphone.
“What
the...!” Pinocchio cried as mechanical pincers seized him, inverting him, and a
series of paddles began to slap against his backside. Steam hissed from the
mechanical contraption, which looked like a sparkling metal centipede, except
where you might expect to find feet, there were only spanking paddles,
revolving around and around.
“I
did warn you,” Mr. Dodgson said, dusting off his hands.
“By
about one second,” the little boy shrieked, struggling mightily in the four
sets of pincers that held him in place. “Let me loose, you dirty old man!”
“Tut
tut, Pinocchio, come now, tell me everything,” Mr. Dodgson said, standing
majestically before the puppet, his short arms folded across his chest. “Did
Punchinello send you as his spy, a saboteur? Tell me the truth, for you know
that I will know if you are lying.”
“I
can certainly tell that this machine was not created just now!” Pinocchio
cried, and his nose remained the same six inches in length. “Watch my nose,
geezer, because—ouch! Stop it already, let me talk! Owww!”
Mr.
Dodgson allowed the spanking to continue, for at least another twenty seconds
(and at two slaps per second, that allowed for a lot of administrated discipline).
“We
had planned to market the Humane Spanker to Victorian parents, those with
miserable children such as yourself, but I thought you might appreciate our
efforts. Save yourself growing a pair of donkey ears, miserable urchin.”
Pinocchio
collapsed in the pincers, his face sweaty and red. He swallowed and fluttered
his eyes.
“Please,
Mr. Dodgson, I promise to be a good boy,” Pinocchio pled.
“Indeed,”
Mr. Dodgson said, lifting his chin. “So, spill it, or does the spanking resume?”
“No,
yes, okay, I will tell you, yes, Punchinello wanted me to send him a signal,
alert him to wherever you took the party, but he assumed you would take
everyone off the Honey Moon, and so I cannot properly signal him, and all that
I have told you is true,” the puppet spat, rambling two hundred words per fifteen
seconds, his nose not changing.
“Mr.
Titan, if could please join us,” Mr. Dodgson said, speaking to the air,
snapping his fingers. After a few moments there came a gentle knock at the
door. “Yes, yes, come in, I called you didn’t I?”
Titan
entered, yawning and rubbing his eyes.
“Look
closely at this boy,” Mr. Dodgson said.
Titan
did, and then he strode directly forward, and seized with his thumb and index
finger something from the boy’s back.
“Bugged,”
Titan said, crushing the flea.
“I
think that was an actual flea,” Mr. Dodgson said, sniffing.
Titan
snatched again, and came up with something a little larger, but invisible.
“Ah
yes, very good, very good,” Mr. Dodgson crooned. “Just as I thought.”
“I
cannot discern what is inside the boy, you’d have to call the Little Girl on
that one,” Titan said, crushing the invisible bug as easily as he had the flea.
“I
can ascertain myself that he is now clean, but I think you had best escort this
boy to wherever the Little Girl wishes to keep him, although as he says, it
cannot be off the Honey Moon,” Mr. Dodgson said.
“Oh
you got the bug, you can now safely take me off wherever you please,” Pinocchio
said, but it was evident that his nose grew an easy three inches from that one
lie. “Well, how do I know, I thought that was the only one.” Again, sadly, his
nose extended.
“I’ll
see what she wants to do with the lad,” Titan said, escorting Pinocchio, his
hand loosely on the back of the puppet’s neck.
Mr.
Dodgson watched them go. Things had just condensed, growing deeper, and more
dangerous. It was a scattershot attack, and all the pieces were now out on the
board, but whether or not the timing proved on their side, or against them,
well, they would leave that up to Providence.
Titan
had proved susceptible to Punchinello, as had Enseladus, Kronoss, and even
Aajeel. Seven, too had proved an inept match. Only the Little Girl, thus far,
had been able to stand up to Punchinello, and if it had not happened as yet,
any moment it would be Jack on center stage, facing down the most dangerous
being in the history of the world (not counting Lady Maulgraul, of course, or
Manda, for that matter). But Punchinello was dark, certainly malignant, whereas
Lady Maulgraul was neither bad nor good, but entirely self-serving; and while
Manda might aim for the best, the ending result could prove the end of mankind,
if that’s what Manda determined was best for Vestigial Surreality.
The
only thing that ensured their safety, for this moment, on this world, in this
location, was the fact that the Punchinello that Jack would shortly be facing
was two versions ahead of this world, and much further ahead in time, so that
if Jack might overcome, he would have the key to defeat Punchinello in any other
previous version. But if on the other hand, Jack lost, then it would be up to
Lady Maulgraul and Punchinello, to bring world against world, and that would
probably only happen in the middle, which was the Story Moon, and Mr. Dodgson’s
little domain of the Looking Glass.
“It’s
up to you, Jack me boy,” Mr. Dodgson said, gripping his hands together. “It’s
up to you.”
© Copyright 2016 Douglas Christian Larsen. Vestigial Surreality. All Rights Reserved by the Author, Douglas Christian Larsen. No part of this serial fiction may be reproduced (except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews) or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the publisher, Wolftales UNlimited, but please feel free to share the story with anyone, only not for sale or resale. This work is a work of fiction. People, places, events, and situations are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or historical events, is purely coincidental (wink, wink).
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