“There is no more magic here,” thunders the false rabbit king. His giant fuzzy toes twitch irritably at Oliver and Olivia and Paul. The toes are at face-level for the children. The imposter rabbit king stands on an enormous stage, where Oliver, Olivia, Paul and Vellie have been thrust by the crowd of rabbit people into the front row of the open auditorium. They had been apprehended by rabbit-security the moment they approached the arena. The supposedly real rabbit king has gotten lost in the crush of limbs and sweat and fur. “There is no more magic, because magic divides one rabbit-self from another. In your land, only the elite force can practice, perfect and share magic with other worlds. Without magic, all will be equal. No rabbit person or creature will be above any other.”

“This is just like Mother!” Olivia whispers urgently to Vellie. “She wanted all those poor crabs and fish to be equal, but she forced them to farm her land and she punished them using the seanicorns!”

“Yes, child,” says Vellie, shaking his head. “He must be gaining control of worlds this way, one at a time, traveling via the Dark Web.”

“How do we stop him?!”

“It will be difficult. It is possible he uses the magic of the rabbit people to disguise his true form.”

“We have to prove he’s not a real rabbit person… come on think! Olivia, think!” Olivia squeezes her eyes shut and reviews all of the facts she knows about rabbits. “They can hop really high! They can hop 90 centimetres! Vellie!”

“Yes.”

“Will The Eighth have all the abilities of a rabbit person?”

“Unlikely. Rabbits are magical experts at appearance and disappearance, so the stream of magic he has access to governs only appearance.”

“Then we have to make him jump!”

“I do not follow…”

Just then, the security team, which is holding the kids and Vellie by the scruffs of their collars, surges forward and fuzzy paws thrust the four of them up onto the stage.

“What do we have here?” Thunders the fake rabbit-king, sounding regal and imposing as you might expect. He raises a quizzical, furry eyebrow and narrows his eyes. “Imposters in our midst?”

“He’s not the real rabbit king!” Olivia shouts, but a roar from the crowd drowns her out. It turns out human children speak much more quietly than rabbit-people, who can project at insane decibels within the specific atmosphere of their home world, that world known as The Rabbit Kingdom.

“MEGAPHONE!” Shouts Oliver, and suddenly Olivia is holding one in her hand.

“HE’S NOT THE REAL RABBIT KING!” She repeats, yelling into the megaphone this time. A hush falls over the crowd.

“That is ridiculous,” says The Eighth, slowly, dangerously, threateningly.

“He’s not and we can prove it!”

“How?” The Eighth smiles crudely.

“Yeah, how?” Say Oliver and Paul together in unison. She lowers the megaphone.

“Oliver! Quick — make a fence around The Eighth, but it has to be 80 centimetres tall, ok?”

“What — why?”

“Just do it! Everyone’s watching.”

“Okay fine. FENCE! FENCE AROUND THE FAKE RABBIT KING! 80 CENTIMETRES TALL!”

Immediately, with a faint clattering, a fence is assembled, encircling the imposter king.

“WHAT is going on? I demand this to be disassembled immediately! Guards!” Shouts The Eighth.

“If you were a real rabbit king, you could hop the fence,” says Olivia into the megaphone Oliver made her. “You could hop up to 90 centimetres. That fence is only 80. You can have it measured if you want. But my brother is very good at word-building, so it’ll be accurate.” She and Oliver exchange a smirk. The guards, who were about to rush to their king’s aid, stop to consider this.

“Yes! HOP THAT FENCE!” Comes a cry from just below the stage and Olivia looks down to see the rabbit king has made his way to the front of the assembly.

“HOP THAT FENCE! HOP THAT FENCE! HOP THAT FENCE! HOP THAT FENCE!” The real rabbit king continues, and slowly, one by one the rabbit people to his left and right take up the chant until the whole assembly of rabbit people seems to be shouting it at the top of their lungs.

The Eighth tries at first to defend himself.

“I do not want to. I do not need to prove anything — “

“HOP THAT FENCE! HOP THAT FENCE!” Shouts the roiling crowd, even more aggressively.

“Well, I — I am the king, I do not have to hop — “

“HOP THAT FENCE!”

The Eighth disguised as the rabbit king takes a deep breath and disappears, and then reappears on the other side of the fence.

“YOU DIDN’T HOP!” Screams Olivia into her megaphone. “You have to hop it.”

The Eighth stares her down and she sees in his eyes an expression that is the true definition of hatred. It makes her feel cold all over. Somehow Olivia feels that only a creature who has truly departed from the community of others can summon such an expression. Only someone who has made darkness and injustice their obsession, to the exclusion of all joy and hope, can make a person feel this cold.

Thankfully, the crowd is on her side.

“HOP THAT FENCE!” They continue to scream, oblivious to the death stare which The Eighth has fixed on Olivia.

“This will not be our final meeting.” Says The Eighth to Olivia. And without another word, he disappears completely. The crowd gasps and falls silent. A second later, a tinny clang is heard throughout the arena, and there onto the stage plops the rabbit king’s golden crown.

The true rabbit king rushes onto the stage then. He hops inside the enclosure and out of it, then in and out again, and again and again.

“I AM YOUR KING!” He shouts. He retrieves the crown and places it between his ears. The crowd cheers in gleeful acceptance of its returned leader. Olivia wonders absently for a moment how they know that this rabbit person is the one true rabbit king and not merely another imposter who rushed forward into the limelight at an opportune moment. She has to admit, the real rabbit king does look uniquely stately with his regal manner and excellent posture. She decides not to give her doubts another thought and instead to celebrate with all of the rabbit people.

“BEHOLD YOUR KING!” She yells once into the megaphone for good measure, before laying the hunk of metal down and backing off the stage. Vellie leads them down the stairs and out of the arena in a clump. Once outside, they walk for a few hundred meters to get away from the din.

“That was amazing!” Says Oliver, once his voice can be heard again. “Great job, Ola!”

“Thanks, Oli. You too.”

“You two are amazing,” says Paul.

The three of them hug for a long moment before Vellie taps them all on the shoulders at once using three of his hands.

“We will need to get you home,” he says. “But first, we need to close the door to the Dark Web in this world. I consulted the Time Use Ledger, In Perpetuity and the portal is very near our current location. Come with me.” He beckons as they walk a hundred meters or so to their right. There, in the perfect green floofius grassius lawn that seems to cover this entire world, is a manhole cover. It reminds Olivia of the ones on their street at home. Instead of the words ‘CITY OF TORONTO’ or even ‘DANGER’ emblazoned in the metal, this manhole cover reads ‘TOR.’

“Tor?” Says Olivia. “What’s that?”

“It means gate, in your Earth-world language known as German.”

“Tor browsers are how you access the Dark Web,” says Paul. “I learned that in my research.”

“Yes, that is correct.” says Vellie. For the first time, he sounds truly impressed with what an earth child has to say. “Tor access points are portals to the Dark Web. Oliver: can you create a heavy blocker for this access point?”

“Giant boulder you can’t move,” says Oliver with authority, and immediately with a plunk the boulder appears, totally engulfing the manhole cover with its massive size.

“We are finished here,” says Vellie. “Olivia, you have in your possession the passport, correct? These two must travel as your charges.”

“Yes, I have it, Vellie.”

“Very well. Back to your home world it is.”

Before Olivia or Oliver can tell Vellie how much they will miss him, there is a rushing and a whooshing and the passport burns red-hot against Olivia’s thigh through her jeans pocket.

In a matter of seconds, they are standing back in Paul’s room. The window is still open. The curtains swish once with a mysterious wind, but then they stop moving and stay eerily still. Olivia looks around. Everything is the way they left it. Except it’s not morning anymore because the long shadows of late afternoon are beginning to form in the corners.

Suddenly Paul’s mother appears in the doorway with a police officer.

“PAUL! My baby! You’re ok! Thank GOD you’re ok!” She rushes forward and engulfs him in a hug. “Where have you been? And the rest of you are here too! Oh thank God, Oliver, Olivia, let me get my phone and call your parents.”

“We’ll notify them, ma’am,” says the officer. “You kids come with us now.”

“Thank God, you’re okay! Thank God,” Paul’s mom keeps repeating.

As the officer leads them away, Oliver turns to Olivia and whispers:

“Do you think she means Thank HSE?”