EPISODE XII

Purpose, Part 1

Randy lifted his hat so he could get a good look at the place. It was far too green to be a respectable establishment, but that was true of everywhere he’d been for the last couple weeks of travel. Once he’d left the dry climates, the infuriating color had left its rightful, limited place and appeared on everything. Trees, bushes, grass… and the moss growing up the walls of this hotel like someone thought the look was charming.

The sooner he got this over with the sooner he could go back to the true man’s climate: dry, arid, hard. Everyone here smiled too much and found water to be so boring they often refused to drink any of it, instead going for fruit juices and that awful fake fizzy juice!

The more he thought about where he was, the more he hated it. Too much life, too much leisure, and too many people. Then there was the technology, all those phones, cars, and weird holographic display things. It all sucked.

He stormed into the hotel, hands on his pistol. He marched right for the bar—though not that anyone here could call it a bar, they’d call it a “restaurant” or something else equally stupid.

His targets were right where he wanted them. Amaris and Irene, standing at the bar, chatting obliviously with each other.

Randy raised his gun. “I gotcha now, no more runnin.’ “

“Um, sir?” one of the waiters asked.

“Little busy…”

“Why are you pointing a gun at nothing?”

The stools were empty. There was no sign of anyone having recently sat in them.

Orville appeared in front of Randy and tipped his hat. “That was almost too easy.”

Randy refused to look at the mental monster, but he was too angry to avoid responding. He tore his hat off his head and threw it onto the ground, stomping it until it was perfectly flat.

“What a waste of a perfectly good hat,” the waiter commented.

“Shut yer yap!” Randy stormed out of the hotel and stood on the sidewalk, staring at the cars going by.

Orville sat on a nearby bench, eating a sandwich that looked slightly too perfect to be real. “You know, it’s probably impossible to find them now. Seeing as they’ve been trying to lose you, and I’ve been telling them exactly where you are and what you’ve been doing. You should just go home.”

Randy wanted to give him a mouthful, he really did. But that would just infect his mind with the mind monster’s power. He had to stay strong, had to say nothing.

But he would not go home. He would retrace his steps until he found where they left. Then he would track them to the ends of the world! Irene would pay for what she did to his mind, and that kid Amaris would suffer for helping her escape. Revenge would be his!

Orville sighed. “Well, I tried. Enjoy the endless, pointless hunt.”

With Orville gone, Randy grinned. The fool could no longer lead him astray! He was free!

Only then did he realize he didn’t even know what city he was in.

His hat couldn’t get any flatter, but he stomped on it anyway. It didn’t really help, so he shot his gun into the air to relieve stress. At which point he was promptly arrested.

~~~

Amaris laid in a field of purple grass under an equally purple tree. Calm hills of the grass spread out in all directions until it came to the park edge, at which point it was replaced by a city composed of massive skyscrapers made almost entirely of blue glass. Holographic neon signs protruded from the buildings, advertising everything from socks to the latest 3D holo-show.

The entire city itself was floating over a mile above the ground, but that wasn’t overly obvious from where Amaris was sitting. If someone were teleported here without any warning there would be no way to tell they were floating unless they walked to the edge of the city and looked down at the jagged fields of bone and glass below.

“Lunch… is ready!” Irene declared.

Amaris sat up, looking at the picnic blanket Irene had set out for them. It was a traditional red and white checkerboard pattern matched with a weaved basket filled with sandwiches, fried chicken, and fresh vegetables with ranch dressing. Most would have thought it all standard store-bought stuff, but Amaris knew better: Irene had prepared the majority of this herself.

The woman knew how to cook. She even fried the chicken earlier that day! Seasoning and everything; and she’d had the gall to refuse to let Amaris have any until right this moment.

Amaris stared at the food, mouth-watering.

Irene playfully lifted up a chicken leg, raising an eyebrow. “Now, Amaris, what do we say?”

“Irene, come on…”

“Amaris…”

Amaris rolled her eyes. “May I have some chicken, please?”

Irene tossed it to Amaris, who eagerly grabbed it and began digging in. Irene frowned. “We need to work on your manners.”

“Why are you so fixated on this?” Amaris asked through a mouthful of chicken. “Holy cow, this is good.”

“Thank you,” Irene said, tilting her feathered hat back. “And as for the manners, Amaris, you will have to rejoin society eventually when you find your parents.”

Amaris noted Irene had said “when” not “if.” It was a distinction she was quite thankful for.

“And,” Irene continued. “To properly rejoin society, you must learn how not to eat like a slob.”

Amaris put on her best attempt at a grizzled, battle-hardened expression. Even with her scar, she didn’t succeed, but she forged on anyway. “I did what I needed to survive.”

“You got lazy,” Irene said.

“Eeeeeeeeeh…” Amaris didn’t feel like getting into this argument. In the end, she had to admit that Irene had a point; even if it was immensely annoying to worry about looking proper in what was essentially a survival scenario.

Irene daintily removed a piece of fried chicken and proceeded to eat it without getting a mess anywhere. Not even a stray crumb.

“Okay, how?” Amaris asked.

“With the proper training, anyone can become a dignified lady.” She sheepishly tapped her wrists. “Even a nervous wreck like me.”

“When would you have the opportunity to be trained in the middle of desert nowhere?”

Irene frowned. “I… didn’t always live there. My family was a remnant of the old nobility in Valite. It became pretty clear that the nobility was no longer welcome and the family spread out to avoid being targeted by people who might get clever ideas of toppling the aristocracy.” She sighed. “I’ve been on my own since then. I used to get letters from my family from time to time, but they all had better things to do than send letters to twitchy little Irene. I was only in Unrust because Aunt Lila lived there and had a place I could stay while I worked things out. I just… never left.” Absent-mindedly she rubbed the cuffs on her gloves. “And now here I am, traveling further than I’ve ever been with a girl who’s cursed terrible things to happen to us.”

Amaris opened her mouth to remind Irene that she was under no obligation to stay, but Irene raised a hand to quiet her. “I-I’m staying with you, at least for a while.”

Amaris frowned but nodded. She honestly wasn’t sure why Irene was sticking around—the woman was terrified of everything. Did she feel safe around Amaris? Or was there some kind of maternal instinct at work? Amaris didn’t know enough to say for sure and wasn’t entirely sure if Irene knew why she was sticking around.

Orville appeared to Amaris’ left. “He won’t be bothering you at all. Poor guy has no idea how many false leads I’ve planted in his head.”

“Good news,” Amaris said.

Irene lit up. “Oh, Orville’s back? Is Randy… elsewhere?” Orville must have appeared to her since she let out a sigh of relief. “That’s good.”

“Let’s see how far away he is, why don’t we?” Amaris took out the notebook she kept the map notes in and flipped to the relevant location. “He’s all the way down here…” She pointed to the southernmost city on the map. “While we…” She traced her finger off the northern edge of the map, flipped a page, and moved her finger over an ocean and past another large collection of cities before flipping the page again and landing on the jagged wastes their current floating city was taking them over, currently traveling in a northeasterly direction.

“…He is never finding us,” Irene said, taking a moment to wipe her brow. “I can’t even keep track of where we’ve been!”

“Airplanes, boats, and trains,” Amaris said, closing the book. “It’s amazing how far you can go if you have money and infrastructure.”

Orville appeared next to the picnic basket, taking a moment to eat a fake sandwich. “Nice place you’ve found here.”

“Only the best and most interesting transportation for Amaris,” Irene said.

“Anyway…” Amaris opened up another notebook. “Now that Orville’s back, we can discuss the plan.”

“Oh, right, the plan.” Irene put down her food and folded her hands together. “I hope it doesn’t involve stealing a horse again.”

“Probably not.” Amaris flipped to one of the pages near the back. “So, Orville, we already established that you and I were cursed by the same person, Freddloi.”

“He appears the same in your memory and the memory of the people around me when I changed,” Orville confirmed.

“He agreed,” Amaris told Irene. “Now, this seems like a good way to figure out how to find my home: just follow Freddloi’s memory until you get to the Cat-Ival. The only problem with that is Freddloi’s memory—Orville can’t enter it for some reason.”

Irene put a hand to her chin. “I mean, if I were cursing people, I wouldn’t want the curse to reflect badly on me.”

“Exactly. And, furthermore, we can bet our butts that he’s out there cursing more people just because he feels like it. So, the goals of the mission are as follows: one, get me home. Two: stop Freddloi from cursing people.”

Irene looked to the side and laughed a few seconds later.

“Mm, yes, I bet Orville told you a hilarious joke,” Amaris deadpanned.

“You have to admit, it is a tall order,” Irene chuckled.

The pain of in-jokes. “Orville, with your abilities, we actually have a chance. You can’t follow Freddloi’s memory, but you can follow the memory of people around him. You can go back to when and where he cursed you and then follow the people around him until you arrive to when he cursed me, and then finally to wherever he is in the present moment.”

There was silence for a few seconds. Irene coughed. “Orville, you’re still in my memory.”

Orville sheepishly appeared to Amaris. “My main concern with that is it will take a lot of time to sift through memories that way.”

“Which is why, even though it would give us a lot of information, it can’t be the first part of the plan.” Amaris held up her notebook and showed the page to him. “I know we won’t be able to do this on our own, we need help. So I want you to send a few messages for me. Just… try not to scramble my memory up too much in the process, all right?”

Orville examined the notebook page, nodding slowly. “So, who first?”

~~~

The “help wanted” sign on the bulletin board had sounded too ridiculous to be true. “Help remove pesky ruby t-rex. Keep ruby shards as payment.” A ruby t-rex? Absurd.

As it turned out the description wasn’t entirely accurate. It was a t-rex all right, one made entirely out of pure green emerald.

Evidently, the guy who posted the notice was colorblind.

The emerald t-rex let out a roar that spewed a hail of tiny crystal shards like needles. Hundreds of them pierced the target’s body, stabbing through every organ in her body.

Jenny methodically plucked the shards out of her eyes so she could see properly. “Ow,” she deadpanned. “You ruined my new outfit too.” She gestured at the silvery-white shirt and skirt that now had over a hundred holes in it. Naturally, the angular shoulders had been hit the hardest. “I just can’t catch a bre—“

The emerald t-rex rushed in and bit off her arm, throwing the limb down his gullet and into the crystalline stomach.

Jenny popped out a new arm in a matter of seconds. “So, one of two things happens here. One, I beat the tar out of you. Two, I become a perpetual food source until something happens where I beat the tar out of you. Why not take the shortcut? Being eternal food is so b—“

The monster flattened her with its foot, creating a messy Jenny pancake on the ground. It removed its foot and watched in fascination as Jenny snapped back into place with several unpleasant popping and slurping sounds.

Somehow her clothing was still intact, largely unaffected by the flattening.

“I prefer enemies that can talk. Then again…” Jenny pulled back a fist and surrounded it with glowing red energy. “I generally have to avoid killing the talking ones.”

The t-rex tried to stomp her again. This time, Jenny fought back, driving her fist directly into the crystalline dinosaur’s foot. On contact, a thundering boom sounded with enough force to knock Jenny back to the ground while also sending a crack straight up the dinosaur’s leg and to the bulk of its body. Being made entirely out of emerald, it cracked clean through, and the dinosaur was suddenly missing a leg.

T-rexes need both legs to stand.

It only managed one hop before toppling onto the ground with a satisfying crash that would have been a lot more satisfying if the head hadn’t fallen on top of Jenny.

Three high-impact explosive punches later, the monster’s head was reduced to green shrapnel and Jenny was pulling green shards out of her eyes again.

“That was very impressive,” Orville said, sitting on one of the monster’s remaining toes.

“That’s not news to me, buddy.” Jenny plucked another shard from her pincushion of a body. “…Who’re you anyway?”

“I am Orville, a ‘memory entity.’ ” He stood up, smiling. “Amaris sent me to deliver a message.”

Jenny stopped plucking emerald shards out. “Huh? Amaris?“

“She’s trying to stop the man who cursed her and find her home at the same time. Everything’s a little fuzzy at the moment, but she’s sure she can’t do this alone.”

“Look, I’d drop everything and run to her if I thought I had a way to get to her. But didn’t she tell you about the escape pod?”

“Oh, she did. But it turns out that was a missile.”

Jenny blinked repeatedly. “Well, uh, it served as an escape pod for her because she’s okay since you’re here.” She crossed her arms. “So there.” She stuck out her tongue at him, really not sure what she was hoping to accomplish.

Orville adjusted his spectacles. “She has an idea about that. All you need to do is make it to Genk.”

“Genk. You’re kidding, right?” Jenny spread her arms wide—and then felt like she was facing the wrong direction, but this didn’t bug her at all. “That’s to the west. I’d be backtracking everything! It’d take weeks!”

“Then you better get started, huh?”

Jenny sighed. “All right, fine. I’ll get there. Care to fill me in on the rest of the plan?”

“Well, with any luck, by the time you arrive I will have already contacted the others through their memories…”

~~~

Sarah looked out at the city of Genk from her utterly massive window on top of the world. It had been repaired from the fight with Toad rather quickly and the only sign that anything had happened was how much newer the materials in the ceiling were than the rest of the room.

She was in a black suit with a decent number of colored pens pinned to the pocket. Her plastic hair was done up in a shockingly normal style for a Gari, with short strands curved around her head somewhat like a helmet.

“Miss?” her secretary asked, scuttling into the room.

“Yes, what is it?”

“The trade agreement with Irest has gone through.”

Sarah let out a deep sigh.

“Isn’t that good news?”

“Yes, it’s great news. But it brings with it an immense amount of paperwork.” She rubbed her eyes.

“I could do it for you, miss.”

“Thanks for the offer, but I can’t afford to let myself become distanced from the proceedings. I can’t just pretend to be involved to the people.” She sat down in her office chair and flipped open her laptop, expecting to begin a few emails. Instead, her phone rang.

She put on a smile and pulled the phone to her ear. “This is Sarah. Ah, the orphanage has been rebuilt? Good! Of course I’ll be there for the official proceedings! We just need to work out the details…” She noticed a man in a gray suit waiting for her at the back of the room. She held up a hand to let him know she’d be right with him and returned to her call—failing to notice that her secretary was looking around bewildered, for there was no one to tell to wait. “Mhm, yeah, eight o’clock. I think I’ll be bringing Kiri with me, so make sure to let the kids have fun. None of the ‘proper businesslike mentality’ nonsense. This is for the kids, let them actually have it.” She hung up. “Now, what did you want?”

“Miss, there’s no one there.” The secretary pointed to the empty chair.

“But I could have sworn…”

Orville cleared his throat, drawing Sarah’s attention. “I’m not really here, I’m a mind-creature sent by Amaris. Do you think we could have a moment to talk?”

Sarah’s mouth made a silent “oh.” She turned to the secretary. “Thanks, can you go get all the Irest paperwork sent up to me? That would be great.”

“Of course, miss. And congratulations.”

“On what?”

“Oh, take your pick.”

As soon as the secretary was gone, Sarah turned back. Orville was waiting for her. “Spill the beans.”

“I’m afraid I don’t have any beans, but… Amaris has come across a potential method to find her way home and stop the person who cursed her in the first place from cursing anyone else. But she’s convinced she can’t do it on her own, so she’s sending me through everyone’s memories to formulate a plan.”

“That does sound like her,” Sarah admitted. “However…” She felt a wave of nausea wash over her. “H-however, what proof do I have? If you’re a memory creature, you can just tap into Amaris’ memory and tell me anything she knows about me. What kind of proof can you offer that she really sent you and you aren’t just stealing memories?”

“I… uh. Huh.” Orville rubbed the back of his head. “She didn’t account for anyone doubting the message was from her…”

“Understandable, since having a memory entity at her beck and call is pretty ‘interesting.’ But, well, I’ve been in charge of Genk for a while now and I’ve seen some pretty crazy shady stuff, and I wouldn’t put this past the Marketeers.”

“Who the what now?”

“Idiots, the lot of them, who make my paperwork stacks larger and angry phone calls more common.”

Orville rubbed his glasses. “I have a thought. Perhaps I can tell you the story of how I met Amaris and the entirety of the plan, then you can decide if you trust me or not.”

“Well, I don’t actually have time for that…” Sarah bit her lip, then picked up the phone, selecting one of the speed-dial options. “Hey, Suuk! I’ve got something that’s right up your alley… it might involve Amaris. You be the judge. No, you don’t need to come in.” She glanced knowingly at the spot Orville was. “I’ll send him to you.”

Orville stood up. “Ah, Suuk then. I should warn you the plan will require a significant amount of resources and some kind of all-terrain land vehicle, which will likely require—“

“I trust Suu—“ The wave of nausea was so intense that Sarah had to run over to a potted plant and regurgitate her lunch. “What in the…?”

“You don’t handle the short-term memory disorientation well, apparently.”

“I don’t even know why I’m sick!” Sarah wailed.

“I’d explain it to you, but that’d probably just make you sicker, so… bye.”

He was gone.

“I sure hope Suuk can give him anything he needs…” Sarah grumbled, sitting back down at her desk. She took a moment to enjoy the normal, unaltered, procedural creation of memories.

“Got the paperwork, Miss!”

Sarah had to force herself to keep the smile. “Very good! …Bring it here so we can cut into this pile. And by we, I mean mostly me.” She clicked her pen and started reading over the trade negotiations.

~~~

Coleus sat in the midst of a Glen situated on top of a mountain, with the older dryads sitting motionless in their tree forms around the lake, as usual. Coleus herself did some humming before sitting next to a suitable patch of soil. She tapped the ground with her fingers, creating two small evergreen trees in the loose shape of a man and a woman. She twisted their branches until they were locked in an embrace.

“They’re pine-ing for each other,” Coleus whispered to herself with a giggle.

Yes, she’d made that pun before. But, like most of her puns, she never got tired of them.

“Amaris didn’t tell me you were an artist with those plants of yours.”

“AUGH!” Coleus jumped up and pointed a shaky finger at… nothing? But wait, there was a man there in a gray suit, or, what?

“My name is Orville, and…”

“Augh! Ghost!” Coleus scrambled over to the lake where the other dryads rested. “I’ve got a ghost in my head!”

“No, Coleus!” Orville appeared in front of her. “Amaris sent me to give you a message!”

“A message?” Coleus stopped in her tracks. “Wait, Amaris!?” Coleus tried to grab Orville in order to ask him a million questions about her, but she fell through him onto the ground at one of the other dryad’s roots.

The dryads made no move toward her.

“Mmm, yes, I shout ghost and nobody comes to my rescue…” Coleus sighed, turning to Orville. “So… what’s this about a message?”

Orville adjusted his hat. “Amaris has potentially found a way to get home and find the man who cursed her in the first place, but she’s convinced she can’t do it alone. We’re formulating a plan in Genk—“

“Coleus actually has an entity in her,” one of the dryads said. “She wasn’t joking this time.”

Coleus turned to the dryad and put her hands on her hips. “Well, thank you for noticing, but turns out he’s a nice guy with a message from Amaris. So leaf this alone, I’ll deal with it!”

“The Glen’s barrier has already been adjusted to filter out his corrupting influence.”

“Wh-hey! He wasn’t dome talking to me yet!” She tapped her head on “dome,” hoping to get the elder dryad to think.

“Coleus…” the dryad turned his old, bark-ridden trunk to show his face. “Your maturation is approaching. The outside world is not for you.”

“Of… of course.” Coleus shuffled away from the lake awkwardly, taking a seat at the pining pines she had created. She stared at them, frowning. With a flat expression, she stood up and walked to the center of the Glen, shifting her location to another Glen—the one in the cave outside Genk.

Wordlessly, she left the mushroomy cave and walked out until she saw the sunlight. The city of Genk still looked absolutely disgusting to Coleus in virtually every way, but that… that was where Orville had said everything was happening.

As she took a step outside the cave, she had second thoughts. She didn’t know the first thing about cities and even though she knew Sarah was in charge of Genk, people still might take advantage of Coleus and use her to track down the Glen and ruin it for all the dryads who lived there…

But Amaris had a message for her and, judging by Orville’s expression, it had been an important one.

“I am so dead…” she whimpered to herself. Closing her eyes, she took a step out of the cave.

She promptly tripped and rolled quite a ways down an uneven, obsidian-filled landscape, cutting many of her leaves in the process. Eventually, she came to a rest; though as far as she was concerned she was still spinning.

“Just call me… Circulus…” She traced circles in the air with her finger. “Wheee…”

“You know, you were supposed to wait up there for me.”

Coleus blinked a few times until a pair of cat-ears came into focus.

“Suuk?”

“Yeah, it’s me.” Suuk extended a hand and helped Coleus to her feet. “You seriously messed yourself up in that fall.”

Coleus took a moment to heal herself with her energy—it took quite a bit out of her, especially this far from the Glen or any sort of nature, but it worked well enough to be functional. The edges of her leaves did turn brown, however. “I should probably dry some new leaf-care ointments.”

“…Dry?”

“Dry? Try?”

Suuk stared blankly at her. “That was the worst pun I’ve ever heard in my life.”

Coleus gave her a thumbs up. “Well, get used to it, because you’re going to hear a lot more from me, Punulus!”

Suuk facepalmed. “I can’t believe you’re the most important part of the plan?”

“R-really!?”

“Yeah, you’re the one that can take everyone super-long distances.”

Coleus’ smile faltered. “Oh. Oh that. Ohhhhhh…”

“What?”

“They won’t be able to stop me if we do it fast!” She moved her hand forward like it was a bird. “We’ll just have to pounce right in there, purr-fectly timed so they cat do anything about it!”

“…I hate you with every fiber of my being right now.” Suuk’s tail flicked aggressively.

Coleus put a hand around Suuk’s shoulder. “You’ll learn to love me! Seriously though, the dryads probably hate my guts right now and will never let me move you guys anywhere without speed. It’ll only work once, maybe twice.”

Suuk let out a low whistle. “Then we better figure out where we’re going to land. I’ve got with me a list of locations that we know we can reach Amaris from.” She pulled out a crinkled piece of paper with a bunch of rushed sketches of landscapes with information. “So, the first place we have is—“

Coleus pointed at the forest of giant mushrooms. “That forest has Glen Jiff.”

“Jiff!?”

“Everyone thinks the name is ridiculous, but we can be there in a Jiffy. When do we leave?”

Suuk squinted, taking a moment to think. “Sarah’s charting our vehicle and supplies, so that’ll take a few days…”

Coleus blinked. “I can’t go back to the Glen knowing this, they’ll make me tell them the plan!”

“Then you stay with us for a few days.”

“In a CITY!?”

“Actually, probably more than a few days, since we have no idea how long it’ll take Jenny to get here…”

Coleus swooned, flopping onto the ground. “The suffering that I will endure… the horror, the horror!”

“And you deal pun damage every time you speak, I say it’s an even trade.”

“You claw at my very soul…”

~~~

Orville had expected tracking Freddloi to be a bit of an ordeal, he just hadn’t accurately determined how difficult it would be.

The obvious difficulty was that Orville could not enter Freddloi’s memory. No matter how many times he returned to a memory of the moment he was cursed—a chance encounter in a crowded market stall while shopping for Lila—whenever he attempted to enter Freddloi’s memory stream, he was blocked.

Orville had never been surprised by this, no doubt a man who went around cursing others didn’t want his curses backfiring on him. The only other memory stream Orville hadn’t been able to enter was his own, which he was thankful for because that could have created an infinite feedback loop. Probably a bad idea, if it was even possible.

However, the Glen… the dryads of the Glen had been able to block him. Nobody he had ever encountered had been able to do that. Luckily, Coleus had gotten enough of the message to get out and was now “suffering like no dryad had ever suffered before!” in Genk. He wasn’t worried about her, he was worried about coming across other entities that might block his influence. Because everyone had reason to keep a “ghostly” presence from rifling through their memories.

His “favorite” place to view his cursing—as much as it was possible to have a favorite—was from the memory of a female neko who was sitting on a bench. Her memory never reacted to him sitting on the bench beside her as he watched himself talking to Freddloi. The man had no features, he simply wore a round, pearly-white mask with six eye-holes cut into it, and a black suit. Freddloi was a puppeteer in this memory. The conversation was muffled since the neko woman hadn’t been paying much attention to it, but the image was clear.

No matter how many times Orville came back here, the eerie feeling of seeing himself, in the exact same clothing he was wearing now, talking to the masked man with no idea that everything was about to change.

Freddloi leaned in. The next words he said caught neko woman’s attention.

“May you never be forgotten.”

There was a flash of golden dust, and then the memory of Orville simply wasn’t there anymore. Orville knew he appeared first in the memory of an old guy a short way from the stand, but those early times jumping through memories were so disorienting he didn’t remember much more than that.

Orville watched as Freddloi left the area. At this point Orville usually jumped to another memory and went back to Unrust or the present somewhere, but not this time. This time, he jumped to a memory right next to Freddloi, tracking him. In a city such as this it was not difficult in the slightest to always find a memory with Freddloi in it, jumping left and right, forward and back, tracing the man all the way back to an apartment. At this point, it became harder to follow him, because he was no longer always in the memory of someone. Orville had to rewind in time a bit, wait for another resident of the apartment complex to come home, and then jump around until he found a resident who had seen Freddloi enter his apartment.

He spent a considerable amount of time attempting to find someone who had entered Freddloi’s apartment but found absolutely no one. The man was apparently the only individual to ever see the interior of his room from the day he purchased it to the day he left.

Speaking of the day he left, it was hard to pinpoint. Orville jumped back and forth a bit, finding a time when a Miss Agatha Bordeau lived in the apartment, and a time in the past when it was occupied by a hive-mind creature made of octahedrons that went by the name “Bacon.” He bounced back and forth several dozen times trying to narrow down the date when he realized he could just go to the Landlord’s memory.

Dates were funny in memories. People rarely remembered exact days when things happened, but even though they didn’t know the numbers, they remembered where the sun was, the weather, and any events happening around town. Jumping to the present to find someone looking at records or newspapers was rarely difficult in a large city, and from that, dates could be discerned.

Why not look at a newspaper in the past? That sometimes helped, if the memory streams had strong recollections of headlines, but memory is a fickle thing, and trying to read print was one of the worst offenders. With time and effort, Orville was able to determine that Freddloi had lived in the apartment for two years, but none of his neighbors did anything more than exchange pleasantries with him, and he never took off his mask. Ever.

Furthermore, even when Orville was able to find the exact day he left, nobody had seen him leave; at least nobody Orville had been in lately. The Landlord only received notice of Freddloi’s departure by letter.

This could be problematic.

He pushed his searches beyond the apartment complex, entering the memories of everyone he could find around that time. The problem was that Freddloi left in the middle of the night when there was no one out and about… but there was someone up in a low-lying office building across the street. What he did see was a flash of yellow light that lasted for a fraction of a second, traveling in a perfectly straight line from the apartment complex to… somewhere out of sight.

Teleportation, perhaps? Orville thought. Just to be sure, he jumped memories a few cities away to one he knew had a reputable wizard college. He spent an inordinate amount of time there trying to find a memory of a lecture on teleportation.

He eventually found something that was close enough: esoteric transportation. Within the memory was a very useful and insightful piece of information: there is no such thing as direct teleportation. Most “teleportation” simply converted the target to light and reverted it upon reaching the correct location. One of the students asked about portals, at which point the professor wizard went on a rant about portal formation propagating at the speed of light in a reference Orville didn’t understand and didn’t care to try to understand.

He had what he needed. That beam of light was probably Freddloi teleporting. Orville just had to follow it.

Which, again, was very difficult. He’d only seen the beam once, and it only existed for a fraction of a second in the middle of the night, and who knew how far it went?

He had to go to a cartographer to get a very precise memory of a map, on which he drew a line to get some idea of the possible locations. It ran through the town of Ogg’g’gg, which was inhabited by spherical creatures made of swirling gas. They had no eyes and thus their memories consisted only of sounds and sensations.

However… at the night the beam shot through the sky, they had been having a festival and had invited their many neighbors for an all-night celebration, and with all the partying humans in the midst of them, more than a few saw the yellow light burst across the sky.

Orville had to repeat this over a dozen times, going off the edge of the map he originally had, forcing him to find another one in the midst of it. This teleportation was extremely far.

But, in the end, and after who knew how much searching, he found its destination, though he had no idea what he was looking at, at least at first. Six massive pillars rose and fell out of the ground, marked by massive gears, pivots, and pulsating green sacs of mucus. As he looked up, he saw that the six pillars were legs attached to a truly disgusting creature made of metal, bone, flesh, leaves, crystals, shadow, and a large number of other bits Orville couldn’t hope to identify. Its mouth was situated in the middle of the six legs, and the rest of it… was a head. A head with buildings clearly built onto it, some large enough to be considered skyscrapers in their own right.

What in Dia’s name…?

Every few minutes, a beam of light would emanate from somewhere near the top of the massive entity. Teleportation beams. Of people entering and leaving, no doubt. He also saw people going up the creature on rickety rope-pulley systems affixed to its legs. He hopped into their memories, rushed forward to see the inside of the creature…

…but he was barred entry, forced into a different memory stream.

Just like the Glen…

This posed a problem.

He was fairly sure Freddloi was in there, but he had no way to tell which of the beams coming in were him, or if he was leaving with one of the other beams. He couldn’t enter the city on top of the creature to find out more, so he was stuck, wasn’t he?

No. This is clearly a base of some kind. It must have a limit to how far its teleportation can work. If I follow it to wherever it is in fifty years, Amaris’ home should be close enough for me to find. And then I can follow it to the present…

Before he did that, though, he found a random person’s memory and jumped to the present so he could figure out how long he’d been sifting through memories.

The answer was not difficult to find. He’d been shuffling around, tracking Freddloi, for an entire month.

Better step up my game.

He returned to the city-creature, finding it much easier to track simply because of how absurdly huge it was. It quickly became evident that the creature was a devastating monster. It trudged along the earth, through oceans, swamps, deserts, and more exotic biomes in search of cities.

When it found them, its toothy maw opened and multicolored tentacles of varied materials shot out at high velocity, grabbing onto entire skyscrapers like an anteater would ants. Even from Orville’s distant vantage point, he could hear the screams of the city as it was torn to shreds.

He could not enter the memories of anyone within the devoured city. Everyone he could see had perished and were no longer accessible.

He was thankful for that. He did not need to see carnage of that magnitude.

However, even restricted to distant viewings as he was, it was still terrible. As he followed the creature further and further, he watched as more and more cities were devoured. Some fought back—some fought back hard, with bombs capable of leveling cities. But whenever something fought the creature directly, it was able to produce exactly what was needed to survive the encounter. Be it a magic shield, a tentacle of an indestructible material, or even turning invisible one time, there seemed to be no end to its tricks.

As it journeyed, the city on top grew ever larger, gaining weapons of its own. Weapons that assisted the beast in its terrible conquest.

Surely, people have tried to stop this thing…

When it wasn’t devouring cities, people were entering the city on top all the time for trade, commerce, and other things. How had it not been infiltrated and defeated yet?

Orville didn’t know. But he continued to follow it and connect what intel he could as he pushed forward along the memory stream of various random people near it, getting closer and closer to the moment where Amaris was cursed…

~~~

“Here we go,” Jenny told her passenger. “I’ve got the deets from Orville—be prepared to make an entrance.”

“You got it!”

Jenny pulled back on her motorcycle’s handle, revving the engine as much as she could. She currently wore an all-leather suit with, of course, angled shoulders. There was no helmet to tie the look together; since when did Jenny need to be concerned with safety?

She barreled into the city of Genk at full speed, kicking up shards of obsidian and narrowly weaving around several pedestrians in a mixture of drab and brightly colored clothes. All responded in equal parts terror and shock at Jenny and her passenger blazing through the city streets with no regard for traffic laws and only minor concern with not running people over.

With a whoop, she turned to the right so quickly that her knee almost touched the ground—but she quickly righted it and continued barreling to their destination. “You know, when I bought this bike, I wasn’t sure I knew how to drive it! Hah! Best decision ever!”

In front of them was a large blue warehouse—the target. Fortunately, the doors were open just enough for a motorcycle so she wouldn’t have to do any fancy punching to get through that might get people upset with her. With another excited cheer, she rode right through the cracks in the doors and twisted the motorcycle into a spinning wheelie. Laughing, she jumped off the motorcycle and landed in a rigid T-pose on the ground with enough force to shatter most of the bones in her foot, but she ignored that. With a snarky grin, she glanced knowingly at those gathered in the warehouse. “I’m here!”

Sarah, Suuk, and Coleus were standing there. Sarah was disapproving, Suuk was impressed, and Coleus was in the midst of a coughing fit due to the motorcycle’s fumes.

“And look who I brought with me!” Jenny gestured at the motorcycle—which had gone out of control without her touch and slammed into a wall, depositing its passenger unceremoniously on the ground. “…Hey, Boro, we were supposed to be awesome!”

Boro—the giant white spider-exoskeleton from the Old Bones—righted himself, clacking his various legs together. “You never taught me how to drive the motorcycle!”

“That is no excuse for not being awesome,” Jenny huffed, folding her arms.

“I’m a vicious undead predator, I am awesome by def—“

The motorcycle exploded, sending Boro flying.

“Hey, I liked that bike…” Jenny pouted.

Suuk put a hand on Jenny’s shoulder. “You. I like you.”

“The cat has good taste,” Jenny said, glancing at Sarah with a smug expression.

Sarah put her hand on the bridge of her nose and sighed. “Okay… you all know why you’re here, though I would have appreciated knowing you were bringing the spider along.”

“Boro’ll be great!” Jenny said. “When I passed by the Old Bones they wanted to help Amaris too, and he volunteered.”

“Yes, but now the transport is going to be a bit cramped.” Sarah shook her head.

“We’ll fit him in somehow,” Suuk said with a shrug. “Or we can tie Jenny to the hood since she can take it.”

“Yeah, I can take it!” Jenny’s smile vanished. “Hey, wait, I don’t wa—“

“Too late, you’re already written down for hood-duty.”

Coleus finally recovered from her coughing fit. “It comes with a complimentary hoodie!”

Jenny somehow snapped her fingers through her gloves. “That sounds amazing.”

Suuk groaned. “She’s just making a dumb pun.”

Jenny winked. “You sure? Dumb and not meowvelous?”

Coleus let out a gasp like today was the best day ever. “I think it’s purrfect!”

“I want more right meow!”

“Hey, you used meow twice! That’s cat-astrophic!”

Suuk let out a mix between a meow and a whimper. “I changed my mind, I hate you.”

Jenny clapped Suuk on the back. “And now you’ve experienced the spectrum of Jenny, welcome to the club!”

“I go through the spectrum of Jenny every hour!” Boro offered.

Sarah let out a loud cough. “Right, we’ve wasted enough time. You all know why you’re here and you all know what we have to do. All that remains… is to do it.”

Jenny raised a hand.

“…Yes, Jenny?”

“Can I see the fancy car?”

Sarah rolled her eyes, but couldn’t help but smile. “You need to see it to use it… but I might as well make it dramatic. Ahem.” She jumped into the air and did a triple pirouette, pressing a button on a remote in the middle of the trick. When she landed, a large crate in the back of the warehouse popped open, revealing the contents to be an utterly massive six-wheeled vehicle with a pristine white cabin and black solar panels on the roof. The wheels were segmented in five sections, clearly designed to grow in size if necessary, or develop spikes when needed. A large mechanical arm sat folded to the side of the vehicle with a hand made of assorted tools.

“Behold!” Sarah slid across the ground in a split, waving her hands at the vehicle. “The new and improved Obsidian Crawler, the latest in All-Terrain Vehicle technology. Adapted from the original designs intended to traverse Genk’s obsidian wastes, this newest model is prepared to deal with any terrain it comes across at high speed! And, and, it’s completely eco-friendly. Coming soon to industry and auto-stores near you.” She stood up and bowed to the applause of Coleus and Suuk.

Jenny whistled, approaching the vehicle and running her hand across its hull—she was barely tall enough to reach its nose, it was such a high-rider. However, she was able to make out its name: Retrograde.

“Why retrograde?” Jenny asked.

“The idea is that it will take Amaris home,” Sarah said, pressing another button to unfold a loading ramp off the back of the Retrograde. “It’s already packed full with all the supplies you’ll need. The cockpit only has three seats, though, so…”

“Hoodie,” Coleus said, tapping Jenny on the back.

“Uuuugh…” Jenny groaned.

“Let’s roll!” Suuk said, jumping up the ramp into the Retrograde. “Those dryads won’t even know what hit them…”

“We’re not hitting them!” Coleus huffed. “We’re just… passing through. Quickly. Very quickly.”

Sarah nodded. “They are already a little suspicious that we opened the mouth of the cavern up a…” Sarah’s phone rang. After taking a moment to let out a sigh, she put on a cheery smile and answered it. “Sarah! …What do you mean the Glen is gone!?”

Coleus gasped. “Oh no! They’re right, I can’t sense the Glen anymore! You must not have been careful enough when you widened the opening and they thought they were compromised!”

“How are we gonna get anywhere now!?” Suuk shouted from inside the Retrograde.

“Just drive north!” Coleus called, running up the ramp. “I’ll let you know when we’re close to one!”

Jenny jumped on top of the Retrograde while Boro climbed in with the other two. “Let’s see how fast this baby can go!”

Sarah nodded, waving to them. “Good luck!”

The Retrograde roared to life, numerous blue lights springing to life all around it. The wheels shrunk in size slightly, folding in such a way that they were rather smooth. Then, with an alarming burst of speed, the entire vehicle took off like a bullet, smashing through the warehouse doors and onto the street.

Jenny only managed to hang on because her arm got wrenched in one of the rooftop rails. “Hey! Think of your passengers!”

But Suuk couldn’t hear her over the roar of the engine. She pressed the pedal to the metal and proceeded to ignore just about every traffic law Sarah had put into place, rushing the Retrograde out of the city.

“…I should probably have them arrested for all that nonsense,” Sarah said to absolutely no one. With a shrug, she took out her phone and dialed her secretary. “Back to business!”

~~~

They had eventually found a way for Boro to ride in the cargo compartment disassembled into his component exoskeleton pieces, much like the other skeletons could disassociate into bones. They kept his head in the cockpit with the three of them as they drove onward. Currently, they were trudging through a swamp. Yes, technically they could have used the road through this part of the world, but they wanted to test the Retrogade’s capabilities. It was performing admirably so far, though they had needed to stop once on a cloudy day since there was no solar power available. While they had other fuel with them in case of emergency, they didn’t want to use it unless it really was an emergency.

Coleus was currently playing on a portable console of some kind. Jenny was watching over her shoulder—it appeared to be about building factories and maximizing the efficiency therein. “I thought you hated civilization stuff?”

“Oh, uh… I did.” Coleus rubbed the back of her head. “But after spending a month in Genk, some of the stuff is… well, kinda cool. All the things you people know about rocks and how to extract things from them is kind of amazing. And the amount of ingenuity it takes to create those factory machines, mmm!” She let out a little squeal. “I tried to make a tree with gears, it only sorta worked. But the idea of a plant factory is really growing on me.”

Suuk let out an audible groan.

Jenny chuckled. “The more you groan the more it makes us want to make more whisker-licking puns!”

“I just like making puns,” Coleus said, returning to her game. Jenny watched as she converted an entire forest into fuel to build another conveyor belt. Suddenly, Coleus dropped the game.

“What, finally understand the horror of industry?” Jenny asked.

“Have you sensed an enemy!?” Boro’s head added.

“N-no, I felt a Glen.” Coleus stood up, bonking her head on the ceiling. “I should have sensed it sooner, it’s so close! Suuk, change course, and go… thataway!”

“What way?” Suuk asked.

“I’m pointing! That’s the whole point of pointing, so you know the point!”

“There’s a tree in the way over there.”

“Just… it’s that way!”

Suuk managed to roll the Retrograde over a fallen log and onto a different section of the swampy bog, heading at a decent speed to the supposed Glen. It didn’t take too long for everyone to see the runic rocks jutting out over the treetops up ahead.

“…Ready?” Suuk asked.

“I… yes.” Coleus frowned. “…It’s been so long since, I’ve been in a Glen. I… I’ve gotten used to the lack of energy. I—oh no, what if I’m not connected to its power anymore?”

“You just made us a fresh pumpkin yesterday,” Jenny pointed out.

“Oh yeah…” Coleus rubbed the back of her head. “That’s right, huh? Yeah, we should be fine. Still…” She tilted her head. “I wonder if the dryads here are mad at me.”

“With any luck, they’ll have no idea it was you in the first place,” Suuk said. “Get ready…”

“For what?”

Suuk slammed on the gas and pushed the Retrograde through the swampy mire much faster than it probably should have gone, approaching the Glen at speeds enough to create small waves in the liquid filth surrounding them. The wheels quickly found footing on a mound and pulled the vehicle out of the muck, charging forward to the Glen.

“Nobody better have any harmful intent!” Coleus shouted, holding her hand up. “That means you, Boro!”

“I am thinking about sheep and explicitly not murdering them,” Boro said.

“I… nevermind, no time.” Coleus closed her eyes, feeling for the edge of the Glen. Let us through, let us through, let us—GOTCHA.

The Retrograde was only halfway through the Glen’s barrier when Coleus made the connection, transporting them directly to Glen Jif.

The only problem was that Glen Jif was on top of a giant mushroom, not on the floor of the mushroom forest. The Retrograde went careening off the edge of the mushroom to the fungal forest below, flipping end over end.

“COLEUS!” Suuk shouted.

“I was trying to be fast!” Coleus wailed.

“Fast up m—“

The Retrograde crashed into the smaller mushroom trees and flipped over again, somehow managing to land right on its wheels under a pile of minced mushrooms.

“That… was awesome,” Jenny said.

“We’re… alive…” Coleus let out a sigh of relief. “We’re alive, woo-ho—“

The patch of earth they had come to rest on was unstable and broke free, triggering a landslide focused around the Retrograde. Mushroom trees came crashing down while the rumbling earth flipped the Retrograde on its back. The seatbelts kept everyone but Boro secured, and everyone but Boro was screaming at the top of their lungs: though in Jenny’s case her screams were of joy and delight.

Eventually, they came to a rest at an area of the fungal forest with significantly lower elevation… inches from an old man in white robes purchasing potions from a pink garilend.

The old man leaned down and tapped on the glass of the Retrograde’s cockpit. “Are you Coleus?”

Coleus blinked from her upside-down seating arrangement. “Uh… yes?”

“I’m Keeper Ashton. I’ve been expecting you, but… well, not like this.”

It took some doing, but they managed to open the Retrograde’s doors and get out, re-assembling Boro in the process. Ashton gave them a warm welcome. “I’m afraid we don’t have the modern conveniences you are used to, but we should be able to organize a team to get your vehicle back on its feet.”

“Thanks,” Suuk said, trying to flatten the hair around her ears. “I’ll help—“

“Later,” Keeper Ashton said, raising a hand. “First, you rest in our Sanctuary.”

“Man, I haven’t been in a Sanctuary in forever…” Jenny tapped her chin. “Actually I don’t even remember being in one, but I know what they are. Weird.”

Suuk shrugged. “Never seen one before today.”

“I’m actually very curious,” Coleus said. “From what Orville told us about it, it’s remarkably similar to what the elder dryads do.”

Boro skittered up to Ashton. “Got any enemies for us to fight? It’s been nothing but driving so far. Boring.”

Ashton chuckled. “I’m sure your journey will have many exciting adventures, my arthropod friend. But I encourage you to seek diplomatic solutions as opposed to violent ones.”

“Bah.”

To Boro’s chagrin their time in the Sanctuary was immensely boring, and the next day the Retrograde was ready to go and he had to disassemble himself again.

They pulled out the big map and looked over the planned route Amaris had been on when Orville had last contacted them over a month ago.

“Oooh, we get to test out the flotation capabilities soon,” Coleus said, pointing at the ocean.

“We’re coming, Amaris!” Jenny declared, pointing forward with a cocky grin.

~~~

A snowman made out of vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry ice cream opened its icicle-filled maw and released a stream of strawberry bullets at Amaris and Irene.

Amaris ducked behind a large waffle cone, using it as cover from the strawberries. “Irene!”

“I can’t do anything!” Irene said, waving her hands frantically. “Either it can’t feel happiness or it was already happy when attacking us!”

“Come to the Ice Cream Mountains, they said…” Amaris said, loading an anti-magic arrow into her bow. “It’ll be a leisurely stroll, they said…” She stood up, managing not to slip on the butterscotch-flavored snow and shot the arrow right into the monster’s head.

The monster split into two, smaller, but otherwise identical neapolitan beasts.

Amaris ducked back behind the waffle cone as another barrage of strawberries came sailing toward her. “Just goes to show, anti-magic arrows can’t solve everything!’

“What are we gonna do!?” Irene wailed.

“I’m thinking…”

“Oh no, that means you have no idea, and that we’re going to die…”

“I didn’t say th—“

The two monsters pulled at the waffle cone they were hiding behind and removed it from the ice-cream snow, throwing it to the side. Grinning malevolently, they opened their mouths, generating dozens of strawberries for shooting.

“No!” Irene shouted, placing herself between Irene and the monsters. Her legs were trembling and she was barely able to stand, but she held her ground.

“Irene…” Amaris said, eyes wide. “Wh—“

A single strawberry went flying…

…And then a massive wheel studded with spikes dropped out of the sky, crushing the berry and both monsters in one fell swoop.

Irene let out a soft laugh. “W-w-well we’re alive…” She swooned and passed out, falling into Amaris’ arms.

“For being so thin, you sure are heavy,” Amaris grunted. Pitch hissed in agreement. After setting Irene down, Amaris looked up to what had saved them—a massive six-wheeled vehicle covered in numerous dents, scratches, stains, and even what appeared to be a piece of seaweed lodged in one of the wheels.

The back hatch opened and none other than Jenny herself strolled out, the smuggest grin of all on her face. “Told you.”

Amaris said nothing—couldn’t say anything. She’d known Jenny and the others were on their way for a while, but… but nothing could have actually prepared her for seeing Jenny right there in front of her. With a cry of joy, she jumped to Jenny and hugged her tight.

Amaris, however, was much taller than she had been last time she’d seen Jenny, and she had the full weight of her backpack with her. The two of them went flying and flopped unceremoniously into a section of mint chocolate chip ice cream.

Muffled laughter from under the frozen treat let everyone else know they were fine.

~~~

Irene was introduced to Jenny, Suuk, Coleus, and Boro as everyone sat around a fire made in the shadow of the Retrograde.

“How are you still alive?” Jenny asked, gesturing at Irene. “Death-defying stuff happens around Amaris all the time! I had my head cut off multiple times!”

“I… I don’t know,” Irene admitted, folding her arms together and shivering—despite her winter coat and the fire the frozen ice-cream climate was still too much for her to be comfortable. “I just… am. And that’s all there is to it.”

“I watch out for her,” Amaris said, feeding Pitch part of a roasted marshmallow. “The curse doesn’t always bring death, Jenny. You remember the whole Old Bones thing?” She gestured at Boro. “Of course you do.”

“I am an excellent example!” Boro declared, skittering through the fruity snow with his many legs. “And I will use that to crush all our enemies!”

Amaris ignored him—she was already fairly sure his one-track-mind wasn’t getting re-adjusted anytime soon. “Turns out I’m good at keeping her safe if I put my mind to it.”

“You’re not very good at being an adult, are you?” Suuk asked Irene.

“N-no, not really,” Irene admitted. “I… geez, I’m the only adult here, aren’t I? I sh-shouldn’t approve of any of this!”

“But you do, and that’s why we love you,” Amaris said.

“I barely know her,” Suuk deadpanned.

“Well, I like her, “ Coleus said.

Amaris turned to Coleus with a serious expression. “How are you doing?”

“I… still miss the Glen,” Coleus admitted. “And I’m really not ready to face the elders. They are not going to be happy when I go back…”

“Coleus… thank you. For… for risking everything.” Amaris sighed. “You weren’t supposed to run away, you were just supposed to transport everyone. I didn’t mean to ask you to do this.”

“Oh, but I was glad to do it!” She nodded vigorously. “Needed to uproot and stretch my legs anyway. I won’t be able to do it for much longer.”

“…It’s been years, hasn’t it?” Amaris asked, frowning. “…I’ve been out here for years…”

“Yeah…” Suuk said. “And… I’ve got news about that.”

“Hmm?”

Suuk pulled a little card out and handed it to Amaris. It showed a picture of Sarah and a picture of some orange garilend, both of their faces surrounded by what were clearly wedding bells. “Wh-what!?”

“The guy’s Anthony. They’re engaged.”

“How… how old is Sarah!?”

“Now? Fifteen, but she’ll be sixteen soon, and they’re planning the wedding for right after that.” Suuk paused. “She knows you probably can’t make it, but you’re invited anyway if we wrap this up in time. Luckily for us, she likes to plan things multiple months in advance.”

Amaris looked deeply at the wedding invitation. She smiled, letting out a delighted laugh, but quickly choked and had to take a moment to wipe cold tears from her eyes. “I… I’m happy for her. I’m confused, since sixteen seems young. But it’s Genk and Genk is strange, and… and…” She closed her eyes and tilted her head back. “I need to get home. I don’t even know how long it’s been.”

“That’s why we’re here,” Coleus said, taking Amaris’ hand between her leafy palms. “The mission, right? Get home, stop Freddloi.”

“Yeah, well, we can’t do that until Orville comes back,” Jenny said, folding her arms. “And let me guess, nobody’s seen him since all this started?”

“It… has been a while,” Amaris admitted. “But he warned us it might take a long, long time, and that he wouldn’t be aware of time passing.”

Orville appeared as if on cue, sitting in front of the fire, warming his hands. “I… I found it.”

Amaris lit up. “Girls, he’s here!”

“Hey!” Boro called.

“You’re part of the girls now, shut up,” Jenny ribbed.

Orville turned to Amaris. “But there’s… complications.”

“He says there are complications,” Amaris relayed. “But we knew this wasn’t going to be that simple. Orville… what have you found?”

“I found your home—the specific house, even, and your parents. I can tell you exactly where it is relative to here. I also found Freddloi. He’s… operating out of a massive city-sized monster that’s been walking the world for decades, eating entire cities.”

Amaris relayed the words without fully processing them, a haunted look coming across her face.

“Amaris, I’m sorry, but… the creature is on a direct course for your home. My guess is… it takes a year, maybe two, to devour everything from where it currently is and your home.”

Amaris stumbled over the last little bit, unable to fully relay it.

“And I can’t enter the city-creature. It somehow blocks my memory abilities.”

Amaris stared blankly, leaning back into the vanilla ice cream she was using as a chair around the fire.

What am I going to do?

“Wipe that frown off your face!” Suuk declared, standing up aggressively, her tail flicking rapidly from side to side. “So what if there’s a massive doomsday machine headed right for your home? We have time! We have a team!”

“We have me!” Jenny said, waving an excited hand.

“Yeah!” Suuk pointed a finger at Amaris, grinning. “We’ve done the impossible before, Amaris. We escaped Toad’s clutches and revolutionized Genk! Why can’t we take down a walking doomsday city?”

“Yeah… yeah, why can’t we?” Amaris slowly stood up. “We’re all here, a great team composed of a rebellious dryad, a sneaky neko, an immortal child, an undead spider, a memory spirit, a happiness saleswoman, an absolutely amazing snake, and a girl who’s cursed to be interesting!” She picked up Pitch in her hand and held him up triumphantly. “That’s why I called you, I knew I couldn’t do it alone! Who cares if I didn’t think it’d be anywhere near this big? We’re here, and we can do something about it!” With her free hand, she clutched the necklace Keeper Ashton had given her. “That’s why we’re all here, isn’t it? So we can do this. Stop this great evil that roams the land… in our amazing car!” She gestured extravagantly at the Retrograde.

“Question,” Irene said, raising a hand. “How are we all going to fit in it?”

Silence surrounded the campfire.

“…I’m sure we’ll figure something out!” Amaris said with a nervous laugh.

This is either going to go extremely well or kill us all. Amaris swallowed hard—still smiling, but becoming more and more aware of how monumental the task she’d just undertaken was.

What choice did she have, though? Go home?

Home was in danger.

They had to do this.

~~~

The Strider opened its maw, unleashing dozens of tentacles to tear apart a new city, obtaining new materials for the Eternal Construction. The city atop the Strider released fireworks and celebratory cheers as the realm below was reduced to rubble.

In the city, there was no central hub of activity or control; but the closest thing was a spherical building made of glass near the front edge of the Strider. In the center of this glass globe was a platform from which numerous images were projected onto the clear surface. However, the forward-facing section of the globe was devoid of images today, to give those inside a view of the assault.

Freddloi stood in the center, amidst numerous consoles and readouts made of glass or glass-like materials, watching as the city was burned bit by bit.

“Freddloi, we’re getting strange reports. Your protocols are acting up.”

Freddloi glanced behind him, taking note of the tiny form of Bellatrix and the significantly larger, but headless, form of Ru. “Interesting…” He reached for the console and pressed a few buttons, prompting a readout to display on the globe in front of him—annoyingly obscuring the sight of the city’s destruction, but he didn’t want to bother to move the projection right now.

Navigating through a menu and inputting his security code, he found that Bellatrix was right. The detectors were going off a lot. It had specifically registered the memory curse attempting to penetrate the Strider’s defenses numerous times. It had actually been happening for a few weeks, but since the cursed man was never able to enter, the sensors hadn’t recorded noteworthy levels of interference until now.

“Fascinating, I think I remember that man.” Freddloi tapped the lower part of his mask. “I suppose it wouldn’t have been that difficult to find me if he put his mind to it. Perhaps he wants revenge. Unsurprising. Rather boring, really.” He closed the window and returned to watching the city’s destruction. “Watch the curse detections closely, Bellatrix. Even though curses like his are specifically screened, he may be able to find others.”

“Oooh, I’ve heard about the attempts on your life,” Bellatrix said. “Most interesting usually, yes?

“Not really, they tend to get predictable after a while. Such a shame I can’t double-curse those who try to find me, they really would deserve it. ‘May your hubris be realized’ or something like that would be appropriate.”

Bellatrix shrugged. “You and those poetic curses of yours…”

Freddloi let out a warm chuckle. “Bellatrix, those poetic curses are far more worthy of my attention than the rampant destruction we normally engage in. Death and power are but two of the many tools in our arsenal on the playground that is this world of ours.”

“…Uh…”

“You’ll understand when you’re older. For now… just watch closely. You might learn something.”

The Strider released a tentacle made out of diamond thread, puncturing a tank that was making the vain attempt to damage the Strider’s legs.