Villainess 4: Janet’s Haunted Escapade

Red Pill 22: Incognitos, Shadows

Out of those gathered in the Ghost Hunting Club’s designated clubroom, Kevin Sydney and Lady Graves were the only ones standing that weren't carrying lamps, because Kevin had his hands full with Janet over his shoulders, and Lady Graves had not brought a lamp with her. The others left standing all carried lamps, including DeeDee and Janet’s thirty-one clones. The other club members (Ridley Woodberry, Mindy Kessler, Jean and Saraya Drevis, and their club advisor Baron Underwood) put their lamps beside their chairs when they sat at the conference table, but Marchioness Fleming placed Janet’s on the tabletop before sitting and chatting with them. Meanwhile, Janet’s clones started talking by the entrance with Sir Abram and Daniel Van Weever, who had just changed shifts with John Day before their arrival, and Janet’s silent clones were either standing guard by all the double-door entrances inside Elba House or patrolling its perimeter and its nearby surroundings outside for any legend-tripping weirdos on the scene.

For Janet’s comfort, DeeDee asked Lady Graves to check her inventory for a spare sofa and an end table that she could set beside the entrance facing the glass display case full of compasses and telescopes and astrolabes and globes. With that, Lady Graves transformed into a blue ghost flame that then disappeared from the room, blinking the lamplights as she said, “I’ll be back in a minute.”

While Lady Graves was checking her inventory for available furniture, flickering the light of DeeDee’s large lamp overhead, DeeDee said, “Sir Sydney, aren’t you tired?”

“I’m fine, ma’am. Thanks,” Kevin said, still holding Janet over his shoulders.

Then there was a snap of fingers that again flickered DeeDee’s big lamp over everyone’s heads, and there appeared a salon sofa with an end table next to it before the empty wall space by the double doors. Then the sofa and the end table moved up against the wall, and Lady Graves said, “That should do it. Now you can put Janet down and rest, Sir Sydney.”

“Thanks, ma’am,” he said.

“No problem,” Lady Graves said.

And so, Kevin set Janet on the sofa, then joined the others at the conference table and listened to Ridley’s account of one of his weirder legend-tripping moments at a haunted bridge in the outskirts of the Student Commons Town. And just after he narrated the climactic jump scare of his ghost story, eliciting gawking mouths and wide-eyed stares from his listeners, Kevin said, “You should’ve seen how fast he was running, too. He was so scared, I thought he’d shat himself!”

“I didn’t shit myself!”

“Sure you didn’t,” Kevin said. “Too bad I had to smell you the whole way back to our dorms.”

Giggles and sniggers erupted from the listeners around the table, including Sir Abram and Daniel Van Weever and Janet’s clones stepping closer from the entrance to hear the story and the four other busts and three statuettes all eavesdropping from the third bookshelf by the back wall.

Ridley face-palmed himself.

“Rowena, Celeste’s waiting,” DeeDee said.

So Rowena got up from her seat, excusing herself and saying, “Will you watch over Janet and her lamp for me?”

“We will, ma’am,” Baron Underwood said.

“And when she wakes up,” Rowena added, “will one of you let us know right away?”

“We will, ma’am,” Ridley added.

With that, Rowena left the table and followed DeeDee out of the room in silence, till DeeDee said, “We’ve got a lot to discuss, you know.”

“The change in Celeste’s contract?” Rowena said.

“Yes, that, too,” DeeDee said, “but I’m more interested in what Janet told you two while she was down there. Rarely have I ever seen either of you delay anything I need to know, so it must be important. Am I right?”

Rowena bit down on her lower lip, yet she remained silent as she trailed behind DeeDee down the second floor hallway full of Janet’s silent clones guarding every double-door entrance and up the half-turn stairs. Silence was golden in most circumstances, but this instance told DeeDee more than words could have expressed, and she had an inkling that it was Janet that caught Lady Graves and Rowena off guard.

“Was it that surprising?” DeeDee added.

“That’s an understatement,” Rowena said. “Celeste and I were shocked at what she suggested, and at the way she suggested it, and at everything she was saying beforehand, too: it was like she was a different person.”

After reaching the third floor, DeeDee spied a giant hitodama of blue flame hovering before a pair of open double doors at the end of the hallway. So both women walked the rest of the way in silence past more of Janet’s clones standing guard beside more double-door entrances, including Celeste’s. Then they entered the office and took their seats, Rowena in the chair that Janet had sat in that afternoon and DeeDee in her no-chair sitting position, putting down her lamp.

Celeste slid a sheet of paper across the desk.

And DeeDee picked it up, saying, “Is this the contract?”

“That’s the one,” Celeste said.

So DeeDee speed-read the contents of the contract to herself in silence, but she barely finished half of it—

(When a woman’s voice intruded into DeeDee’s mind, saying, Get a seat for me, too, please!

Maxine? DeeDee said. Why are you—

Incoming in three seconds and counting! Maxine said. In three . . . Two . . . One . . .

All right, hold your horses! DeeDee said.)

Then DeeDee let out a sigh, putting the contract aside and saying, “Celeste, get another chair.”

Rowena and Lady Celeste Graves traded glances, and Celeste said, “Do we have a visitor?”

“Who else is coming?” Rowena added.

“Abbess Maxine Diddly is joining us,” she said.

“You’re kidding!” they both said.

“I’m not,” she said.

So Celeste snapped her fingers, and another chair appeared before her table. And moments later, a masked woman in the clothes of a nun appeared on that chair, crossing her legs and smiling at a wide-eyed Celeste Graves, a gawking Rowena Fleming, and a nonplussed DeeDee with a raised eyebrow.

“Long time, no see, you three,” the visitor said. “Looks like you’ve all been doing well.”

“DeeDee, did you invite her?” Celeste said.

“I would have informed you much earlier than just now,” DeeDee deadpanned. “She just invited herself into our little gathering like the brat she is.”

Maxine looked at her, saying, “Okay, am I—”

“—interrupting something?” DeeDee said. “Yes, you are.”

“We were going to discuss something important about Janet,” Celeste added, “when you came barging in out of nowhere. That’s really rude, you know.”

“Why are you here?” Rowena said.

“It’s because of your daughter,” Maxine said.

“Janet?” Rowena said.

“Yes, her.”

“Did you visit her?” Rowena said.

“No,” Maxine said. “Lady Fleming visited me.”

“At St. Avalon’s Abbey?” Celeste said.

“That’s the one.”

“At what time?” Rowena added.

“Late last night before dawn,” Maxine said.

“How did she even get there last night?” DeeDee said.

“I’m assuming it was through astral projection,” she said, “because her aether affinity was so much. As for why she was in St. Avalon’s Abbey at three-fifty this morning, I can only guess. When I first saw her, I thought she had awakened her powers, but when she couldn’t see my darkness affinity, I put her back to sleep.”

Only then did Rowena breathe out a sigh, saying, “And I was thinking it was an emergency.”

“Don’t worry, Mama Goose,” Maxine said. “Lady Fleming is fine, no harm, no fuss. Is she still asleep?”

“She is,” DeeDee said.

“When is she waking up?” Rowena said.

“Who knows?” DeeDee said, remembering RuRu’s words. “Maybe in two hours, or maybe in two and a half hours, or maybe somewhere in between. We won’t know for sure, until she wakes up. But with that said,” she added, looking from Celeste to Rowena, “what exactly did Janet tell you?”

“You tell us what’s going on with LaLa Marionette first,” Rowena said, “and then you tell me what Janet has to do with it, and only then will we tell you what she told us. Do I make myself clear?”

DeeDee winced at her words.

“Geez,” Maxine said. “You’re a hard bargainer.”

“And you’re an interloper, so be quiet,” Rowena said, then at DeeDee with her arms crossed her ample bosom: “Out with it, DeeDee. What does my daughter have to do with your sister, the Guardian of the Light?”

DeeDee thought of her conversation with RuRu, the Guardian of the Darkness, wondering if she should reveal such godly matters, then said, “Every year on the 6th week of school, my sisters and I have overseen the magic aptitude tests of all freshmen students in Lassen Academy, but this year, LaLa Marionette missed yesterday’s test in Father Robinson’s Magic Studies class in Period 3. Of course, we thought LaLa was sleeping in, but when we checked her abode, she wasn’t there. As such, we spent much of yesterday looking for her, only attending Period 3 and later Period 6 to oversee the test in the morning and in the afternoon, respectively. The rest of the day, we spent looking for LaLa, but we were all tired after overseeing the aptitude test in both of Father Robinson’s classes, so we took a nap before continuing.

“Then Janet Fleming came knocking, literally,” DeeDee continued. “I was sleeping in my lamp when I heard several knocks. After getting up and possessing my doll form, I found Janet there in my shop.”

“What about her clones?” Rowena said.

“I couldn’t see them at the time,” she said, “till I turned my full-length mirror in Janet’s direction and saw them in the reflection with her. Then I took out Janet’s profile book from my private library and discovered 116 redacted profile entries, so I had Janet’s clones read out their last entries, which amounted to 31 in all. That left 85 others unaccounted for, but after listening to the entries from the 31 clones there, I knew their deaths were abnormal. And what’s more: their deaths were all due to Rosalie’s schemes and often included Prince Blaise’s participation.”

“Damn that Prince!” Rowena said.

“I know,” DeeDee said. “Anyway, I looked for Rosalie’s book and Prince Blaise’s books, but I only found the Prince’s book, while Rosalie’s was missing. What’s more: I couldn’t open the Prince’s book, which told me one thing: someone had infiltrated my shop and tampered with the profile books inside my private library. So later that night, I had Janet accompany me to my shop incognito and help me move my inventory into a spare room in Elba House. After Janet returned to her dorm, I inspected the other profile books in my possession and found three others that showed signs of tampering. After informing Janet’s clones, I had them help me look through all three.

“In all, we had five books showing signs of tampering: that of Lady Janet Fleming, Prince Blaise, Sir Kevin Sydney, Lord Ridley Woodberry, and Father Joseph Reeves. Based on our findings at the time, I had assumed that the culprit who had taken Rosalie’s profile book was the same one impersonating Rosalie in the Academy, but my talk with Lady Graves this afternoon had overthrown my initial theory. Not only was someone impersonating Rosalie, but that someone’s profile book was also missing. Thus, I had two missing profile books and one culprit impersonating someone else.”

“Lady Dorian?” Rowena said.

DeeDee nodded, saying, “That’s the one.”

“Okay, I see what you’re getting at,” Rowena said, “but how does this involve your sister, LaLa?”

“You see,” DeeDee said, “the initial impression I had was that the real Rosalie Edgeworth and LaLa Marionette were both missing and that Lady Dorian had something to do with it.”

“Because Lady Dorian has been impersonating Rosalie?”

“Yes,” DeeDee said.

“But that’s just a coincidence,” Rowena said. “Two missing persons don’t always make a connection just because the culprit is associated with one of them.”

“That’s true,” DeeDee said, “but your daughter helped me in that regard. I just wish I was there to see it happening with you and Celeste.”

“Janet was incredible,” Celeste said. “She was going full-on detective mode that time.”

DeeDee smiled and said, “I bet she was.” Then she turned back to Rowena and added, “Anyway, yes, your doubts are valid enough. I myself had a hard time making any plausible connection between Rosalie and LaLa beyond coincidence, because I had assumed Lady Dorian had stolen Rosalie’s book.”

“But Janet said it was Rosalie who took it,” Rowena said. “Also, she stressed Rosalie’s presence in this world as if she knew that girl was destined to save it somehow.”

“Like a saintess?” DeeDee said.

“Yeah,” she said.

“Also,” Celeste added, “Janet compared the situation to a game that’s been rigged against her.”

So Rowena said, “But that would mean—”

“Look, I know what you’re thinking,” DeeDee said, guessing what was on their minds, “but all games have rules that must be followed, no exceptions.”

“Then,” Rowena added, “does that include the saintess selection process for all saintess candidates?”

DeeDee eyed Rowena, for she knew what she was getting at: human foibles formed the basis of many games from cards and gambling to aristocratic in-fighting and political intrigues to even matters of marriage alliances and wars. In a world of appearances, you lived and died by what other people think and say about you, for what mattered wasn’t who you are but what other people think you are. And for Janet’s case, as it was for Lady Graves and for Lady Bartleby before she became Marchioness Fleming, the game of choosing a saintess candidate was of paramount importance not only to the noble families involved with the Blaise royal family but also to the church, for the church and the kingdom are one. The fortunes of the former rose and fell with the latter like a painted ship on a painted ocean, a portrait of the collective struggles of all interested parties seeking personal gain in the Kaden Kingdom’s longest held custom.

“In theory,” DeeDee said, “no prejudice should exist against any affinity user from becoming a saintess candidate, but this kingdom follows its own set of traditions.”

“By consensus?” Rowena said.

“Right,” DeeDee said. “That’s why all earth and air and fire and water affinity users are excluded from becoming saintess candidates, which leaves only light and darkness and aether affinity users. Yet of these three, the light affinity is favored because of its association with the church of this kingdom. On the other hand, the aether affinity is associated with a belief in superstitions because of its prevalence amongst commoners, and the darkness affinity is often equated with witches and demons because of its prevalence amongst the outcasts of this kingdom.

“Because of these associations,” she added, looking at Rowena and Celeste in turn, “you two were subjected to rumors that led to your deaths. For Rowena, you were falsely accused and died in prison, and for Celeste, you were slandered and murdered in your dorm room.” Then to the interloper: “But you, Maxine, you’re the only one who doesn’t fit that pattern.”

Rowena gaped at Maxine and said, “You were murdered?”

“Right, you died before I did,” Maxine said. “A bunch of robed men entered the abbey while I was alone, asking if I took in an orphan with the darkness affinity.”

“Astor?” Rowena said.

“Yes,” she said, “but I lied my ass off, because I heard you had died while in prison.”

Rowena paused for a moment, then said, “Did these robed men appear as if out of thin air?”

“Yes, they did,” she said. “The abbey was empty at the time, but when I happened to turn around, they were there inside with me. How did you know they could do that?”

“They also appeared to me in prison,” Rowena said. “At first, I thought they were a part of the staff from the High Court, but when they started interrogating me about Astor’s whereabouts, that’s when I knew something was off.”

“You’re kidding!”

“Trust me, I wish I was,” Rowena said. “Those robed men, do you know who they were working for?”

“I suspect it was the Dorians,” Maxine said. “What’s left of them, anyway.”

“Under whose orders?” DeeDee said.

“The Schrader royal family,” Maxine said. “Even the Dorians wouldn’t do something so brazen without the backing of a kingdom like the Schrader kingdom.”

“By any chance,” DeeDee said, “did they silence you about their presence in another kingdom?”

“They did,” she said.

“Did they have any idea who you were?”

Maxine nodded her head and said, “That’s the weird part, you know. They all knew who I was straight away, but when I asked them how they knew, they said they had a new saintess in their kingdom that knew where I was.”

“But didn’t they abolish their church in your time?” DeeDee said. “It’s my understanding that you came here incognito to escape their persecution.”

“They didn’t abolish their church,” Maxine said. “They only went underground after killing off their political enemies. And when they were looking for Astor’s whereabouts, they just happened to recognize me.”

“Did they question you?” Rowena said.

“Yeah,” Maxine said, “but I said at first that I didn’t know who they were talking about. Then they said they had gone to St. Avalon’s Orphanage next door to the abbey asking about Astor’s whereabouts, and the kids told them to see me about it. Since either I was lying or the kids were lying, they threatened to kill me or burn down the orphanage if I refused to answer them. So I lied my ass off, yet just when I thought they would leave, they had to satisfy their bloodlust! My God, after everything I’ve gone through just to enter this kingdom, I can’t believe I was killed off on a whim!”

“At least the orphans were spared.”

“Yeah, I know,” Maxine said, “but damn it, if it wasn’t for that bastard boy—”

“Hey, that’s enough!” Rowena said.

“Your brother was a playboy!” Maxine said. “When he couldn’t get under my skirt, he got under someone else’s and got her pregnant, then got banished by your father. If I hadn’t helped you and your husband to find that boy, I might’ve been spared from this mess!”

Rowena was about to say something caustic when Celeste said, “Ladies, please be mindful of my tenants.”

Maxine grimaced, and Rowena bit her lip, but both women bowed their heads and apologized to Celeste.

After that, DeeDee said, “Was there anything else they said about this saintess?”

Maxine shook her head, saying, “That’s all I know. If you want to find out more, you’d have to visit that godless cesspool of a kingdom, but be forewarned: you might not get out of there unscathed,” and she removed her mask, and two eyeballs fell from her sockets onto Celeste’s desktop.

Rowena and Celeste looked away, wincing and grimacing at the sight of Maxine picking the eyes up and popping them back in and replacing the mask over her face. Only then did they look back at her, but they avoided looking at her eyes.

“Those warlocks did that to me while I was still alive,” Maxine said. “May God damn their kingdom and their king and their fucking saintess!”

Only DeeDee, privy to many methods of torture and killing, locked eyes with Maxine and said, “Your observation changes the focus of my investigation. Since my private library doesn’t house the profile books of those living beyond the borders of this kingdom, I now have to worry about a different saintess from another kingdom, in addition to finding LaLa and Rosalie,” and she breathed out another sigh. “And those are on top of what’s been happening at Lassen Academy.”

“Sorry,” Maxine said.

“Ah well,” DeeDee said, looking at Maxine and Rowena in turn, wondering about the new duke of Bartleby, this Astor Bartleby. “Let’s just take things one at a time, starting with that Astor fellow. Why were they looking for him?”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Maxine said.

But Rowena paused on DeeDee’s question, then said, “DeeDee, can you fetch Astor’s profile book? I want to know what he’s been through before I tell you.”

“Didn’t you ask him after you took him in?”

“I did,” Rowena said, “but he couldn’t remember.”

“All right then,” DeeDee said, getting up and rounding Celeste’s desk towards the tall bookshelf behind her on the back wall of her office, making the landlady of Elba house turn in her chair. “Celeste, I don’t want to bother Janet’s friends downstairs, so can I—”

“Of course, you can use my bookshelf to access your library,” Celeste said. “Just knock three times on the right side and wait for a bit.”

“Thanks,” DeeDee said and gave three hard knocks on the right side of the shelf, then waited for a time. Then there came a small click and a heavy clank somewhere behind the bookshelf, and the shelf swung open, and DeeDee said, “I’ll be back in a bit,” and she stepped inside.

After downing another glass, Janet leaned back in her chair and pressed her palms against her eyes as the atrocities against her clones kept racing through her mind, digging deeper furrows into the cup of her soul. These atrocities sent blood rushing through her arteries and veins, tormenting her like a caged bird forced to sing through its own tears, her mind seething with murderous thoughts, her heart beating like a war drum. And all the while, without Janet even knowing, the black flickering tendrils of her fury were manifesting around the outline of her astral form, and a red halo with a green corona around its edge began to form around Janet’s head. Little by little, her powers were stirring inside her from the raging catharsis of her clones’ collective pain.

Through all this mental agony, Janet wiped away her tears and opened her eyes to the Guardian of the Darkness staring back at her and saying, “There’s only 1,399,000 left to go, Janet! You’re doing good!”

As RuRu poured more of the astringent brew into her glass, Janet looked at her hostess through bleary eyes and said, “How good is ‘good,’ by any chance?”

“You’re a third of the way done,” RuRu said, “and you did it in an hour’s time, to boot. Just two more hours, and you’ll become a new woman!”

Janet leaned over and cradled her head on top of her forearms over the table’s edge, then noticed something about many of her clones’ memories: one of getting framed for leaving death threats in the hallways of Lassen Academy against Lady Dorian, another of getting apprehended for poisoning the Queen at a holiday banquet in the Royal Palace, another of getting executed by firing squad for poisoning the Prince’s fiancé during the graduation ceremony, yet another of getting stabbed to death after returning from the graduation party at the Prince’s mansion, and still another of getting killed by bandits a year after her banishment from the graduation party, and so on and so forth. All of these memories brought Janet back to her first day with her clones in the bathroom, for she noticed something that none of them said anything about that day. In their memories, as she reviewed them in her mind, she saw the movements of several black silhouettes that nobody except one person seemed to notice in these scenes: Lady Dorian.

“RuRu,” Janet said, “have you noticed anything weird going on in Lassen Academy?”

RuRu grimaced and said, “Not really, but that’s because I’ve been busy with something else.”

“And what’s that?”

“Drink more,” RuRu said, pointing to her full glass on the table, “and I’ll tell you about it.”

So Janet drank more, and RuRu poured more, and Janet drank more, and RuRu poured more, and so on. Throughout their drinking and pouring routine, RuRu informed Janet of LaLa Marionette’s disappearance before yesterday’s magic aptitude test in Period 3 and Period 6 in Father Robinson’s Magic Studies class. Janet said that she had missed that test, because she had fainted during Homeroom 1 after confronting the Prince and Lady Dorian, so RuRu said she noticed Janet’s absence from Period 3 when the other students took the test. When Janet asked if Lady Dorian had taken the test, RuRu said that she hadn’t, because she acted too distraught to take it in Period 3 or in Period 6. When she asked if the Prince had taken it, RuRu said he had and was confirmed as a fire affinity user.

RuRu’s observation took Janet back to what her beheaded clone had said about Prince Blaise, that he was suspected of tampering with the crystal in Janet’s hand during lunch. If her clone’s observation was true, then in addition to Janet’s clones, were those same silhouettes in the Cafeteria during lunch? And if so, then were they also present at the Prince’s summons? With these in mind, Janet took another swig from her glass and said, “Was there anything else you noticed that day?”

RuRu shook her head, saying, “We were all busy looking for our missing sister, so we didn’t notice much besides what I’ve told you already.”

“I see,” Janet said.

“Why do you ask?” RuRu said, pouring more into her glass.

Janet picked it up and downed it in one gulp, then said, “Now that I’m awakening my powers, I’ve been seeing moving shadows in my clones’ memories.”

“What kind of shadows?” RuRu said.

“The kind that people don’t see,” Janet said.

RuRu paused as she poured more into Janet’s glass, then put her bottle on the table and approached Janet. When she placed her hand over Janet’s head—

(“What are you doing?” Janet said.)

—RuRu said, “Calm down and just close your eyes. Try to focus on those shadows that you saw, and I’ll do the rest.”

Janet did so, closing her eyes and reviewing her clones’ memories, and saw those silhouettes again: several silhouettes had put up the death threats on the walls of the Academy that got Janet framed for leaving death threats against Lady Dorian; one silhouette at the holiday banquet at the Royal Palace dropped a tablet in the Queen’s cup that got Janet framed for an attempted murder of a royal; another silhouette at the graduation ceremony had given the Prince’s fiancé a mild poison tablet to better act out the scene that got Janet executed by firing squad for poisoning the Prince’s fiancé; yet another silhouette stabbed Janet to death after her return from the graduation party at the Prince’s mansion; and still more silhouettes (dressed as bandits this time) chased down and murdered Janet a year after her banishment from the graduation party. More silhouettes appeared in many other memories, in which Janet got blamed for their actions, but they all had one thing in common.

In addition to playing the role of Rosalie Edgeworth, Lady Dorian played other roles in Janet’s demise: she played the victim to get the Prince to do her bidding against Janet; she played the innocent bystander seeking help for Janet but only after she was dead; and she even played the mastermind that got rid of Janet after she had gotten her banished. Yet under RuRu’s assistance, those silhouettes appeared as robed individuals following Lady Dorian’s orders . . .

Janet blinked upon hearing her hostess calling her name, saying, “What was that?”

“I said to pour your own glass for a bit,” RuRu said. “I need to talk to DeeDee right away,” and she talked with DeeDee about the silhouettes in the memories of Janet’s clones, telling her that they were in cahoots with Lady Dorian.

Meanwhile, Janet took up the big bottle and poured herself a glass before taking it up and downing its contents. But after repeating this procedure over a dozen times, she got tired of it and looked at RuRu still talking with DeeDee as if she was there right next to her, but RuRu had wandered from the table. Now she was pacing back and forth without casting a glance her way, so Janet thought about her options. After an hour of downing glass after glass of this horrid brew, she’d be damned if she had to endure two more hours of pouring herself a glass and downing it over and over.

Then she looked at RuRu, still talking, then peered back over her left shoulder and stared up at her own darkness affinity looming over her. It had lost a third of its initial size, though it retained its red hue glowing in its center. Then Janet looked at RuRu’s bottle in her hand, then at her glass standing empty on the table, and then at RuRu still talking with DeeDee, oblivious to her intentions.

Deciding to risk it, Janet stood up from her seat and said under her breath, “Bottoms up!”

And she raised the rim to her lips and lifted up the rest of the bottle like a funnel and began chugging its contents, squinting her eyes of tears at the astringent liquid burning down her throat. The effect of her chugging was like a baptismal waterfall cascading down her gullet and crashing into the lake of her stomach, which filtered through the countless rivers of her bloodstream, which then overflowed the cup of her soul, turning it into a fountain, the dark waters glowing red in its depths and shimmering green off its dappled surface. And all the while, the giant blob of Janet’s affinity pool kept shrinking and shrinking and shrinking with the massive gulps she was consuming . . .

To Be Continued