And finally, reason number three: my friends had made extensively detailed plans to mess up the play with catcalls, water balloons, and funny noises whenever possible. As you can probably guess, that was the reason which really won me over.
I amused myself all day with images of Tim going in to kiss Gwen and having a water balloon lunged at his face instead. For variety, I altered what I’d put inside of the balloon (Everything from pudding to paint slipped through my imagination.) I’d had to stop myself from snickering more than once from my visual imagery.
And people say kids don’t have any imagination anymore.
I smirked as Lockard, dressed in puffy Italian robes, gave his little opening spiel.
“Welcome! Blah-blah-blah, blah-blah, Frank Lockard, blah-blah, Romeo and Juliet… blah-blah, blah! And now, for our play!” (I didn’t even hear half of it.)
“Hey, anyone want a water balloon?” Poncey asked as Drew made obnoxious snoring noises.
“Hey, guys,” Simon said, “Tell me when it’s at a death scene, so I can laugh hysterically.”
“Hey, quit elbowing me!” Jason muttered. “And save the balloons for later; the dying scenes aren’t serious until the end!”
“Come on, I was thinking we’d throw one right at the prologue-guy to ruin it right at the start.”
“Why did I come again? And why did I decide to sit with you guys?” I asked, slumping down in my seat. Subtlety was beyond them, obviously.
“Hey, shut up,” Mikey replied. “I don’t care what you guys do, but make sure it’s at the right moment. Timing is everything here.”
The prologue guy, Garrett Kafka, dressed up in Italian robes similar to Lockard’s, came out. I had to laugh. Kafka was a popular senior, but we had never gotten along very well; we never really traveled in the same circles, I guess. But I knew him enough to know his ego was taking quite a hit for not being the star tonight.
Holding a scroll, Kafka began to read monotonously, “Two households, both alike in dignity, in fair Verona, where we lay our scene, from ancient grudge break to new mutiny, where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. From forth the fatal loins of these two foes, a pair of star-crossed –”
He choked as a water balloon hit him square in the stomach.
My friends and I howled with laughter.
A light flickered, and then Garrett – along with my gut - stilled.
His uneven, raspy breathing could suddenly be heard over the microphone on his shirt. And all I heard was the sound of him hitting the floor. Fainted? Dead?
I couldn’t tell from where I was sitting. But it wouldn’t be the first time a performance at Central killed someone.
“What’s going on?” Drew asked. “No one’s supposed to die this early. And I didn’t get to do anything yet.”
“Neither did I,” Poncey looked around. “Could this be part of the direction?”
Suddenly the emergency lights flickered on, and I made my decision. “I’ll be back,” I said, jumping up from my seat. The transfixed blank stare on Garrett’s face I could just make out in the poor emergency lighting reminded me all too much of what happened at the Homecoming game.
I needed to find the guy I’d seen before – the limping man in black. He’s the culprit this time again, surely. That was my plan, and I was sticking to it.
Then thunder exploded; a bolt of lightning crashed through the ceiling and stuck the stage; it splintered and dusty figures flew up as it cracked underneath Garrett’s body. We all unanimously cringed as Garrett’s body thumped onto the desks below.
“Ah-ha!” I boasted largely to myself as the stage splintered, and a gaping hole appeared. I’d been right about the stage workmanship.
Time for a new plan, though.
Out of the upheaval of dust and debris, a human-like form appeared in a blast of smoke and sparks; it was a woman, I could just make out, with messy, curly hair, and a blue-colored skin tone…. Uh-oh.
It took me only a split second to recognize her from my nightmares. Which I guess weren’t really nightmares anymore.
It’s Maia.
“Ladies and gentlemen, there has been a call for new casting. Allow me to provide some enticing new entertainment.” She, with her smurf-colored arms, pulled a man out of his seat. “I need your assistance in my magic act,” she crooned.
“Wait! Stop! What are you doing!?” Mr. Lockard came out running, almost tripping over the hem of his long, ridiculous outfit. “This is not your play.”
I wish at this point I’d been less shocked. I would’ve enjoyed Lockard’s humiliation much more if I hadn’t been frantically wondering what was wrong with me.
Maia grinned at him. “Oh, I see. You’d like to go first!” She grabbed him by the neck and hoisted him up. A moment later, frazzles of light came pouring out of Mr. Lockard’s mouth. He screamed, and slumped over seconds later.
The light from within him curled up and settled into the palm of Maia’s free hand. She tossed his limp body on the floor. “Yes, this is what I wanted.”
Most of the audience was looking from Mr. Lockard to Maia with expressions of horror, like they’d just seen a cat get run over by a car. They were waiting for Mr. Lockard to get up, but after a long moment, when he still didn’t move, everyone started screaming.
“Help, get us out of here!”
“Did you see what she did to that ugly man?”
“She killed him!”
“I want my money back!”
The big crowd made its way to the nearest doors, but it was no good. Even I could see from where I was that all the doors were locked and sealed shut. Probably with a supernatural lock, too.
We were all pathetically trapped and helpless – and with some kind of soul-cannibal on the loose. I could not contain my laughter as I tried not to freak out.
Who says dreams don’t come true? Mine certainly were coming to life tonight. Literally.
Maia began eagerly picking up more audience members to drain. I randomly thought how I’d never seen such gusto. I laughed again. Everything is going horribly wrong, I thought as my eyes prickled with tears of madness.
“Dinger, what’s your problem!?” Mikey screamed at me.
What was wrong with me indeed? Was I simply dreaming again, going mad, unable to tell waking from sleeping? Or was I truly faced with a reality which was so unreal I’d yet to process it?
I heard Gwen screaming and something inside me snapped. I wasn’t crazy. Well, maybe I was. But Gwen was real, and I knew I had to protect her once more.
While everyone was screaming and scrambling, I bustled up onto the stage to make sure Gwen was safe. The rain drippled down from the gaping hole in the roof onto my face, blurring over my vision, stalling my rescue and hiding my hidden inner turmoil.
“Huh?” I suddenly stopped short, seconds before everyone else.
A bright beam of white, hot light shot out from a dark corner of the auditorium.
In the brief second I saw it, I swore it was an arrow. “An arrow of light?” I wondered. Weird.
Well, why not? We’d already gotten a blue fairy-turned-vampire type of warrior sucking the life out of the audience.
The streak of light struck Maia at her feet. She jumped back and fell, right into the drama classroom below (I decided I would properly laugh at that later.) Her power was momentarily broken; the doors suddenly burst open, and everyone hurriedly rushed out, stampede style.
I was grabbed by an overwhelming wonder; I had to know whether or not this was being televised. Or recorded.
A familiar scream brought me back to the problem at hand.
“Gwen!” I called out, resuming my search for her. Where was she?
“I’m over here!” Gwen called out. She grabbed my arm as she nearly ran me over. “What’s happened, Ham
? What did that lady do to Mr. Lockard and Garrett and those other people?”
“I don’t know what,” I told her honestly. “But they’re not waking up, so I assume she killed them.”
“What!?” Tim gasped as he suddenly came up beside us.
“Yeah, we have to get out of here, now!” I yelled. “Everyone, run for your life!” I was so glad not many were people backstage. That made running to the exit much easier.
Gwen abruptly turned around. “I forgot!” she exclaimed. “Tim, go on without me! I have to get Raiya!”
Tim looked at her uneasily. “All right, I trust you!” he called out before resuming his run.
“What?” I looked at her incredulously. “No, just go, Gwen!”
“She’s in the student lounge near the band room! She was sick earlier; we have to get her out of here, too!”
“I’m sure she’s already gone,” I shouted, pushing Gwen through the exit. “Besides, I think this lady wants fresh victims, not sick ones. Go!”
“We have to –”
“We’re leaving!” I finally took her by the shoulders and directed her out the door. She relented a moment later, but she wasn’t happy about it. At least she’d be alive to hate me later.
Outside, people scrambled to get away from Maia, while some, freshly drained, flattened out on the street, the relentless rain sprinkling all over them. I watched as Maia licked her lips. “The souls of humans sure are tasty,” she smiled evilly as she turned to face us.
Great. We’re the only ones who were twenty yards or less away from her. There were others running already down the street, but Maia let them go.
Up close, I had the full effect of Maia in real life. In my dreams, nothing was completely clear, nothing certain. There was a façade, a veil, which separated me from the true darkness of her essence.
But now the rainy night sky darkened with her appearance, poisoned by her radiation; everything with even the smallest amount of light and life in it was chased away.
The pale ivory of her gown contrasted sharply with the glowing of her eyes. And while she’d mostly been eating souls, she hadn’t stopped herself from sucking up some blood, too. It was all over her hands and face as she fixed her gaze on Gwen.
“Such a pretty girl,” she murmured to Gwen, who heard her and trembled.
“Hammy… we have to escape…” Gwen whispered to me.
“I know, that’s what I’ve been telling you. Let me think of a plan.”
“Hurry,” Gwen pleaded with me. “I think I’m going to throw up.”
Maia continued walking toward us. “You must be Juliet. Well, well… I have to say, I read the play, and we all know what happens to Juliet in the end, don’t we? Too bad about your performance tonight, but we both know I would make a better star!”
Without thinking, I jumped in front of Gwen. “If you want her, you have to go through me, you… you ugly smurf-hag!”
“Fine with me, insolent boy!” Maia cried out, striking me in the head; I wasn’t quick enough to dodge it.
I went reeling as Maia laughed cruelly. “I’ll get to you in a moment. I want to claim my proper title of star of the evening first!”
That’s when a light flashed, and the rain stopped. The thunder clashed out once more before it went silent; a moment later, another ugly creature fell to the ground.
“What’s this? Gibliom?” Maia asked, hollering at the monster freshly fallen from the sky. “What’s going on? Get back up there and make it rain again!”
I did a quick double-take. What was she talking about? She was the reason for the horrible rain this week? It figured. Then I recalled the vision of her relaxing on her cloud while this monster – now that I see him – ran around brewing up the thunderstorm. This was her minion!
“My Lady,” the monster struggled to get off the wet ground. “There’s something –”
Another flash of light. He’s knocked onto the ground, flat on his face. Gibliom still moved, but he’s trembling.
I couldn’t take my eyes off this thing on the ground; he’s so hideously ugly, it’s impossible to just look away. His skin was dark blue-gray, with wrinkles on his wrinkles and wispy, snake-like hair, while his eyes burned scarlet.
It was then that I heard it. The lulling tune of a harp poured out from out of nowhere. My familiar melody. I stilled. It was the song from my dreams.
Maia heard it, too, and seethed. “I know that melody…” she whispered. “Show yourself!” she commanded.
The tune became louder as I looked all around. “There!” I cried out, as I saw her.
There’s a girl, if she could be called a girl, on the roof of the school building behind us. She was standing tall, playing the harp next to her. Her long brownish-red hair gave her an element of gracefulness even as the rigidity of her armor lent her strength.
Gwen saw her and gasped. “She’s lovely!”
I felt like saying the same. The girl was no ordinary girl. She had wings – white wings, like an angel. A smaller pair of wings fluttered out of her head, while a pair of glimmering silver chains draped over her forehead were pulled into the half-bun at the back of her head. A long, bright red feather dangled in her hair, contrasting pointedly with the blue and violet of her leather tunic.
She finished the last line of her pretty piece and then snapped her eyes open.
I felt a twinge inside me. Even from this far away, I knew her eyes were a captivating shade of violet, speckled with starlight.
“Who are you?” I couldn’t resist the urge to ask.
She didn’t answer me, but turned her full attention to Maia. She held up a half-gloved hand and reached into the sky. A second later, a bright arrow appeared in her hand, and her harp transformed itself into a bow.
Maia took a step back.
Gwen was whimpering, and this was perhaps the only thing that made me realize it was a good time to try to escape. It would be easy to use the distraction to get us out of there…
“Maia, you have done well up to this point,” a new voice called out from the sky. “Why do I have to come to your rescue now?”
I didn’t have to look up to know who it was now. Everyone and his brother had shown up. Why not Orpheus too?
“Orpheus!” Maia cried out. Her fro-like hair whipped around as she turned her attention to the newcomer.
Hovering in the sky just above the school was a dirty-looking man wearing a black cloak-like outfit. The long robes mostly disguised a wrinkly, repulsive body, but didn’t do anything to contain the smell. The rotten eggs aftershave wasn’t going to get him a girlfriend any more than the comic-con outfit.
“Yes, yes, it’s me,” Orpheus replied, confirming my suspicions. “What seems to be the problem?”
“It’s –”
“A what? A block in your brain?” he asked as he floated over to her.
I smirked, briefly forgetting the imperative nature of the situation. He might smell bad and look horrible and not be a nice guy, but I liked his insults.
“No – look!”
Everyone looked back towards the angelic warrior. I didn’t blame Orpheus for getting angry a second later.
“What?” Maia gasped. “She’s gone!? I swear, Orpheus, there was a person standing up there a moment ago!”
“You’re not supposed to be afraid of people – you’re supposed to attack them!” Orpheus sighed.
I suppose people will wonder why Gwen and I didn’t just run away. You have to understand that this was not something you get to see every day. After years of reality TV shows, you should know by now the power a dysfunctional family has over its audience.
So it was only when Orpheus looked down at us that we snapped back to normal fear mode.
“Let’s just hurry up and get these two, and be done for now.
You know we need their Soulfire.”
Soulfire? Okay, so reality TV had just turned into science fiction. Or maybe fantasy?
“Psst! Dinger!” I looked over and saw Mikey beckoning me from behind some brick columns. I almost rolled my eyes; Mikey’s not seriously stupid enough to think a brick wall could fend off these evil magician-electrician people, was he?
But better to be behind a wall than out in the open. I grabbed Gwen by the wrist and pulled her along behind me as I ran for cover.
I flinched as Orpheus suddenly appeared directly in front of me. “Augh!” I screeched to a halt, falling over; Gwen followed in suit.
“Hammy!” Gwen cried out as she landed hard on her right side. There’s a snapping noise, and horror sneaked into me as I saw Gwen’s hand bent back on her arm. I felt sick.
And Orpheus wasted no time.
He grabbed me by the wrist. A strong stinging sensation flew up my arm; my teeth clenched in severe, excruciating pain, and I struggled not to scream (loudly.) I trembled as Orpheus laughed. It’s the same cold laugh I remembered from my dreams!
Why do my dreams only come true when it means certain death? No, it’s never for true love or winning the championship title!
I went back to being concerned for my life as another sizzle of power crept through my body, setting my nerve endings on fire. “Stop it!”
“You’ve been enough trouble!” Orpheus cried out, laughing. “I’ll suck out your soul, and then we’ll see how much trouble you cause!”
Orpheus and I were too caught up in his moment of glory and my moment of life-altering agony to see the arrow. It sliced through the air and dug into his left eye, squirting a stream of runny black acid all over his front.
“Augh! Ouch!” Orpheus cursed loudly. He clenched his teeth as he jerked the arrow out a moment later; the eye popped out along with it, nearly making me vomit on the spot. And while the flood of pain stopped drowning my body, I was physically reeling from his blow.
“You see? I told you!” Maia called out. “She just moved!”
Orpheus looked over (with his remaining eye) to see the warrior with the violet eyes staring down at him. I followed his gaze as I fell to my knees, trying to recover.