Alex Reynard
presents

~~P~H~O~B~I~O~P~O~L~I~S~~

Dream II: Public Performance

	We have no past. We won't reach back.
	Keep with me forward all through the night.
			-Cyndi Lauper, "All Through The Night"

-***-

Chapter FIFTEEN

Junella and Zinc were having their own quiet conversation up front, leaving Toby, Piffle and Doll by themselves in the quiet of the back seat (which oddly seemed much wider with three in it instead of one). Toby sat with his paws on the edge of the window, watching the stars. The night was clear as a summer pond, and he could see an endless field of tiny white Christmas lights whizzing by. George had settled down to merely freeway speed, mindful of the structural integrity of the passenger compartment. Still, it made the night sky look like a zoetrope spinning.

"Are they really moving around," he asked Piffle, "or am I just seeing things?"

Piffle set Doll down on the seat, lovingly patted her head, and squeezed beside Toby at the window. "You're not hallucinatin'. People have gone up there, y'know. In balloons! And it's not outer space at all. It's a great big hollow ball of water. They call it the Veil Of Tears. It stretches aaaaallll the way around the world."

"I thought the world was flat," Toby said, remembering Junella's map.

Piffle chuckled. "It is and it isn't, depending on where you're standing."

That was so impossible it was entirely expected, Toby thought.

Piffle pointed over his shoulder. "All those stars, have you noticed yet they're constellations?"

Toby squinted and stared as Piffle described them, her fluttery voice tickling his ears like a dandelion.

"They're all living critters too, just like you and me. They live up there in the sky ocean. See? There's a big wolf prowling around. That bright sun is his eye. Looks like he's seen some star-bunnies. Lookout, little guys!" She giggled. "He's probably caught them before a million times. It's like all those old myths where the gods relive their fate over 'n over again forever. Those star critters are eternal too, as far as anyone can tell. I wonder what it'd be like to be one?" She sighed wistfully.

Toby plopped back on the seat. "That reminds me... It still feels weird to me that you could take anything positive from that horrible sweatshop we escaped from."

Piffle plopped back too (making sure not to flatten Doll as she did). "I don't blame you for being confused about that. I wouldn't expect anyone else to understand unless they went through it themselves. And I'm not saying I was really keen on it. But... I guess I've just bounced around so much from peril to peril, I don't get much scared anymore. It's just, 'Gee whiz, what's happened to me this time?', and I try to give it a fair shake. If I don't like it, I don't stay. The Doctor's place was... fascinating. Intense." She tapped her fingers together. "I... think maybe I might like to go back and get caught by him again sometime."

Toby did not have to verbalize his 'WHAT!?', his expression said it perfectly.

Piffle folded her paws in her lap primly. "I told you about how all that sadness turned into a weird kind of peaceful, buzzy, splifficated-ness after a while. I've never felt anything like that before. It wasn't happiness, but it was so much the opposite, it almost was. It's hard to describe. I like to do stuff I've never done before."

Toby shook his head a little. "You're braver than me then. I don't think I could ever be like you," he said with mixed admiration and declination.

She grinned slyly and poked him. "Say... weren't you telling me before about all your miserable ol' days being sick and doing nothing, and every day being the same? And you're willing to go all the way to Anasarca to get that back?"

Toby's cheeks flushed hot. "That's... not even close to the same thing." He scowled, but the thought drilled deeper. "Um. Well." Toby felt his head spin a bit. "Geez, maybe it is..."

Piffle patted his leg. She resumed combing Doll's hair as she talked. "Some of us like variety, some of us like stability. If we go to the ice cream shop, Toby, I won't mind you getting plain vanilla if you don't mind me getting orange mint rocketberry fudge supreme."

He thought that metaphor was quite cute. And he was beginning to realize that maybe Piffle was a lot wiser than her bubbliness belied. "Is that a real flavor somewhere?"

"No, but wouldn't it be nifty if it was?"

"You might even get me to try a bite," Toby said bashfully.

She 'Ooooh'ed and giggled.

Things were starting to exceed Toby's flirtatiousness threshold (even though part of him liked it quite a bit), so he tried to find a release valve. "That, um, uh... Back at the campsite, you said something about running away from home? I'm interested in hearing about that."

It was Piffle's turn to blush. "Really? It's... nothin' exciting. I don't wanna be a wet blanket. I don't even know why I brought it up."

He was puzzled by this reaction. She was normally so boundlessly open about everything. "No, I want to hear it. I mean... if you're comfortable telling it."

She reached up to fuss with her antennae and was silent for a moment. "Okay," she decided quietly. "For starters, I don't remember how I ended up here. It's been so long ago, all my memories of my old life are gone. I don't know who I was before here. But I like how I've ended up, so que sera sera."

"Even with the fly eyes?" he gently teased.

"Doncha think I would've gotten rid of them by now if I didn't like 'em?" she parried with a chuckle. But then she sighed. "I have kind of an adopted mommy here. And she's very kind and she cares about other people a lot. But it's hard to tell when you first meet her. She's very gruff. And she's... Well, I don't wanna say she's like you, but she is concerned with safety all the time."

Toby fidgeted. What a polite way of calling him a wuss. Though her description was tugging at his memory for some reason.

"Plus it's hard for her to get around," Piffle continued. "She has kind of a... fungal problem."

Toby's eyes shot open so wide he looked like an owl. "YOU KNOW THE MUSHROOM WOMAN!?"

Both the fursons in the front seat jumped at his outburst.

"Does she live in Drury Lane?" Zinc quipped.

Toby didn't even hear it. He was too amazed by the coincidence of it all. "I saw her too!! When I first showed up here! There was this red monster, and then some kind of lizard ate a wolf, and I was terrified out of my mind! And then she showed up! She told me to run to the caves, I'd be safe there. She was so scary I was almost petrified of her, but looking back, she was actually the first furson who helped me out."

Piffle looked pleased. "That's her allright! Small world, huh? Her name's Billawhi, but I call her Mommy. She likes that. She really does try to help people, though she an' me argue a lot about how. She thinks she's helping more by telling them to hunker down and play it safe. I tell her it's better to teach them to just keep on the sunny side and not worry too much."

Toby was utterly fascinated by this, trying to imagine how two such opposite personalities could coexist under one roof.

The hamsterfly held Doll close and buried her nose in the artificial curls. "She's a good cook, and she tells great stories, and I know she loves me, but..." A tear came to her eye. "She's always telling me to stay put. And I wanna go out and play. She gets so worried about me. Worried I'll get kidnapped or eaten or transmogrified into something."

"But you do," Toby pointed out. "Frequently, it sounds like."

She nodded. "And that's the point! All that stuff happens, and I'm still fine! But she won't see it! She just keeps on nagging me to stay inside where it's safe, stay inside where it's safe... We've got a burrow under a big tree. It's a pretty little place and I love it. But I don't want to be cooped up there like a jailbird. So... I'm kinda teaching her a lesson. I left that day and I decided I wouldn't be back for a very long time. I left her a note. And then I ran into you, and you needed help, so it felt like maybe it was meant to be."

Toby patted her shoulder comfortingly. "I think she'll understand. You can't keep someone in a cage if you really love them."

As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he felt something deep in his mind creak open and start to whisper something about his own mother. The one who'd been poisoning him. But he shut his eyes tight and slammed that door shut. No. He was not having any of that. Not now, not ever.

To distract himself, he looked out the window. For a moment he thought the Fearsleigher had shrunk to the size of an ant. But a closer look showed that, no, the plants around them had just gotten much, MUCH bigger.

The flowers, the grass, and even the occasional mushroom had all grown to Wonderland proportions. Blades of grass loomed over the road like bowing monks. Flowerheads blotted out the stars, while their thin stems swayed with the wind. Petals the size of tablecloths lined the highway. It was a sight both whimsical and unsettlingly ominous. Possibly because of how much darker it had become: moonlight barely squeezing through the stalks in thin stripes. Or possibly because the massive posies leaned so nail-bitingly to and fro, it seemed like at any moment that one might crush their car.

The mood in the backseat had changed. Piffle seemed finished with her story and didn't know what else to add. She sniffled quietly as she tended to Doll's locks. Toby felt awkward in the silence. He looked out the window for as long as he could stand to, then let his hand crawl over the seat to find hers. He held it gently.

"Thanks, Toby," Piffle said almost inaudibly.

He turned around. "I hope you patch things up with her eventually."

Piffle nodded, leaving no doubt. "I'm sure I will. I know we're both a little crazy, but loving someone means you love what's wrong with them too." She considered her own words for a moment. "I thunk a long time about this. It was hard deciding I had to put my own heart first."

"Birds gotta leave the nest," Toby said. He winced at how cliché it sounded.

Piffle smiled though, and buzzed her wings a little. "Yup. We'll forgive each other in the end, I just know it. Plus, I'll have an ace in the hole from now on." She thumped her chest like Tarzan. "'Mommy, I have been to Anasarca and back! I think I'm tuff enough to handle what's in our own backyard!'"

They both chuckled about that. And since the matter seemed settled, Piffle asked Toby what he'd been doing all this time. So Toby told her everything about emerging in Quinsy, the peculiar man on the stoop, and finding George in the woods. He told her about his nightmare companion's past, his imprisonment, and his attempts to become a civilized equine. He told her about the night ride to Phlogiston, the Jenny-Mae, the deal he'd struck, and the altercation with Tinder Fingers. Toby skipped some of the parts relating to Trachea's Trading Post and their trip over the falls, but conveyed that tensions and bad decisions had run high. He told her about his entrapment and escape in the mirror-box, and finding Doll. Piffle was very impressed with how brave he'd been to overcome his fear and give their toy friend a chance.

Toby was just getting to the part where he defeated the moon, when he glanced outside and noticed softly falling swirls of white. He smiled. He hadn't actually seen this stuff except through his bedroom window for years. "Hey, it's snowing!"

Almost immediately, Junella growled from the front seat, "AW, PISS!"

"What, what!?" the mouse yelped. "Is the snow dangerous? Is it actually atomic fallout!?" He started frantically rolling up the windows.

"It's not the snow. It's what's bringing it," Junella snarled back. Her black vinyl teeth ground together in a scowl. "I thought maybe it was just a fluke storm. No such luck. Look on ahead." She pointed past the windshield, far down the road.

Toby leaned in as far as he could, and was barely able to discern several figures standing there. They looked like statues. They were dwarfed by the mammoth flowers, but still far larger than any normal furson. "What are they?"

Zinc squinted, then let out a whine of recognition. "THESE assholes!? Oh for pete's sakes! We're already running late!!"

"My sentiments exactly," Junella rumbled, pounding the dash with her fist.

Zinc sighed like a homeowner preparing to shovel last night's snowfall. He clanked his wrench-jaws. "You want me to take care of it?"

Then a sparkle came to Junella's eyes. "Actually, no." She turned around in her seat to face Toby. "Maybe we got off on the wrong foot, mouse. Nobody likes being ordered around by someone they don't respect, after all. You only know my reputation, Toby. Would you like to see a demonstration of why I have it?" Her grin glinted like a gun barrel.

Toby blinked. "You don't have to."

"No, I think I need to. You're gonna hesitate when I say 'jump' unless I show you why I'm the one giving the orders." She turned back to the windshield and the unmoving fursons that were fast approaching. "Besides, working off frustration can be fun."

"I have overheard some of the previous conversation, Madam Brox," George called out. "These unknown pests are blocking our way. Shall I come to a halt or go bowling?"

She chuckled at that mental image. "No, but great suggestion for next time! Let's slow down and see what they have to say!"

Zinc tapped a nonexistent watch on his wrist. "Time's tickin'. Don't get fancy."

"I'll be as fancy as I need to," Junella said, smirking.

A few moments later, they were close enough for Toby and Piffle to both make out the beings they were headed towards.

Giants. Ten or twelve feet tall. Angels. There were five standing in the road, arms linked, making a barrier of their bodies. They were all in robes, their feathery wings spread outward behind them. From out of the floral forest shuffled more of them. Many more.

Toby could not tell if they were ice sculptures, or if their bodies were so frozen solid it made no difference. Frost covered them head to toe to wingtip. It seemed they brought winter weather with them wherever they went, because the road and plantlife ahead were knee-deep in powder. Each angel walked with a pained, shuffling gait, thanks to the massive blocks of ice encasing their feet. Toby wondered if George attempting to ram through them would have ended disastrously. From their posture alone, they looked as unyielding as redwoods.

The one in the center of the road held up his arm, palm out: HALT. Chips of ice fell from his sleeve like dust from attic rafters. He was a lion, his features stern and his enormous mane as slick and stiff as stone.

Since the Fearsleigher was frictionless, George could only bring them to a stop by slowing his pace and letting the skatecar bump into his butt. He did so a few yards in front of the lion leader.

To Toby's dismay, the other ice angels closed in around the car, quicker than he would have thought possible. They soon formed an impenetrable circle. Their ice-shod feet clinked together, echoing.

Junella reached up through the side window and grabbed the roof rack. Using it as leverage, she pulled herself up top in a single flawless motion. Her scarf sailed through the air behind her like a comet's tail.

The skunk planted her small paws on her vehicle's silver roof. She put her hand on her cutlass' hilt. She looked dead center into the gaze of the lion. They were nearly eye-to-eye thanks to the height of the car's blades.

"WE'RE IN A HURRY!!! FUCK OFF!!!" she belted diplomatically.

There was a second's silence. Then, like a tape recorder switching on, the lion and all the other assembled angels began to chant in perfect unison: "WE ARE THE COLD COVEN. YOUR LIFE IS MEANINGLESS WITHOUT OUR TRUTH. JOIN US AND BE SAVED. WE ARE THE COLD COVEN. YOU ARE THE COLD COVEN. JOIN US AND BE SAVED. WE ARE THE COLD COVEN. YOUR LIFE IS-"

And so on.

Toby spun 360 in his seat, watching all those frozen, synchronized jaws moving up and down. It was eerie as heck. None of the angels moved a muscle otherwise, but Toby made an educated guess that they were perfectly capable of Doing Unpleasant Things if their offer was refused.

Zinc was slouched down in his seat, looking far more irritated than anything else. "Just nightmares," he said. "These nosebleeds show up and try to convert you to their religion, which mostly consists of turning into a popsicle and saying 'We are the Cold Coven! Bla bla bla!" all the time. They got me for a coupla days once. Juney tracked me down and killed me back to normal."

Back on the roof, Junella attempted politeness. "We don't want your truth! We wanna be ignant! You've got one chance to back off and let us through!!"

"JOIN US AND BE SAVED. WE ARE THE COLD COVEN."

"Suit yourself," she cooed with a smile. It would have been so anticlimactic if they'd obeyed.

"WATCH THIS, KID!!" she screeched to Toby.

The mouse poked his head out just in time to see Junella leap like a clockspring towards the Coven's leader. Her cutlass was raised above her head, both paws gripping its hilt like a zipline. She seemed suspended in flight for a moment, her body a curved bow, her scarf a sail.

Then with a crack as loud as a gunshot, she drove her blade directly into the lion's face. She plowed her steel through the bridge of his nose on into his brainstem. She landed with both feet on his shoulders, and immediately gave her sword a twist.

The lion's head became a chandelier explosion of glinting ice-blue and blood-red shards.

Toby's jaw was halfway to the ground.

He stared in tingling awe as Junella went to work. As the body of the lion began to topple backwards, the swift skunk hopped froglike to the next angel and dispatched him just as easily. Her blade flashed in the moonlight. Her tailful of record shards clawed open anything it touched. Her speed increased with every kill. Her eyes darted to each new target as she pinballed off the last one's remains, leaving orange streaks like taillights behind her.

It was an almost perfectly silent fight. The Cold Coven chanted no more, caring only about stopping this infidel. And Junella said nothing at all. Her hands were where they belonged; on her weapon. She made no pithy wisecracks. Not even a grunt of exertion. Her cutlass and tail did all the talking for her.

Zinc had produced a bucket of popcorn from out of thin air and was enjoying the show.

Toby didn't know whether he felt astonished or terrified. Junella fought with a ferocity his mind could barely witness. She moved from one opponent to the next, using their slow swings at her as walkways or gymnastic bars. She leapfrogged over heads and shinnied up arms. Her needle-claws sank in deep to let her make her own gravity. Their bodies were her battlefield. And she would not be taking prisoners or leaving survivors. She ended the ones who attacked her swiftly, with almost professional courtesy. But the ones who tried to run away, she made their deaths bad. She killed them with special care, as if to say, 'You stood with your comrades in opposing me. And now you won't stand with them in death? Don't insult me.'

An accusatory frozen finger came pointing towards her. Junella cartwheeled through the air, using her momentum to break it off like snapping a carrot in half. A heartbeat later, she was staking it into the angel's own throat with the butt of her sword.

Limbs fell against the road and shattered. George had to duck chunks of incoming torso. Severed faces, their features contorted in startled agony, flew through the air like frisbees. Junella left nothing to chance. Not one enemy remained in anything but a state of complete disassembly. Her blade was a blur, chopping and stabbing and shattering anything and everything still capable of movement.

Toby saw her eyes. The glee in them was obscene. It was not battle she lusted for, but the narcotic rush of control that came from watching each ensuing enemy become inanimate. Any who stood against her had to fall, no exceptions.

The angels died like tumbling dominoes. Until only one was left. She was running into the woods away from terror incarnate, but terror pursued her. The angel's mouth opened in a silent scream as Junella sliced through both her ankles in a single swing. The angel plunged forward, cracks splintering like lightning bolts across her icy body as she hit the ground. Then Junella was on her back, plunging her sword in again and again like an out-of-control oil derrick. She did not stop until there was nothing left but pieces too small to chop.

Now the floral forest was as silent as the stars.

The skunk stood hunched over in the moonlight, shoulders heaving. It took a moment for her mind to return and the white-hot blankness of combat to subside. Then she giggled. She straightened up, holstered her trusty sharp friend, shook the gore out of her tailspikes and headed back to the car.

George looked like he was in love. He spoke in hushed reverence, "That was a magnificent show, Madam Brox! I would have loved to join you, but it would have been as unspeakably rude as to have interrupted a virtuoso violinist's solo."

That got a grin out of her. "It ain't flattery if it's true," she said, and gave his side a pat. "Double time now! I got a little too fancy with that!" When she climbed up into the cab, the door was not shut for more than a millisecond before George put the pedal to the metal. They were soon traveling at freight train speeds again, leaving the field of frozen carnage far behind them.

Junella settled into her seat and gave her arms and legs a good stretch. She looked behind her.

The look on Toby's face was absolutely precious. He looked like he'd never be able to blink again. His mouth was as wide open as a milk pitcher.

"And THAT, is why people know my name," she said.

"You just... ALL of them...!" the mouse sputtered.

"Yes, all of them," she coolly confirmed. She wiped what seemed like sweat from her face, but it was actually the melted flesh of her foes. "I've got a certain notoriety to uphold, don't I? What people say about Junella Brox is this: if you make yourself her enemy, she will make sure there's nothing left of you after. Got a problem with that?"

"No, I..." Toby gulped. He shook his head, trying to shake himself out of shock after watching her perform such savagely efficient acts of butchery. "I can certainly understand, in a place like this, wanting to not take any chances ...But to see it!!"

She allowed a bit of empathy into her tone. "You're gonna have to get used to seein' it. If you can't take it, it's smart of you to want to get back home. Because that back there? That's a normal day at the office for me."

He nodded briskly, getting the message. "I will do my best to follow directions from now on, Miss Junella. You definitely showed me why you're in charge. It's just... it's gonna take me a little while for my stomach to settle. It feels weird knowing I'm riding in a car with someone who... kills people."

"Two people who kill people!" Zinc piped up, wanting to feel included.

"I ain't never kilt nobody who didn't need killin'," Junella drawled with a smirk.

Zinc had gotten to the bottom of his popcorn and was crunching the last kernels. He glanced in the rear-view mirror at Toby. "And don't feel too bad about those holy ice-holes back there. Half of 'em were forced converts who're now their normal selves again and probably delirious with relief. The other half'll just come back to life again to bother more suckers."

"That does help," Toby acknowledged. He looked out the window. The snow was already completely gone from the landscape.

Junella noticed Piffle had been awfully quiet this whole time. "And what about you, Miss Princess? Got anything to say about my area of expertise?"

Piffle's posture showed quite clearly that she was not the type to engage in violence except as an absolute last resort. "You were quite elegant out there," she complimented simply.

The skunk patted her on the head like a puppy. "Good to hear. I was worried maybe you'd be one of those compassionate types. 'Oh dear! Please don't hurt the poor things!'"

Piffle pouted a tad at being teased. "Just because I look like a sissy doesn't mean I are one. I know the difference between a nightmare and a furson. I just prefer a different type of problem solving, that's all."

"Yeah, letting them catch you," Junella poked.

"Sometimes," Piffle defended, as if that were a perfectly valid strategy.

Junella appraised the hamsterfly a moment longer. She didn't care for the chubby rodent's sunshine-and-gumdrops demeanor, but the girl could take a bit of ribbing and not back down. Commendable.

"That reminds me," Toby interjected timidly. He was incredibly reluctant to raise this question, but now seemed a good a time as any. "Zinc told me how he got his arms and, uh, facial configuration. I asked about you, Junella, and he said you'd be better at telling the story than him."

Thankfully, she did not seem irritated by the inquiry. "How I got my groove on, you mean?" She brushed her fingertips over her chest, sounding like a DJ scratching.

"Yes, if it's a story you don't mind telling." He was quite curious in particular about whether she'd chosen her vinyl form or been transformed into it against her will.

Her neck was getting stiff from craning it around so far. She wriggled back into her seat and looked up into the mirror at Toby. "Not many have the stones to come right out and ask me, puffball."

"I can't tell if you're seriously complimenting me or not."

She chuckled. "I don't know how I got here. All I know is, I showed up naked and alone one day, right in the middle of some seriously ugly motherfuckers. Would they have done anything bad to me? I don't know. All I do know is, I fluffed up like a cat when you step on its tail. I started clawing and spraying and kicking and bitching, and I didn't stop until I was alone in the street, as red all over as a firetruck."

Toby and Piffle winced in stereo.

"I went on what you might call a blood-wild frenzy of indiscriminate homicide," Junella continued. "My mind didn't react so good to being plucked out of my regular life and dropped down in the middle of a nightmare world, y'see. Anything that moved, I sunk my claws in. I was out of my skull for days. Weeks maybe. When I started to come back to some kinda sense, I had gained a bit of infamy. So I made use of it.

"Was I a bit of a prick for a while? Sure. I didn't get that this wasn't just a long dream and that these were real people. But I settled down 'ventually. Started trying to feed myself and find work. I didn't let anyone get the drop on me. Until that music store."

Her teeth clenched at the memory. "I like music. I always have. So I saw a record shop, and I went in. I didn't realize it was a trap until I was already in it. That mad musicmaker, she was a bit like that Doctor you described. 'Cept she was just after money. Drop a customer into molten vinyl, stamp 'em flat, sell 'em as record albums."

"That must have been very painful!" Piffle said with concern.

"Not as much as realizing I'd let my guard down. The heat was nothing compared to my anger. When I'd melted and she poured me in the press, I pushed back. I pushed until it broke. I went a little overboard after that. I smashed every record in that building and fed every last one of the pieces down her throat."

Toby gagged just imagining it.

Junella smiled a little. "Then I dragged her ass to the nearest nightmare limbo and threw her in. Sometimes I check to make sure she's still in there. I listen for the screams."

Toby mentally kicked his past self in the pants for ever being so stupid as to cross words with this skunk. Then he had a rather dreadful thought. "Wait, those records were people. You didn't..."

"Naw! I let 'em go first! You act like I'm coldhearted or somethin'," she sang with a guffaw. "Anyway, afterwards I found myself standing there bald and black as an 8-ball. I thought it looked good on me, so I kept it. Got some needles for my fingers and taught myself to play my skin. Got my Jennie-Mae later on, sailed her a while until she ran aground in Tinder's backyard. Ran into Zinc. Thought he looked good on me, so I kept him. He's been a loyal little lunkhead ever since." She reached across to scratch his ear, making his tail wag. "That's about it."

"Where'd you get your white scarf from?" Toby asked.

"Thrift shop. I wanted my stripe back."

"It looks really good on you," he said.

She looked at his face in the mirror, trying to gauge whether he was being sincere or just ingratiating. She considered a few caustic comebacks, but rejected them and said simply, "Thank you."

*******

Chapter FIFTEEN

Whether the flowers outside had shrunk away to nothing or had all been cut down, Toby didn't know. Once again, he'd transitioned scenes without noticing. Now they were speeding like an ICBM across a lifeless dry wasteland, kicking up a miniature dust storm behind them. The ground was as cracked and arid as month-old pizza crusts.

For miles around there was nothing but nothing. Except in the direction they were headed. Toby could see a patch of dark, and a patch of light.

"That's Coryza," Zinc pointed out. "One of Phobiopolis' very few cities. It's hard to build here, I'm sure you can imagine. You have to find a spot with the lowest uncertainty possible. Otherwise your floor might end up your ceiling one morning."

The mouse nodded. "That makes sense. You said other places were high in uncertainty, so there'd likely be an opposite end of the scale."

"Barely," he replied. "There's no place completely stable. Ectopia's closest to it. On the other hand, some places are so screwball, you can pretty much just walk out and snag imaginite with your bare hands. Whoever founded Coryza either had real luck or real brains. Land's stable, but nearby's this vortex thing with imaginite up the wazoo. Good for mining if you got a strong safety line and enough nerve. By the way, the reason for our current haste is that if we don't get there soon, we might not get in at all."

Something had been itching Toby's brain about that. "How can you tell? Neither of you have watches and the car doesn't have a clock."

"Don't need 'em," Zinc said, impressed the kid had noticed that. "You might've scoped it went from day to night real quick a while ago. This whole region: nighttime forever. But eventually you get a feeling for when it's night-night and not just regular night, got me?"

Toby blinked. "No."

Zinc waved a wrenchclaw towards the window. "Look outside. Does it seem any different than at the campsite?"

Toby looked and tried to see. The wind made his ears flap all rubbery-like. The stars were more piercing, that was clear. Maybe the sky was a little closer to black than blue. "I'm not sure," he said as he leaned back in.

"I am," Piffle said.

"What's different?" Toby asked her.

She shivered a little and held Doll tighter. "You know how you can't just tell someone how to ride a bike? I can't tell you why the sky was nice back there, but it's getting scarier by the minute now. It's just in your bones, I guess."

"Or exoskeleton, as the case may be," Zinc said suavely.

"Ooooh! You know a big word!" she kidded. Both of them laughed.

"You'll get a feel for it eventually, pinkie," Zinc told Toby with a leg-nudge. "The important thing is, Coryza's like a flower that closes up at night. We wanna be inside when that happens."

Toby looked ahead out the windshield. Past George galloping along tirelessly, he could now see a massive structure smack dab in all this nowhere. It glowed warmly, making the whole thing look like a city-sized tea candle. But Toby soon realized, the light was starting to fade.

Zinc noticed too. "Shiiiiit. They're starting already," he said through gritted teeth.

"I've got eyes," Junella reminded him. She spoke a little louder to make sure George overheard. "If we keep going at this speed, we'll just barely squeak it!"

"Then I shall go faster!" George sang out, clear pride in his voice. The Fearsleigher's chassis had already been shaking a bit from his velocity, and now it rattled even louder.

Toby dared to lean out the side window to see Coryza coming closer. He felt something pop into his hand, and found the little tube was a spyglass Zinc had passed to him. "Thank you." He extended it, pressed his eye to the aperture, and squinted the other shut against the sprays of sand and dust.

The whole city was a circle. Like an enormous cake tin filled with houses and shops. Every building was exactly the same height. They were all lit up as brightly as a Christmas village. Streetlamps stood at attention every few feet, strings of bulbs ran across every rooftop, candles burned in every window. It was the most welcoming sight Toby had seen in Phobiopolis so far.

He also saw the reason why those lights were growing dim. Encircling the city were a number of enormous metal panels. Each one shaped like a child would draw a house: a triangle atop a square. Toby could see smoking machinery and dozens of townspeople pulling on stout cables, raising the panels up. As each square stood up straight, the triangular sections swung down on hinges.

Toby gasped as he realized what was going on. It was brilliantly straightforward. How do you keep a large number of people safe in a land of monsters and fear? Lock the whole town up an an enormous metal box. Each of Coryza's mighty panels interlocked with the one beside it. Toby could hear the slamming-together even this far away. The citizens were closing them in a double-clockwise pattern, so by the end there'd just be two panels left open at opposite ends of the city. George obviously realized this too, and altered his trajectory toward the place where the last open panel would be. By the time the walls were all closed up, everything would fit together as neatly as a jigsaw puzzle.

Toby's imagination decided to torture him by painting him a picture of what it might be like for those unlucky travelers who ended up outside when the panels sealed tight. Having to spend the darkest hours of night huddled close to the metal walls. Banging and scraping their fingers to bloody nubs, begging to be let in. How many new skeletons each morning would be crushed to dust underneath those panels? How many centuries' worth of powdered bone lay beneath them?

Thankfully, these ghastly thoughts were driven from Toby's mind by Piffle shouting, "There's someone out there!"

Toby jumped across the seat, nearly into her lap, to get a look.

She was right. A few hundred yards away, someone small and thin was running at top speed towards the closing city. And from the look of their stumbling stride, they would reach the limit of their body's endurance long before they reached Coryza.

"We've gotta stop for them!" Toby shouted to Junella.

Piffle backed him up. "Yeah!"

The skunk kept her eyes straight ahead. "We can't. If we so much as slow down, no one gets inside."

Toby's heart rate shot up. "Can't we at least try!?" he said desperately.

The skunk didn't acknowledge him with so much as an ear flick. Zinc either.

"How can you be so heartless!? I don't know what's gonna happen to that furson all alone outside the city, but I know it'll be awfulness beyond comprehension!" He looked again out the window. The little figure was waving their arms back and forth over their head. "PLEASE!!" Toby begged.

Junella looked back at Toby and Piffle, her eyes as cold as the ocean depths. Then her scowling muzzle fluttered and she couldn't hold in her laughter anymore.

Toby was so outraged that he actually thought for a microsecond about slapping her.

But then the skunk swatted Zinc on the arm. "Let's stop fucking with their heads and go help that runner. You wanna man the turret or should I?"

"You got the angels! My turn now!" he said with zeal.

Before Toby could deal with the relief that the duo's cruelty was merely a prank, Zinc opened the car door and stepped out. Toby involuntarily screamed a bit.

But like Junella before, Zinc had clamped himself tight to the frame. He swung himself up onto the roof as calmly as if they hadn't been traveling at over 100 miles per hour.

Piffle and Toby both poked their heads out the side windows to see what the hell the canine was doing.

Toby had seen the harpoon turret before, but gave no thought at the time to its function. Zinc slotted his wrench-hands into the custom-designed slots, near-purring at how smoothly they fit into place. He felt the turret's gears go clink-clink-clink as he sighted in on his target. The wind was pretty annoying. He hoped his ears wouldn't break off and go sailing away like a pair of paper planes.

He held his breath and squinted through the crosshairs, watching the flailing little figure. So much to compensate for. Their speed, the runner's speed, the wind, the dark. Finally, he simply closed his eyes and told the harpoon in its chamber that it had better damn well hit its mark if it knew what was good for it.

He clenched the trigger.

Toby's head snapped around as he watched the silver spear shoot across the desert and plunge straight through the chest of the running furson.

"Hot DAMN!!" Zinc whooped.

Toby shut his eyes to keep out the sight of the limp body being dragged along the bumpy ground, twisting and flopping, as the harpoon turret reeled it in. Nausea made him moan. He tried to keep in mind Phobiopolis' rules of impermanent death and that the stranger would very likely be fine after this.

"Yaaaay! You saved him! Good shot!" Piffle called upwards to Zinc. Junella also gave the roof a congratulatory thump.

"Deadeye Zinc!" the canine howled. "King of the wild-ass fucking frontier!"

Toby caught a glimpse of the stranger's dirty, mangled corpse being hauled up the side of the car. He really hoped he could keep himself from throwing up on anyone's feet.

But a moment later, he heard the 'shooonk' sound of a harpoon being ripped out of flesh, and then the grateful shouts of, "Thank you! Thank you so much! I never would have made it in time!"

"Just being a good citizen," Zinc replied. "Here, take my wrench. Try to squeeze yourself in the back."

Toby had to move out of the way as a pair of green feet came barging in.

Their rescuee looked fit as a fiddle, showing no traces of being impaled and dragged across the sand a few moments ago. He was either a snakelike lizard or a lizardlike snake. Either way, he was as young-looking as everyone else, as green as a peapod, and was wearing swim trunks with a tanktop. His large eyes stuck out from his head like gunner pods. "Hello!" he said to Toby and Piffle (and winced noticeably when he saw Doll). "Thank you all for helping me!" He nodded towards Junella. "You too!"

"Zinc did all the work," she replied.

The twiggy reptile smiled ear to ear, sitting with his hands in his lap and his beanstalk legs twitching up and down.

Toby tried to strike up conversation. "So, how'd you end up out here all by y-"

His sentence was cut off by Zinc hurling himself back into the front passenger compartment in a tangle of legs and metal. He wound up with his nose smershed into the glove box. He slammed the door behind him and attempted to straighten out. Wrenches flew dangerously close to everyone's heads for a few seconds. "Damn, I hope I get to shoot more stuff with that thing before this trip is over!" he said gleefully.

The reptile leaned forward to squeeze Zinc's shoulders. "All of my gratitude, all of it! I wish I had some way to repay you, but my pockets are empty. I lost my concentration at a tub station this morning and ended up a hundred miles off course," he admitted sheepishly.

"Happens to everyone," Zinc said with a handwave. "If you're serious about repayment, we'll be staying at the Tatterdemalion."

Their green guest nodded in recognition. "I know the place. I'll do what I can. My name is Spiretto Bronze, by the way." He held out his hand for a shake.

The canine tried not to crush it. "Zinc. Just Zinc."

Toby had a realization that Spiretto was likely the most normal-looking furson he'd encountered so far. Though maybe he turned into a werewolf on Thursdays or something.

By now George's thundering hooves had brought them within the aura of Coryza's waning light. Toby could see the flickering torches held by guardsmen standing around the city's perimeter. Only two more panels remained open, but it looked like they'd make it inside with a pinch of time to spare.

What everyone had forgotten was that their vehicle was being driven by a literal galloping nightmare. Exactly the type of being that Coryzan citizens preferred to remain outside.

So they were all a bit startled when the first flaming arrow hit the hood.

Toby was already reflexively rolling up the windows as he watched a swarm of fireflies appear out of the night headed towards them. But they were certainly not harmless as insects. He flinched and turned the window crank faster as the spear-sized projectiles started booming off the Fearsleigher's roof and sides.

Needless to say, most of the arrows were directed at George. He was performing some rather elaborate acrobatics to dodge them while still keeping the skatecar on track. One of the arrows lodged smack dab in his ribcage. He ripped it out with his teeth and chomped the shaft in half. "THAT IS HIGHLY UNCALLED FOR!!" he bellowed.

"I shoulda known this would happen," Junella said with a sigh. She leaned out the window and yelled to George, "I'll handle this!"

Putting Toby's nerves on edge once more, she exited the vehicle as Zinc had. She clung to the open door and snaked herself around it. She leapt and kicked out at the same time, landing on the Fearsleigher's hood just as the door slammed shut. She stood and directed her gaze ahead, ears twitching as more arrows whizzed by. Then she crouched and sprang, landing deftly on George's back.

"Oof! Be careful up there, Madam!"

"I'm steady as a sunrise, thanks." Her toes and tail clutched the nightmare's ribs like a tripod, leaving her arms free to wave back and forth to get the archers' attention.

To Toby's wonderment, it wasn't three seconds later that the fiery fusillade stopped.

Junella's chest was outthrust, hands on her hips, standing bold and nonchalant upon a deathless black steed. The pair of them looked like a single statue carved from night itself. When they finally reached the city limits, Coryza's guardsmen either stood gawping in wonder or ran out to meet her. The torchlight reflected fluidly across her grooves. It matched her eyes beautifully.

This was an entrance that legends were born from.

The moment was robbed of only a slight bit of illustriousness when George trotted to a stop and let the Fearsleigher bump into his backside. Junella wobbled a bit but kept her pose.

"Miss Junella! You tamed this thing!?" one of the golden-armored guards called out. He and the others cautiously clustered around George, keeping their torches pointed out in front of them. They were all as stunned as Junella and Zinc had been by the sight of a nightmare that was not at the moment doing everything in its power to attack them to death. The monster was even allowing itself to be ridden!

George was not good at looking harmless, but he attempted it as best as he could.

Using the top of George's skull as a pivot point, Junella gracefully hopped down. She stood before the assembled crowd of Coryza's most fearless, drinking in their expressions of astonishment. "I can't take all the credit. He came pre-tamed," she sang modestly.

"Izzit really a nightmare or did you build it?" one of them asked.

George looked towards the armored tapir. "I can assure you, I am-"

"IT TALKS!!" several guards sputtered.

George did not have eyeballs, yet he still managed to roll them.

Coryza's captain of the archers had just come sliding down the ladder from the watchtower's arrowslit and was now running up to extend his hand to Junella. "My apologies, my apologies!" the tall chestnut stallion cried out. He shook her paw. "Hopefully we didn't damage your vehicle too much. But I'm sure you can understand our reaction."

"No sweat," she said.

The captain looked up to George, staring into the pinprick eyelights of the undead beast, comparing their equine features. "Extraordinary..."

"You're not half bad looking yourself," George could not help replying.

Several guards guffawed. The atmosphere relaxed noticeably. Everyone seemed to recognize instinctively that a being with a sense of humor couldn't be all bad.

"Looks like we got here just in time," Junella said, nodding towards the second-to-last panel being pulled into place at the other end of the city. Even at such a distance, everyone's teeth rattled with the 'THUMMM' of the triangular roof falling into place. "We were planning on staying the night. Is he gonna be a problem?" She hooked a thumb over her shoulder at George.

The captain looked at her, then at the other guards, then at George, then at the other guards, then back to Junella. "Honestly, if it was almost anyone else but you, I'd give a definite yes. I'd suspect some sort of plot to... I don't know. Mayhem of some sort or another. But if you give me your word he's not a danger..."

The skunk reached up to stroke George's muzzle like petting a kitten. "If I had a sugar cube I'd let him eat it out of my hand."

Taking a last consensus-gathering glance towards the other guards and not finding too much skepticism, the captain shrugged. "Good enough for me."

Junella smirked broadly as the captain stepped aside to grant her passage into the city. She took hold of George's harness and walked alongside him as he stepped onto the massive metal panel. The skunk waved cheerfully to the Coryzan citizens who had gathered in the street to marvel at the impossible sight of a well-behaved nightmare.

Toby felt like his eyes were overflowing. So many things to see! All the city guards in their gleaming golden armor and burgundy uniforms, armed to the teeth with weapons from every century. Spiked morningstars, compound crossbows, submachine guns, laser cannons, even a blunderbuss!

The section of wall George was carrying them across was just as impressive in its own way. From on top of it, Toby could see the sheer scope of its design. It was as tall and wide as the side of an apartment building. Dovetail teeth would lock each panel like a zipper to its neighbor to keep the city sealed up tight. The hinges connecting the square and triangle sections were as big as boxcars. Into the metal were soldered several things that looked like iron soccer goals. Toby soon realized that each one was just the right size for a guard to sit in and keep watch from through a tiny slit. Toby looked for any doors at the base of the panel and saw none. Maybe they really did lock out both monsters and shelter-seeking travelers alike when they closed up for the night.

The architecture of Coryza proper was actually less chaotic than Toby had expected. It was kind of an Old World aesthetic. He did see touches of both the modern and the ancient, but for the most part the city wouldn't have looked out of place in the previous century. As he'd noticed before, each of the town's buildings was exactly the same height. They built them up as close to the metal roof as they could. Houses were stacked on top of businesses and vice versa. Toby saw ornamentation and greenery everywhere. Bright paint, elaborate storefronts and signs, vertical gardens, murals, gargoyles, windowboxes. Even the manhole covers and streetlamps were intricately carved. He guessed that all of it (plus the abundance of lighting) helped to offset the claustrophobia of living in a city that was half the time perpetual night, the other half airtight-sealed.

George's hooves clopped mellifluously against the cobblestones. Scores of people backed slowly out of the way at his approach. He tried to bow pleasantly to as many of them as he could. One small rabbit boy ran up and stared shamelessly. "Coooool!" he gushed. His mother quickly yanked him back by his collar. George chuckled.

Toby could see dozens of men and women with thick leather gloves waiting impatiently for the Fearsleigher to get off the panel so they could start raising it up. The guards and the captain of the archers were already inside, many of them ready to help heave the final piece in place.

One guard with an elaborate golden nose sculpted onto his helmet shouted out, "ANYONE ELSE?"

From above, another Coryzan who was already at their watchpost replied, "Nothing!! Just a bunch of cactusyotes!"

"I don't think we need them trackin' in muddy footprints," the nose-guard said with a rumbling laugh. "CLOSE IT UP!!!" he shouted to everyone else.

Toby watched forearms and calves bulge with effort as the crowds on both sides started pulling. Steam-powered machines added a whooshing, whizzing sound to their grunts of exertion. Muscle and machine worked with all their might, and the huge metal panel began to move.

Rust flaked down like rain as the unimaginably heavy slab rose, angle by angle. The crowds, even the ones not pulling, all chanted, "One!! TWO!! Heave!! HO!!" Toby could see smiling faces everywhere. Even the ones clenched up with strain still held a trace of a grin. He guessed this nightly ritual brought the whole community together.

As he looked across the crowd, he saw fursons from a wide variety of species, even within families. Plenty of them had impairments or improvements (as one chose to see it) like Junella, Zinc and Piffle. Clothing styles were as varied as their wearers, though strong colors were much more prevalent than greys or earth tones. Coryza appeared to be a city of individuality and unity in equal measure.

Toby looked way, way up and watched with flinching anticipation as the triangle above him began to lean inwards. It 'CLANGGG'ed shut with a noise that felt like a punch to the chest, sending a reverberation rippling through the air that knocked a few watchguards' hats off.

A cheer rang out from the crowd as they knew their city was safe for one more night. Then, as if by hidden signal, every last one of them all turned away and resumed whatever they'd been doing before. Conversing, selling, playing, or heading home.

Spiretto let out a sigh. "I made it," he breathed. He then whirled around inside the vehicle, giving everyone hugs. "Thank you, thank you again!"

Zinc chuckled as the lizard kissed both his cheeks. "I dunno about the rest of my crew, but I was thinking of capping the night with some desserts. You wanna come along?"

Spiretto's eyes widened with heartbreak. "I'm afraid I have no choice but to decline. I must be getting home. But it was a generous offer!" He reached out to shake Zinc's wrench one last time.

Piffle scooted out of the way to allow him access to the door. "Goodbye! Have a good night!"

The snakey lizard (or lizardy snake) hopped down to the sidewalk and smiled back up to her. "And you as well!"

Toby watched him dart off, tail swishing behind him. "Reynold, Reynold!" he cried out. "I made it in time!!"

Toby didn't know who Reynold was, but the mouse felt incredibly happy that they and Spiretto would soon rejoin. Even though Toby hadn't actually been a part of the reptile's rescue, he nonetheless felt glad.

It was a good feeling to know that, even if everything in this environment was constantly trying to kill him, there were still plenty of people here with their hearts screwed on straight.

*****

CHAPTER XVI

Watching with shining eyes, leaning slightly out the window, Toby was like a kid on Christmas as he took in the streets of Coryza. They reached their destination far too soon. He came very close to asking if they could spend another few minutes going around in circles.

It cannot be emphasized enough how much care the townspeople had put into every surface of every side of every building. Color and ornamentation everywhere. Toby's eyes were zipping to and fro trying to keep up with it all. Everything was laid out with surprising efficiency. From a city built on the soil of nightmares, he'd expected twisted little streets and dark alleys all over. Instead, he soon realized that everything was laid out in a tidy circular grid like a dartboard. All the buildings were crammed tight, utilizing the full potential of every inch of real estate. Toby's temporary illiteracy still persisted though, so he often had no idea what any of the businesses were selling. Some of it was pure gibberish while others might have been real things in Phobiopolis. What was an Alabasteration? Or a Tuuwean Beark?

He turned to see Piffle gazing out her window too, antennae bobbing. "This is probably nothing new to you, isn't it? You've been all over the place."

She shook her head. "Nope, this is my first time! I've explored the forest a lot, but I haven't really been much farther than Cryptolysis." She nibbled her lip. "Umm, I know you're in a hurry to get home, Toby, but d'you think you'd mind sparing an afternoon to browse around tomorrow?"

"Not at all!" he shouted. "I was just thinking that, actually!"

The traffic around them was a rainbow of transportation. There were boats on wheels, egglike minicars, spinning tops, rickshaws, magic carpets, coupes, convertibles, trucks, scooters, and even a wheeled refrigerator. There was too much rumbling and music for Junella's voice commands to be overheard, so she relied on the buzzer system to steer George. Soon enough, they were arriving at the somewhat-world-famous Tatterdemalion bar and hotel.

To Toby it looked like most other moderately-expensive tourist lodgings. Brick walls, arched windows, bushes and ivy greening up the sides. The only two interesting features of note were the perplexingly small parking lot, and its name. Instead of a wooden, fiberglass or neon sign, the word 'Tatterdemalion' simply existed above the main entrance in an elegant font, like the title of a movie.

The tiny parking lot's valet was visibly startled to see a luminous deathpony come trotting in off the street, but she quickly straightened up and regained her professional demeanor.

Toby looked out the window and was confused for the umpteenth time. Not only was the parking lot only big enough for a single vehicle (maybe two) but there was some kind of... blur in the middle of it. Like a grey-flecked smudge the size of a bouncy castle, just sitting there as if it made sense. The parking attendant was an otter in traditional uniform: black jacket and pants, white shirt, red cummerbund. She appeared perfectly normal, except for having a moth's mouth. 'How does she eat?' Toby wondered. Her muzzle was just a coconut-like bump with a slit up the middle, out of which protruded a springy spiral tongue. 'Never needs to buy a crazy straw, I guess.'

Her voice vibrated quite a bit but was sufficiently coherent. "Ummm... short-term or long-term parking?"

Zinc leaned across Junella's lap to send a breezy grin the otter's way. "Probly just for tonight, babydoll. Though our engine's kinda sentient. Anyplace we can keep him?"

She blushed. "Not a problem, sir! We have many guests arrive in creature-drawn vehicles. Should even be much less hassle than normal, as yours doesn't seem coerced."

George exhaled in relief. He'd been worried he'd have to spend the night with nothing but wagons and sedans for company. Though of course he would have accepted such a fate without complaint.

The otter was a bit cautious in approaching George, until he gave her a deep, gentlemanly bow and extended his hoof for a shake. Giggling, she did. And even though his harness was handmade and unfamiliar, she soon had it off of him. George stepped away to stretch his back, and everyone else hopped down from the Fearsleigher to do the same.

Toby was bursting to ask about the blur, but figured if he just kept quiet he'd see for himself. And so he did. The otter skipped over to a carnival-like red lever. When it was pulled, the blur began to slow down. It changed from a dryer-lint-colored cloud to a flickering procession of cars, all passing in and out of existence so fast it was like watching timelapse footage or a flip-book. For fractions of a second at a time, the lone parking spot would be filled with a sports car, a military transport, a hovering disc, a crab-shaped robot, or hundreds of other vehicles. It was like watching the spinning symbols on a slot machine. Every now and then the space would remain empty. The otter adjusted the lever back and forth until the space came up empty again and stayed that way. Toby was just about to ask if they'd have to push the Fearsleigher into it, when the skatecar started sliding forward on its own. It was sucked up into the space as if filling a vacuum. Then with a tug on the lever, it disappeared away into the blur.

George trotted over to the otter. "And where would my nightly lodgings be, Madam?"

She brushed a hand through her headfur, as surprised as everyone else to hear him speak. "WOW! Um, we have a corral, but I guess in your case, you can stay anywhere your... 'owner' chooses." She said that specific word quite carefully, just in case it might cause insult.

George chuckled good-naturedly at it.

"Just stand right where you are for a moment." She went back to Junella and unfolded a rectangle of thin plastic from her pocket. There was a transparent window in its middle, and she held it up in front of George. "Everyone, please look at your horse through this."

Toby, Doll, Piffle, Junella and Zinc all did.

Then the otter shifted the rectangle diagonally to make the window smaller. As she did, George appeared to remain the same size relative to the window's border. When she'd slid the corners to within an inch apart, she took the rectangle away and now George was the size of a nectarine.

He looked quite startled. "Oh, how fascinating! I didn't feel a thing! I do hope this is impermanent."

Toby could hear his brain making eggs-frying-in-a-skillet sounds, trying to figure out how an optical illusion could reduce the size of real objects.

Junella chortled at his expression and patted his arm. "Don't think about it too hard. You'll go mad faster than normal." She reached down to the cement so George could walk up onto her palm. Then she tucked him comfortably into the folds of her scarf.

Zinc rustled around in his jacket and found a gemstone necklace to tip the valet with. She smiled appreciatively while discreetly positioning herself in front of the 'Our Attendants Do Not Accept Tips' sign. Zinc shot her a wink, then rejoined the group as they walked towards the hotel's entrance. He tossed his wrenches around Piffle and Toby, nearly toppling them. "So! Who's up for some desserts? The answer is me; you weren't quick enough. So we're all gonna go get some right this very instant!"

Junella arched an eyebrow at this minor insubordination. "Maybe I wanted to go straight to bed?"

He didn't even blink. "Or maybe you want cake, and maybe I know you well enough to know it."

She rolled her eyes and chuckled. Not saying he was right, but not saying he wasn't.

Piffle gasped. "Cuppycakes!! I forgot we were gonna go get some before we got Dacryphilia-napped!" She squealed and clapped her paws.

Toby was fine with this. All he'd had to eat since yesterday was an orange and a few candy bars. They seemed to have stayed put just as they should, so he was more than happy to try more substantial fare.

He had a thought and looked down to Doll. "Do you eat?" he asked.

He felt a question mark being drawn on his leg, followed by L-E-T-S-S-E-E

***

In the lobby of the Tatterdemalion, Toby tried not to look directly at the walls. Nearly everything here was wood, expertly carved and stained a rich caramel brown. But the whorls in the boards were all moving. Constantly. Swirling around like fish in an aquarium. It made Toby feel seasick.

The place was cozily dim, lit by caged candles every few feet. The atmosphere was thick with a combination of food smells, smoke, jovial conversation, and thumping footsteps. Customers lounged around a fireplace on red leather sofas or headed up the ornate staircase to their rooms. On the walls were portraits of heroes and monsters.

The outside of this place had looked modern, but the inside was almost exactly what Toby had been imagining. It was the quintessential inn for weary travelers in a world of iron and dragons to rest their swords and tired feet. He wondered if they served grog at the bar, or mead. Thinking of this made him realize for the first time that he himself was on a quest, just like so many heroes in stories he'd read. Somehow along the way, he'd gone from a frightened bumbler staggering around in the dark to the focus of a grand expedition to a mythical site. He had a goal and he had his party of companions. 'Just not the actual heroism,' he reminded himself. He looked down at the hammer tucked into his pajama bottom's waistband. 'Not the most impressive armor or weaponry either.'

Piffle noticed a display stand full of brochures about Coryza's many attractions. She started snatching up a bouquet of them.

To the left of the entrance was a counter with a guestbook and an industrial-sized willwell. Behind it was a wall overcrowded with room keys, staff notes, and slots for mail delivery. Toby watched as an army of identical-looking nonev mice ran all around the mail slots, either tucking letters in or dashing off with them to disappear into holes in the wainscoting. He assumed they had to be a form of delivery service, otherwise the staff would be chasing them out with brooms.

"Useful li'l squeakers," Zinc said, noticing where Toby was looking. "They're called The Vermillion. Carry a couple hundred times their body weight, like ants. Plus they can go into any hole in Phobiopolis and come outta any other one. One solid good thing about this crapsack world: you can buy somethin' mail-order and have it show up in about five minutes."

"Cool. Can they carry-" Toby completely forgot what he was about to ask when the hotel's proprietor came walking around the corner.

She did not mind the mouse staring at her. Most people did. And in a land where the impossible was normal, it was a treasured feeling to be seen as unique. The feline lit up when she saw Junella. "Dear friend! It's been far too long! And you've brought guests this time?"

"Yep. All four of us," the skunk said.

"Five!" corrected Piffle, holding up Doll.

"Six," George added from Junella's shoulder.

"So it seems," came the reply, and she crossed the room to introduce herself to Piffle and Toby. She placed her palms together and bowed. "This is my hotel. I am Mrs. Mia Xenoiko. Your comfort and safety are in good hands."

Piffle gave her own name and returned the bow, but Toby took a little longer to wake his brain up. It is not often one encounters a living tattoo.

From any angle one could view her, Lady Xenoiko appeared to be two-dimensional. Her features were surrounded by an inked outline, her colors clear and sharp. Beyond this though, she was also of two distinct and opposite natures. Split precisely down the middle, she was two different species at once. Her right side was a demure Japanese housecat, with fur as white as a ceramic teacup. Her makeup, hair and ornamentations suggested both a geisha and a maneki-neko figurine. Her right side was a fierce fiery tiger, looking like it had leapt straight out of an ancient woodblock print. The striped fur swayed like a sunburst. Both her eyes were pure yellow though, with a single black brushstroke in the center. She was wearing a dazzlingly blue kimono, tied with a white sash like Junella's scarf, which almost seemed to be holding her contradictory halves together.

"I'm..." Toby said. "I- I- I'm a stuttering idiot."

Lady Xenoiko held her tiger paw to her mouth and giggled silently. "I'm sure you're not. My appearance is having its desired effect. In a business this rowdy, being able to intimidate and discombobulate with one's mere presence is an asset."

"Did you go to that 'Freeze Yourself New' place?" he blurted.

Her eyes widened. "I should say not! Those amateurs?" She chuckled at the very idea they could be capable of such work.

"Toby, by the way," he finally remembered, as the dualistic feline padded on her sandals back behind the counter.

"She's neat," Piffle said, visibly wondering what it would be like to live in a body like that.

Lady Xenoiko's housecat paw was slender as an iris petal. In contrast, her tiger paw was three times its width. She walked barefoot to the register and traced a snowy finger across the chart showing all the hotel's rooms. Her tail flicked in vexation. "It's a bit late in the evening. And on a weekend," she said to Junella.

"Do you have ANYthing?"

"I have a double I can convert to a quad in a short amount of time," she replied. "That is, if you don't mind batbeds."

Junella sighed. "They make me burp for some reason, but it beats sleeping at the train station."

Xenoiko laughed musically and began to ring them up. "No charge for your horse, as that's covered by the parking fee. We can provide a small bed for him if he likes." As was proper for a hotelier, she took his impossible sentience in stride.

George leaned forward so suddenly he nearly tumbled to the floor. "That would be appreciated to a degree I cannot possibly convey!!" he shouted, almost wishing he could cry. A bed! After a centuries-long night of pitch-black soil and crawling insects!

"And Doll can sleep with me," Piffle piped up.

"Duly noted," Lady Xenoiko replied, not sure if the toy was actually alive or if the hamsterfly was a bit touched in the head. She looked back at the cash register. "How many nights?"

Junella was about to answer, when Toby cleared his throat.

"Umm... Piffle and I were kind of thinking about exploring the city tomorrow."

"I thought you wanted to get home, mouse?"

"I do! It's just, this place looks neat and, well..." He shrugged. "It'd be really nice to just relax for a short while in a place that seems relatively safe. I mean, before we go back to facing monsters and haunted forests again."

The skunk was normally a stickler for time on a road trip, but she could see his point. "Allright. We leave before they close up for the night though."

Toby risked her finger-needles to shake her hand. "Sounds fine."

Lady Xenoiko rang them up. "Checkout is normally at noon as you know, but they're my rules and I can bend them for a valued customer. If you can be out before six and don't leave much mess, I'll only charge you for an extra quarter-day."

"Deal!"

"The total for the room comes to 40,000 grit."

Toby's eyebrows went up. He nudged Zinc. "Is that a lot?"

"Naaah. We ain't talkin' dollars. It's a good price; she likes us. We come here a lot and occasionally snap some pencilnecks for her if a bar fight breaks out. That reminds me! Gimme a moment and I'll get you a willwatch."

Lady Xenoiko gracefully lifted the key to room 257 off its hook and handed it to Junella. "If my memory's correct, I believe you have some mail." As soon as the sentence was finished, a mouse zoomed out of one of the mail slots with a clutch of letters in its teeth. It ran across the floor and up Junella's leg to deposit them in her paw, then dove into Zinc's bellybutton and disappeared.

'He wasn't kidding when he said any hole!' Toby thought.

The canine leaned closer to his partner. "What'd we get, Juney?"

She seemed moderately pleased. "Looks like more job offers than death threats this time."

When Junella tucked the letters away in a nonexistent pocket, Lady Xenoiko scooted the guestbook forward and held out a pen. Toby noticed that when Junella took it, her needles brushed against her palm and she sang briefly, "apple juice".

The mouse watched her give her signature, and then an irresistable urge came over him. He scratched his fingernail down Junella's shoulder.

"taxicabwonderfuldaylightloverRhondavideonightingaleboy"

She turned around and gave him a look of supreme unamusement.

Toby paled, unable to believe he had actually done such a thing.

"You get exactly one of those for free. Next time, I collect a lucky mouse's foot keychain."

"Perfectly understood!" She tossed him the pen and he quickly scribbled his name.

Or part of it. He stared at the page. He'd written 'Toby' just fine, but was now drawing a complete blank on his last name. 'Oh no...' He'd forgotten about Piffle's warning that he'd start forgetting things.

Piffle poked her head over his shoulder. "deLeon," she supplied.

"Thank you!" Toby said and wrote it down. "I thought I'd lost it for good!"

"Arencha glad you've got me around to be your memory piggybank?" she said with a smile, then started adding her name to the guestbook too. All twelve parts of it.

Seeing as he'd have plenty of time to ask now, Zinc tapped the counter with a wrenchtip. "Pardon me, Señorita, I believe I misplaced my willwatch last time I was in here. Little black one? Could you check the lost and found if it's not too much trouble?"

"No trouble at all." Xenoiko reached beneath the counter and hauled up a cardboard box that was at least half-full of willwatches alone. (Plus the usual hats, sunglasses, phones, daggers, and a mummified set of demonic sexual organs.)

"Well waddaya know! Here it is! I'd lose the other half of my head if it wasn't stitched on. Thanks a ton!" He turned back to Toby and made a 'ta da!' gesture as he handed the little device over.

It fit comfortably on the mouse's arm, but he felt uncomfortable somehow nonetheless. Then it hit him. "You don't have wrists. You just stole this, didn't you?" he whispered accusingly to Zinc.

Oh that grin of his. "I wouldn't exactly call it 'theft'. These things practically grow on trees. People practice with 'em until they get good, then toss 'em in the street. And that," he poked Toby's chest, "is precisely what I want you to start doing. It's the third skill anyone needs to learn in Phobiopolis. After running and hiding."

"I'm good at those at least," Toby admitted.

Piffle finally finished up and added a little heart after her name. "There we go!" She pirouetted and passed the pen to Zinc.

Since Zinc indeed had no wrists, and abnormal elbows too, it was rather hard for Toby not to laugh at the astonishing contortions the canine had to go through just to write the four letters of his name.

Though when he finished, his signature was as neat as anyone's. "You can't imagine the practice that took," he told Toby and Piffle.

Junella didn't think it truly mattered, but she lifted George down so he could add his hoofprint as well.

"Will you be going directly to your rooms?" Lady Xenoiko asked. "Any luggage?"

"No and no," Junella replied. "Zinc volunteered us for dessert. And we'll be fine with what we've got on us."

It occurred to Toby that he had no clean clothes to change into tomorrow. Then again, did he need them? Any dirt seemed to disappear from his pajamas when he stopped noticing the stains.

"Have a lovely meal then," the feline wished her guests. The sextet began heading for the bar area. "And Zinc! Please try not to destroy the sheets this time!"

"I'll try!" he called back. To Toby and Piffle he said, "Fell asleep with my wrenches still bolted on once. Dreamt I was in a boxing match."

"I'm surprised the bed survived," Toby said.

***

Toby had expected the tables around the bar to be packed tight with grizzled, squinty-eyed adventurers, wearing viking helmets and bear pelts and guzzling down tankards of ale. And while there were a few who fit that description, most of the seats were filled with everyday citizens. A surprising amount of families too. The mouse noticed a waitress in a saloon outfit swish past with a tray full of silvery rocks on it. 'Was that a meal, or the leftovers of one?' he wondered.

The room was set up like the dining area of most restaurants, and continued the lobby's theme of carved wood and candlelight. Nearly every chair, booth and barstool had a butt on it, leading Toby to wonder if they'd have to order their meal to go and eat in their rooms. Luckily though, Zinc had already spotted a booth in the corner where the busboys were wiping the table and collecting their tips. He pinched Toby's pajama sleeve and led him through the chatty crowd.

Toby's attention was torn between not bumping into anyone and snatching glances at the bartender. It was a plant! The whole area behind the half-moon bar was filled in with dirt and a behemoth tangle of green was nestled in its center. The plant's vines snaked in all directions to pull bottles off shelves, mix drinks, refill baskets of pistachios or set out napkins. It had several bud-shaped 'heads' which customers were speaking to. Toby had no idea how it could hear or see them.

Zinc let Junella slip in first, then perched himself right on the edge of the leather seat so he could maneuver his wrenches around without knocking out her teeth. The booth itself had a wooden tabletop which was pockmarked and scratched from hundreds of diners over the decades. There was a hanging lantern overhead which gave off a pleasant yellow light. The color seemed to make Toby hungrier. He skootched in beside Piffle and she set Doll between them.

Toby noticed a medium-sized willwell at the end of the table, but no menus or condiments.

His mouth opened to ask about that, but Piffle tickled his chin shut. "It's a thoughtstaraunt, Toby!" she said. "Some places serve cooked food, some serve imaginite."

"That explains the rocks on the plates," he reasoned.

She nodded. "In a place like this, you don't order whatcha want, you order how much food you wanna eat. Then in the kitchen, they spray willpower over a chunk that size and bring it out. You look at it and turn it into whatever you'd like."

"Real smart business model for places that wanna save space by not stocking ingredients," Zinc interjected. "And it means the food's always good. Or as good as you can dream it."

Toby hadn't even thought about what he wanted until then, but in that moment he suddenly knew. Oh, he couldn't wait! He could taste it already! Though it occurred to him he didn't know whether someone else would cover this or if the checks would be separate. 'I'd better start practicing now,' Toby thought.

He looked down at his willwatch: a black plastic oval the size of a kiwifruit. It had a dial and a red line. Toby stared at the red line. To his surprise, he actually got it to wiggle on the first try. He pushed harder. It was more stubborn this time. Getting it to actually move was more difficult than it looked.

Piffle noticed his efforts. "Wanna tip? Try picturing your hand reaching in to yank on it. Or sometimes I like to imagine a lot of little mes inside, all working hard to make it move."

Toby imagined a team of tiny Tobys in construction hats, all shoving at the red line. That made a substantial difference. It wasn't flying around the dial yet, but it was at least moving. "Thanks, Piffle!" He pictured his construction crew adding ropes and pulleys. That helped too. It seemed that visualization worked better than sheer force alone.

Junella smirked at Toby being so excited to move the red needle a few inches. "Tricks like that only work so far. They'll get you to a point where you can buy groceries, but if you wanna be rich, you gotta develop yourself. How much will is in your soul?"

That took the wind out of Toby's sails. "So I'm destined to be a hobo then," he quipped.

Junella laughed, but with him, not at him. "Nah. It just takes practice. And I mean more than staring at your wrist until your eyes bug out. I mean like getting out in the world and bending it to your demands. Will comes from confidence, confidence comes from experience. Like I said earlier, you just need life to kick your ass a little. Then you'll start kicking back."

That sounded daunting and terrifying and impossible and... hopeful. "Thanks, Junella. I don't have much confidence in myself. But if other people say it, maybe I can convince myself to listen to them."

Junella simply nodded: 'That's how it is'.

Toby was just about to redouble his efforts at the willwatch, and Zinc was just about to ask about their mail, and Junella was just about to ask George if he'd rather stay in her scarf or run around the table, when their waitress showed up.

She was a potbellied rat with four arms and lipstick the color of a fresh bruise. "Goodeve'nin. My name's Sue and I'll be serving you tonight. How hungry are ya?"

Zinc barely waited for the end of the sentence. "Three pounds please!"

'Three pounds!?' Toby thought.

Sue wrote it down, then pointed her pen at Junella.

"I'm not that hungry. Just a pound for me."

Piffle was next. "Four pounds!"

Toby was dumbstruck. "Am I the only furson here who eats normal-sized meals!?"

Junella reached across the table to tap his hand. "This ain't Earth, remember? Calories don't exist. Might as well take advantage of it."

He hadn't considered that. Though it made perfect sense. If he could go for nearly two weeks on virtually nothing, the opposite ought to be true as well. "Allright then. Two pounds," he told the waitress. 'And if I don't finish it all I can ask for a doggy bag.'

"Ten total," Sue added up. She rustled around in her apron and placed napkin-wrapped silverware before each of them, plus straws.

"Do we order drinks separate?" Toby whispered to Piffle.

"Only if you wanna get zozzled."

He blinked.

"Ossified?"

He blinked again.

"Drunk?"

"Ohhh."

She tittered. "I haven't been here specific'ly, but it's probly like at Falcon's Feast. You can imagine yourself some beer if you wanna, but the bartender's even better at it. So most people order that. Otherwise, just picture milk or pop when you make your meal. I'm having a root beer float!"

"I don't think I've ever actually had one of those," Toby realized.

Piffle jostled his shoulder. "You should, you should!"

While the group waited for their food to arrive, Junella read Zinc's mind and got out the mail for them to both peruse. She was also about to ask George if he wanted to come down, but the pint-size horse was quite obviously luxuriating in the comfort of her fluffy scarf.

Toby went back to practicing with his willwatch, sometimes using visualizations, sometimes just testing how strong his inner strength was. Not very, he realized without surprise. Piffle supplied him with as many helpful hints and encouragements as she could think of.

Toby had managed to get the red line to go around the dial three times. "So is this enough to pay for my share of the food yet?"

Piffle tried hard not to giggle. "No, silly! Willwatches are just for practice. They don't store anything."

"Oh hell," Toby swore. "I'm gonna have to do this again when the bill comes?"

She squeezed his shoulder soothingly. "Don't worry. We'll help out. It's your first time, after all."

He put his hand on top of hers. "Thanks. And I really hope I can start contributing soon. Something! Anything! I feel like an infant you guys're all babysitting. I never stop with the questions, I'm always confused-"

Piffle lightly pinched his lips shut. "You hush. Everyone was like this for a while. Me especially! I almost talked Mommy's ears off asking her everything that popped into my head. And even if you can't help out right now, it's good that you want to. That's very selfless and thoughtful and kind of you."

Toby blushed so hard he thought he might melt. "That's... wow. Thank you. And you're all of those things too. Thank you for being so willing to help me out. And that reminds me," he said to Zinc, "you've explained a lot of stuff to me too. If I haven't said I'm grateful for that yet, I am."

"Ehh. I like to hear myself talk," the canine said modestly.

"I've told you stuff too," Junella pointed out, mock-offended.

"Yeah, but mostly you've just been an old grump," Toby dared to tease.

She grinned. "You're getting bolder, mouse."

"Oh hey!" Zinc spoke up. "You remember that thing with him hitting the moon with a paint can? I was gonna say earlier, I think I know how he did it."

Toby had nearly forgotten their incredulity over that. He was intrigued by the remote possibility he might have done something impressive.

Zinc pointed a wrenchtip at the mouse. "You said you knocked the wall over? It just fell over?"

Toby nodded. "I'm assuming that's uncommon."

Junella suddenly had a flash of insight into Zinc's thought process. "No, no, no; you are NOT gonna tell me you think he mindfucked it!"

"It fits the facts," the canine countered.

"WE couldn't do it on that scale!!" 

"Exactly my point. We have to try. He has no idea. Hence, odds are in his favor."

Junella stared up at the ceiling, her face showing that she knew her partner was exactly right but still not quite believing it.

Toby traced his finger on the tabletop. "At what point is someone gonna tell me what it is I did?"

Junella held up a finger. "If we do, you might not be able to do it again. Consider that. Besides, here comes the chow."

Toby was left once again in a state of bewilderment as Sue the waitrat returned and set down serving platters in front of them. In direct light, each chunk of imaginite was more white than silver, but had shimmering branches of iridescence running through. They reminded Toby of sea salt lamps.

Sue's many years of customer experience told her the albino was a rookie just from the way he looked at the nugget on his plate. "You know how this works, hon? That stuff'll turn into whatever you want, but it's volatile as heck at the moment. Be careful what you think at it. If you turn it into the wrong thing by mistake, there's no refunds."

Toby nodded to her. "I'll remember that." He tried not to make direct eye contact with his chunk for fear he might turn it into a goat head or an old boot by mistake. He decided to see how the others did it first.

Zinc wasted no time. He licked his chops, glowered commandingly at the imaginite, and turned it into a double chocolate layer cake with several scoops of caramel ice cream piled on top, plus a frosty tumbler full of milk. There had been no shimmer or sparks or smoke. One moment there was a rock on his plate, then reality seemed to wobble it out of existence and shove a minor mountain of dessert into its place.

"That does look good!" Piffle said as Zinc started digging in. "I might ask you for a bite later."

He winked and gnashed his teeth at her flirtatiously.

The hamsterfly giggled. She put her paws over her eyes, then concentrated for a moment. She took her hands away like playing peekaboo and made her four pounds of imaginite into a gleaming three-tiered glass stand crammed with dozens of cupcakes, every topping imaginable, in every color of the visible spectrum. Some were even shaped like animals or faces. It was a marvel to behold. The kind of display you'd see at the center of a championship baking competition. (Plus two tall root beer floats and a bowl of salty mixed nuts to clear the palate.)

Junella's jaw was nearly on the table.

Zinc whistled. "That's some imagination!!"

Piffle's mouth was too full of a cream-cheese-frosted carrot-and-currant cupcake with glittery green sugar on top to reply.

The skunkette, out of spite, turned her single pound of imaginite into a peanut butter milkshake, and a blue-frosted yellow cake shaped like a shark's head. It had white chocolate teeth and eyes, plus hard candy fingers in its strawberry maw.

"Both of those are creative," Toby said to Piffle and Junella, sensing competition between them.

The hamsterfly smiled appreciatively. The skunk 'hmmphed'.

Toby had no desire to top anyone else's treats. He knew exactly what he wanted and it was a snap to envision it sitting in front of him. He directed his will at the imaginite and it obligingly became a steaming bowl of split pea soup, with two grilled cheese sandwiches and a pickle on the side, along with a pitcher of icewater. The mouse leaned in close and inhaled the aroma of his soup. Every ounce of worry and tension faded away like magic. This was what heaven smelled like.

Zinc snorted. "Pea soup? We all get dessert and you get pea soup!?"

"Shut up," Toby shot back without conscious thought. His eyes were closed and he was lost in happiness. "You have your comfort foods, I have mine." He skimmed his spoon lightly across the surface of the bowl, capturing chunks of potato, ham and carrot, and brought it up to his mouth.

From the expression on his face, no one would have been surprised at that point to see the mouse slide out of his seat and fall into a blissful coma on the floor.

Toby tried a bite of the top sandwich. Magnificence. Exactly the right amount of melt to the cheese and burn on the bread. He took another sip of soup. There were no words for the flavor! He could feel the warmth slide all the way down his esophagus to his tummy. The texture of every ingredient was perfect. Toby felt himself transported back in time to his early childhood. Dinner at Grandma's house. She would start making her soup the night before and by the following day the whole house would smell good. Toby's memories of his grandmother had already begun to degrade, but he didn't think anything could erase the memory of her split pea soup.

George perked up at smelling such wonderful things. "Pardon me, Madam Brox. I don't believe I have ever actually eaten. At least, I wouldn't call biting panicked innocents 'eating'. Would you mind terribly if I were to sample some of your meal?"

"Go right ahead." She plucked him out of her scarf and set him down on the table. "Getcher nose right in there. I ain't afraid of horse germs."

"A thousand thanks," he replied, and happily plunged his face into the icing. He gobbled it up and swallowed. The mouthful traveled visibly down his throat and simply vanished somewhere around his midsection. "Oh my goodness! This flavor is overwhelming! I may need to lie down."

"You can try mine too," Piffle said. Zinc and Toby gestured to indicate the same offer. Toby normally would have been a bit grossed out by the idea of someone eating off his plate, but there was no denying that the sight of a teensy little horse trotting around the table and taking polite nibbles here and there was ridiculously adorable.

"I almost forgot!" Piffle reached over to pat Doll's hair apologetically. She held a red velvet cupcake to Doll's mouth-ish area. "Everyone look somewhere else so she can try to eat it."

Everyone did. Toby didn't have any trouble tuning out everything else but his soup.

When Piffle peeked, Doll had not so much eaten the cupcake as gotten it smeared all along the edges of her face-gouge. Lumps of frosting sat unswallowed in the bottom of her hollow head. "Oh dear. Didn't work, huh?"

She looked away so Doll could respond. N-O-F-O-O-D-4-M-E, and a :( were traced onto Piffle's thigh.

"Did it at least taste good?"

C-O-U-L-D-N-T-T-A-S-T-E-A-T-A-L-L

The thought that someone would be trapped in a form that was unable to appreciate cupcakes was so overwhelmingly sad it drove Piffle to tears. She scooped up Doll and hugged her tight, rocking back and forth and whispering promises to free her from such an unthinkable fate.

Toby reached over to pat Doll comfortingly too.

Junella tried to keep her face a blank, trying to not reveal how much seeing the hamstergirl hug that ratty, dirty, faceless thing creeped her the bejeezus out.

George was busy attempting to take a bite out of a brazil nut, which was proportionally as large as his ribcage.

Zinc just shoveled more warm cake and drippy ice cream into his mouth. "You givuh anfy fhought to whevver you wan' know my fheory 'r not?" he asked Toby, sending a spray of crumbs his way.

"'Scuse me?" Toby asked.

Zinc swallowed, then over-enunciated, "Have you given any thought to whether you want to hear my theory about you? Considering that, like Junebug said, it might jinx you."

Toby put down his spoon. "I hadn't, actually. But... I am really curious what you think. And knowledge is usually better than ignorance, right? If I have no idea what I did, I'm as likely to screw it up next time as to get it right."

Junella licked her lips. "That's hard to answer. See, it's all about your state of mind. And I hate admitting it, but Zinc's probably got it: you're such a blank slate, you're a natural."

"Okay, now my curiosity's hit the roof. You guys gotta tell me, whatever the consequences."

Junella looked over to Zinc. "You take this. I got frosting on my fingers and don't wanna end up lookin' like I'm covered in war paint."

"Righty-o." She already had a bit of pink on her forehead, which he declined to tell her about for amusement's sake. Zinc turned to Toby, still filling his mouth every other sentence. "Allright. The official-type term for it is 'dumbfounding'. But us common riffraff what ain't got no couth call it mindfucking." He paused a moment to figure out how much extra kaka he needed to lay out before he could explain the specifics. "Okay, we went over how no place in Phobiopolis is completely stable. There's uncertainty in the air everywhere. So if you're good at it, or if you're lucky, you can make it do things for you. Junella, would you kindly demonstrate on a three-count?"

"I'm still eating, but allright."

Zinc gave Toby a bigass grin. "Watch this. You're gonna like it. Three, two, one, DRAW!"

It was almost too fast too see. One moment Junella's hand was on her napkin, the next it was filled with silver and pointed at the wall directly above Toby's head. He squeaked loudly and ducked down. Junella, still nonchalantly chewing, had literally plucked a snub-nosed revolver out of thin air. Without even looking at it, she tucked it out of sight below the table, then revealed an empty hand.

Toby's eyes were as wide as two tomato slices. "That was incredible! I saw you do that with the mail earlier, but I thought my eyes must've been playing tricks on me. You can literally take things out of nowhere and put them back! WOW!!" (His squeak and exclamation had a few other diners swiveling in their seats to get a load of the greenhorn.)

Junella kept her cool exterior, but did smile a bit at having her skill appreciated.

"That's dumbfounding," Zinc said. "Remember back at my place when I pulled an egg outta the fridge? I didn't know it was in there. In fact, now that I think back, I'm pretty sure I ate the last of 'em Thursday. But it didn't matter 'cause when I reached in there, I knew I was gonna come out holding an egg. Because I wanted one. I didn't ask for it. I didn't order it to be there. I didn't even think about it. I just knew it was gonna be there and it was."

Toby began to grasp the concept. "It's like making things with imaginite, but without the imaginite."

Piffle extended a finger to help George climb up to the second tier of her cupcake tree.

Zinc shook his head. "Close but not quite. Imaginite's way easier and way more reliable. Plus, the two methods work in opposite directions. To make something outta imaginite, you concentrate. To mindfuck something, you gotta have no idea you're doing it. No conscious thought."

"That's gotta be difficult," Toby remarked.

Zinc made a 'you ain't kiddin'' snort. "Ever heard the old 'Don't think of a polar bear' routine? S'like that. Obviously Juney and I can do it in some situations, but it takes practice like you wouldn't believe. You gotta clear away ANY hesitation between wanting something and getting it. You're basically just assuming somethin's already there for you to take, and your chutzpah fools the world into agreeing with you."

Junella took a sip of milkshake. "Like when Zinc says draw, I draw. Reflex." (Toby noticed she could still reply with her mouth closed, which made sense.)

"That happens to me a lot!" Piffle said. "If I wake up in the morning all smudgy and blinky, I'll reach out for my skirt and it'll be where my hand lands. I didn't know there was a name for it." She frowned. "I wonder if it'll stop now that I'll be expecting it?"

Toby could easily understand just how tenuous this ability would be. "Allright, I think I get it, but how does this relate to me? I didn't make anything. The paint can was already lying there."

Zinc grinned. "What you did, you fantastic sonofabitch, is to figure out a completely new way of getting out of Trapforest Path. See, the normal way out is to find the edge at either end, then wiggle your way around it. Either find a tree you can squeeze your way past, or climb up and over. I've never heard of someone knocking the wall down before! So however the hell you did it, you must've assumed it was the most logical solution, and went for it without any doubt."

Toby chuckled. "Kinda. Doll gave me a hint about the moon; I guess I misinterpreted it. But I figured if I could hit it with something, I'd get out. Like ringing the bell at the top of a test-your-strength game. It just felt right."

"Use that," Zinc urged, pointing at him. "If we're stuck in some shit later on, and you get an idea how to get us out, ignore anything we say and just do it. But it's gotta come from your gut, not your head. And No Hesitation."

"I have no idea if I'd ever be able to pull off something like that again," Toby admitted. On a whim, he reached out to pluck an ace of spades out of the air. But all his fingertips touched was each other. "I'll have to practice that."

Zinc scooped up another monumental forkful of cake and disappeared it in one gulp. "Try it when you're distracted," he recommended. "Pop on some music, do math in your head, run around in circles. Get your mind doing something else, then pounce."

Toby nodded. He took another slurp of soup (It was even staying at the perfect temperature!) and considered possibilities. He looked down at his willwatch. He kept the little oval in the center of his vision while his other hand supplied soup and sandwich to his mouth. He focused again on the red line. Energized by this discussion of his moon solution, he found it slightly easier to push now.

Zinc caught on to Toby's plan and motioned for the others to go back to their desserts. He did too, but occasionally glanced back at the mouse. He watched Toby drill his gaze into the willwatch while chewing furiously. Then the mouse's paw suddenly darted out. It caught air this time too. But it had moved with less hesitation.

Toby let the noise of the other customers chewing and conversing recede. He let himself forget his companions. All that mattered was his meal and his wrist. He let his tongue bask in the nostalgic warmth of his soup. It brought him back to better times, before he was confined to his room. Back when his mother still let him eat normal foods. And leave the house, and go to school. Without realizing it, a spark of resentment was added to his efforts to move the willwatch's red line. If he really, really concentrated, he could keep it moving at a steady pace. He envisioned his team of Tobys chaining a bunch of bulldozers to it and gunning the engines. Toby's vision narrowed in. Only the window of the willwatch existed. He let himself hear each tiny Toby shouting to the others. He let himself hear the rumbling engines and see their billowing black exhaust. His jaw cranked up and down. There was no distinct flavor in his mouth anymore: the tastes transitioned directly to emotion. It was a clashing set of feelings at first. Comforting calmness from his food, frustrating exertion from the willwatch. But soon they mingled together. The positive emotions he felt from his memory-rich soup turned into encouragement. Every sip or bite felt like it was cheering him on. Toby did not notice the beads of sweat trickling down his forehead, not even when they landed in his bowl. The red line was still moving mockingly slow, but it was moving. That was important. If Toby had reached his limit of speeding it up, at least he could stop it from slowing down.

Everyone else at the table had gone silent, just watching what was happening with expressions of disbelief or amazement.

"Toby..." Piffle whispered.

"Huh?" He looked over at her, then blinked several times as his vision readjusted after focusing on something so close up.

Piffle pointed at the tabletop.

Toby's head turned, and he felt time freeze when he saw a small pile of aces laying there.

*****

CHAPTER TWENTY

Despite trying several more times during the course of that night, Toby was unable to produce any more cards. Even when he tried focusing on the willwatch again. He couldn't banish his conscious expectations. Still, nine cards! Not bad at all! At least it proved it was possible. And if he could do it once, he could learn how to do it again. The others all congratulated him for his feat, though Junella teased it was just beginner's luck. She reached out to grab an ace herself, and failed. The look on her face was priceless.

Time passed. The customers around them rotated in and out, the desserts dwindled, and everyone sampled everyone else's treats at least once. By the time they'd gotten down to scraping the plates, they were all slightly zozzled just from the pleasant sleepiness of being so full. Toby had licked all around the edge of his soup bowl, seeking out every last drop of the green ambrosia. Piffle's glass display now showcased nothing but crumbs. Zinc's area was a massacre of melted ice cream and chocolate. Junella had actually been quite dainty about finishing her meal while keeping everything tidy (though she still had the little pink smear on her forehead). George was lying on his side in the middle of the table, ribs noticeably wider apart, happily passed out and snoring tiny snores. Doll was back to still-needing-a-bath-but-not-as-much-as-before thanks to Piffle and an army of wet naps.

Toby took a moment just to quietly appreciate the comradely feeling of the moment. He hadn't known any of these people longer than a day, and they'd only been introduced to one another mere hours ago. Yet somehow, he could feel them all clicking together. Their banter was becoming breezier. They tolerated one another's personality peccadilloes more easily.

'I barely remember having friends,' Toby realized. 'I mean, I remember having them. I remember Eric and Erica next door. Justin, Nick and Brandon at school. But all I know are their faces, their names. I'm aware that we were friends but not what it felt like. And I don't think this is that memory-fading thing happening again. I think those memories were already gone. How many years did I spend in that bedroom, away from everyone else?'

He looked around the table at these strange companions that had fallen into his orbit. And he realized there was a part of him, even now, that wouldn't mind so much if he got to Anasarca and found out he couldn't go home. Even with all the gut-wrenching fear he'd been through so far, being with people he could trust made it... bearable. Almost.

'Still, this isn't really a friendship. I'm paying Junella and Zinc to be my taxi service. I can't expect them to just protect me forever after that. Piffle might not mind me hanging around though...'

After laughing at Zinc's joke about the hot rodder befuddling a traffic cop, Piffle looked to the side and noticed Toby's thoughtful expression. "Hey. You've been quiet for a while, Toby."

"I'm just sleepy, I guess," he lied.

Junella patted her round belly with a bongo sound. "We all are. Time to head to bed, agreed?"

Zinc shifted in his seat. His stomach groaned and he did too. "Yeah, it's been fun just shooting the shit, but if we don't leave at this point, they'll probably have to roll us to our rooms."

Toby chuckled at the mental image. "So what time are we getting up tomorrow?"

Junella and Zinc shared a quick 'Let's let him find that out for himself' grin. "Oh don't you worry about that," she sang. By now the thoughtstaraunt's crowd had thinned out a fair amount. Junella was able to spot Sue fairly easily and hail her. "Check please!"

To the skunk's surprise, the ratfemme nodded in acknowledgment to her, but then turned away towards the lobby.

Toby made an educated guess that Junella was asking for Sue to tell the willwell on the table how much they owed. The mouse was somewhat eager to try paying for his share. Eager but nervous. He'd gotten only marginally better with the willwatch so far, and he also guessed that moving the red line on a real willwell would be proportionally difficult to how much you owed.

A moment later, Lady Xenoiko herself sauntered into view. Toby was re-amazed by her sharp colors and contrasts. "Good evening to all. From the look of your plates I gather you imagined yourself up a fine repast?"

Zinc opened his mouth to reply, and a burp came out.

The housecatiger smiled sweetly. "The truest and most efficient response."

The mutt grinned and suppressed a second one. And a third.

Xenoiko looked around the table. "Do any of you know a small green fellow named Spiretto Bronze?"

"Yeah! We helped him get inside the city before the big box closed up," Piffle said. "Well, mostly Zinc did. I just watched."

The canine flexed his wrenches at her, making her titter.

Xenoiko nodded. "He and his sons came in earlier to ask about you. He said he was in a hurry, but that he wanted to extend his thanks to you all. As such, when I mentioned you were attending to foodstuffs, he offered to take care of your bill."

Everyone perked up at that. "That was nice of him!" Toby said.

"He wanted to pay off your room as well," the feline added. "And would have if I hadn't stopped him for his own good! The poor, determined dear, grunting and snorting, straining himself to bursting just to fill up the willwell for your food. Such loyalty is a commendable virtue."

Zinc agreed. "Too bad he didn't stick around. I woulda thanked him proper."

"So, you may retire to your room whenever you like. Everything's finished up and ready." She paused, then pouted, turning her kitty side towards them for emphasis. "...Though I must admit disappointment. I'd been hoping I could convince you to pay for your meal in our more direct manner. I've been feeling lightheaded all day."

Toby aimed a 'What's she talking about?' look at Junella.

Lady Xenoiko caught it first. "I hope this does not put a sour taste in your mouth, innocent traveler, but some of us in Phobiopolis have certain... dietary requirements."

"Ohhh. Like Mr. Trachea," Toby acknowledged.

Her whiskers bounced. "Good! You know of him! This will be so much easier to explain. You see, he needs breath. I," she touched her lips, "need blood." Toby was just about to open his mouth and say that silly V-word when she hushed him with a fingertip. "None of that. I need a specific type. My condition is unique to only two people: myself."

Zinc was already pulling his shirt up, revealing his sandy chestfur and sending crumbs flying. "Welp, Mrs. X, you've been good to us before, so I don't see any reason not to do you a favor now. C'mon. Take yourself another piece of me."

Lady Xenoiko lit up. "Dear Zinc! Many, many thanks! Once again you prove to me that your rough exterior hides an honorable heart."

His tail wagged a bit.

She leaned in closer, seeming to stretch herself across the table like taffy. Her eyes bored into his. "...Which, since you have given permission, I shall help myself to."

Her teeth reflected in his eyes. She salivated.

In a flash of orange, her tiger paw shot out to cover his face. This was a reflexive movement to steady her aim and muffle any screams. Her housecat paw shaped itself into a dart and, with little effort, plunged through the skin and ribs of Zinc's right pectoral. In less than a second, his gushing red heart was in her paw.

Toby's eyes were very, very big. He immediately reached out to grab Piffle. He held on tight as he watched. He bit his lip to keep himself silent, while inwardly reminding himself, repeatedly, that Zinc obviously knew what was coming and that this was survivable.

It didn't look like it though. The canine's eyes were rolled back and the weight of his wrenches slid him down the seat in a slump. The wound in his chest was big around as a softball.

Lady Xenoiko held her dazzling red prize up to the light. Zinc's blood dripped in tiny rivers down her milk-white fur. Her smile was one of overjoyed satisfaction, which doubled in size when she brought the strawberry-shaped organ to her mouth and sucked it dry in a single gulp. The heart turned from deep crimson to clear cartilage in seconds.

Toby was paralyzed, watching in tingling horror as Lady Xenoiko set the little deflated bag on Zinc's plate. The tableau was almost artistic.

Junella had observed her partner's temporary death with bemusement. "Still hungry, hon?" she asked the innkeeper.

Xenoiko licked her lips and fingers. Her arm was cleaning itself; absorbing every last precious red cell. "Always and forever, dear. Are you offering too?"

"Sure. Just watch out for my scarf." She tucked the ends of it behind her just in case.

'Is this an everyday thing?!', Toby wondered. 'Letting people EAT you? Geez, maybe this is why no one was bothered much by Piffle being a luau roast.' His revulsion was ebbing a bit, aided by Junella's nonchalance (and not looking over at Zinc's- oh lord, he'd looked again). If the skunk considered this normal, Toby was willing to trust her and keep his discomfort unspoken.

He cringed and hid his eyes as he heard the hollow crack of Xenoiko punching through Junella's outer shell. But curiosity overwhelmed him. Was she vinyl on the inside too? He peeked through his fingers.

With all the gentle care of removing a baby from its cradle, Lady Xenoiko plucked her friend's heart from her chest. It was a little difficult with Junella, since one could never tell where exactly the heart might be.

Toby's disgust turned to fascination. Junella had a hole in her chest like a cracked window. No, actually it looked exactly like smashing a hole in a hollow chocolate Easter bunny. Inside, the skunk was almost completely liquid. Black ichor, the consistency of candle wax, poured out of the hole and oozed from the midnight heart Xenoiko was holding.

The feline touched the onyx organ to her lips and drew in its essence. As before with Zinc, she drained it swiftly, leaving a transparent shell the color of smoky glass. "Mmmmm! Always such an unexpected flavor. Nourishing, yet with the slightest trace of poison. I know you're not alive to hear it, dear, but I always look forward to your heart."

Piffle's interest was wholly captivated. "Would you like to try mine too?" she asked, her voice trembling a little in excitement.

Toby was surprised and yet not surprised by this. He held the hamster's paw a little tighter.

The black blood vanished from Lady Xenoiko's mouth as she turned to give Piffle a bright, grateful smile. "What have I done to deserve such good fortune! I am feasting tonight! Thank you so kindly, Miss McPerricone. I haven't even gotten to know you yet."

Piffle blushed. "Well, I like to try new things. And I'm curious how you'll think I taste." She started to undo the buttons on her blouse. "Sorry if my exoskeleton gives you any trouble."

"I've fed on rock monsters before," Xenoiko assured.

Piffle fiddled with her buttons. "D'you mind if I ask why you need hearts?"

The feline nodded, but her smile was melancholy. "You have every right to ask." She sighed. "I have been here many years, and was not always an honest businesswoman. My earlier self was jealous of power, petrified by the fear of someone mightier taking advantage. In many ways I was like your friend Junella. But she came to her senses sooner, whereas I went further down the path into darkness. Aldridge is only a legend to most people now, but long ago there were many like him who were capable of weaving and twisting the fabric of this land to their will. I asked Miss Tarrare, a particularly powerful sorceress, for greater strength, so my enemies could never threaten me again. She gave me exactly what I wanted. And then the cravings came, for the kind of prize you've seen me take already. Suffice to say, for a time I was a monster as cruel as those in any fairytale. If my husband hadn't tamed me, I'd be that still."

"Tamed you?" Piffle asked, having finally gotten her abdomen exposed.

Lady Xenoiko's smile changed to pure fondness. "Yes, at the time he considered himself a demonslayer. I certainly fit the bill. He outwitted me, defeated me utterly, and in doing so forced me to confront what I had become. In gratitude, I begged him for forgiveness. He gave it. We soon became happy together."

Piffle swooned. "Aww! That's so romantic!"

"That is why I chose the form you see." Xenoiko gestured with both hands along her halves. "To represent the civilized woman I aspire to be, and the beast I must never forget I still hold at bay."

She reached forward with her housecat paw. She could hear Piffle's heartbeat. Could smell it inside of her. "And now... It is a special treat for me to drink from a heart I have never tasted before."

Piffle blushed and trembled as that gentle, snowy paw rested on her forehead. "Go ahead," she whispered.

A gurgle escaped Zinc's mouth. His eyes blinked out of sync as he came to, just in time to see Lady Xenoiko take a mighty swipe with her tiger paw into the hamsterfly's chest. The verdant exoskeleton shattered like a lightbulb. Zinc flinched as a fleck of shrapnel pinged off his nose.

Piffle exhaled softly.

Toby suddenly found the wall directly opposite from him very, very interesting. He kept his gaze nailed to it as he listened to the wet sounds happening just beside him. He squeezed Piffle's paw and felt the pulse inside it slow to a stop.

A slurp. The sound of something empty and moist being placed on a plate. Lady Xenoiko chuckled warmly at the stricken expression on the mouse's face. She wiped her mouth with two fingers. "This is a bit much for you to take in, isn't it?"

Toby was still super-duper interested in staring at that wall. "You could say that."

A purr. "You're handling it well though. And you have my assurance, they'll be fine. Wouldn't I be out of business in a week if I couldn't stop killing my customers?"

Toby weakly laughed. It sounded like an accordion being poked. "I don't doubt that. It's just... hard to sit through. But I figure, I'll probably be dealing with worse later on. Better to just tough it out now, right?"

"Intelligent," she commended. "Do I dare have the faintest hope that maybe you'll be bold enough to offer your heart to me too?" She intruded her face into Toby's view. Those yellow eyes were nearly irresistible.

Toby put on a hideously fake polite smile. "I... hate to be rude, but..."

Lady Xenoiko tipped back her head and laughed. "I didn't honestly expect you to! It's allright, dear mouse! Maybe I can convince you someday. After all, why do you think so many of us with special requirements go into business? Trachea, Velvet, Ballad, myself? It's hard on the legs and the conscience to constantly chase down victims and take from them. It's a much more stable and enjoyable life to settle down and receive what you need in trade. And besides, persuasion..." she traced a clawed finger down his cheek, "...works so much better than force. Don't you think?"

Toby was surprised to find that part of him felt compelled to agree to whatever this beguiling furson requested. But then simple primal instinct slapped him across the face and reminded him that in no way shape or form was he mentally ready to allow anyone, no matter their skill in salesmanship, to rip any bodily organs out of him. "Maybe next time?" he said with a quiver in his voice.

Lady Xenoiko nodded and did not push further. The matter was settled. She knew exactly what buttons to press and also when to stop pressing them. "I understand. Though please, do me a favor and tell Piffle when she wakes up that she was as sweet as a summer peach."

"I think she'll appreciate that," Toby said. And felt strong relief when their hostess nodded goodnight to everyone (including the groggy-but-again-alive Junella) and headed back to the lobby. Her tail swayed like a poem behind her.

Zinc watched her departure too. "Man, she does that good!"

Toby still felt a bit dizzy. "Which part? Killing you!?"

The canine nodded. He had his wrench-arm around Junella, helping her to sit up. "Exactamundo! In our line of work, dyin's just a part of the job. You get to recognize certain... flavors of it. Some are a lot worse than others. Some ain't half bad." His grin was unambiguously randy.

Junella traced her fingers around the hole in her chest that was rapidly sealing up. Her waxy filling flowed back up inside her. She nodded to Toby in agreement with her partner, still too out of it to find the right words on her body.

Piffle, by contrast, suddenly came fully awake with a loud, "WOWEE!!"

Toby was so startled he accidentally looked at what Lady Xenoiko had done to Piffle's chest. His face greened.

"That was neat!!" the hamsterfly said, wobbling in punch-drunk cheerfulness."And boy did she make a mess of me! I look like a cracked egg!"

"Could you fix that up please!?" Toby wailed with his head under the table.

***

Despite the mixture of quease, drowsiness and tummy-fullness Toby was feeling, he did indeed remember to pass along Lady Xenoiko's compliment to Piffle. As expected, the hamsterfly was ecstatic.

Zinc and Toby both stood up to stretch and to allow the ladies to skootch out of the booth. Piffle quickly buttoned her blouse back up and pulled Doll to her side in another hug. Junella roused George, who came out of his deep dream so suddenly he snorted a pea-sized fireball.

Junella led the group past the thoughtstaurant's mostly-empty tables to the big staircase in the lobby. Lady Xenoiko was busy trying to find a room for an owl and gazelle couple, but found time to send them a goodnight wave. Toby waved back. He let his mind wonder for a moment what it would feel like to allow her to harvest his heart. The others hadn't seemed to feel any significant pain from it.

The staircase creaked quietly in time with their footsteps. Toby liked the feel of the smooth railing. He noticed that all the posts were carved into various mythical creatures, posed like they were flying or swimming. He also noticed Zinc burping every few seconds. Junella did too, but hers were perfectly soundless.

When they reached the second floor landing, Toby's gaze was drawn to a massive portrait hanging there. The heavy gold frame was a work of art by itself, but the painting within it was a clear labor of love. In it, Mr. and Mrs. Xenoiko were posed sitting together, smiling towards the artist and holding each other's hands. Their gold bands were prominently visible. The feline femme looked as if she were still in disbelief at the happiness she was feeling. To Toby's surprise, her husband was about half her height and looked twice her age. He was a wizened little monkey, a marmoset perhaps, with big eyes, bigger eyeglasses, and a beard that nearly drowned his face. He was grinning explosively. Like he could barely restrain himself from shouting to all the world how lucky he was.

As Toby drew closer, he saw an engraved message beneath the pair:

	STILL THE BEST
		1973

'Wow...' Toby thought. They'd been married for that long? He remembered how people aged in Phobiopolis. Their appearance only indicated the minimum amount of time since their arrival. So Mr. Xenoiko had lived a whole lifetime here. Who knew how long he'd lived on Earth before that? Lady Xenoiko seemed at least forty. Sue the waitress too. And there was no telling Junella and Zinc's real ages. They were both clearly experienced in the ways of this world, but might have chosen to stay as teenagers for the advantages of a young, agile body.

Toby tried to imagine himself if he never made it home. Greying fur. Wrinkles. Maybe walking with a cane...

"Yo, mouse! You forgot how to move your feet!?" Junella shouted.

Toby squeaked. His friends were all the way at the end of the hall. He hustled to catch up.

Junella checked the number on the door against the key in her hand. She waited for Toby to rejoin them, then turned the knob.

Toby peeked cautiously inside. He wasn't exactly afraid, considering how nice the rest of the hotel was, but he nevertheless prepared himself for weirdness. Thankfully, there was very little of it. The room was quite cozy. Rather small for four though.

There were two beds in the main room, facing each other at opposite walls. They looked comfy enough. Dreamcatchers hung over both of them: natch. The walls were wood (and still moving, Toby noticed with a wince), the curtains were maroon, and the lanterns gave off soft, golden gaslight.

Piffle headed straightaway to the bathroom. "I'm gonna give Doll a good scrubbing! Does anyone need to do their business first?" When no one objected, she smiled and turned on the sink. Soon she was happily humming while shampooing Doll top to bottom.

Toby sat down on one of the beds and bounced a bit to test its firmness. A shiver went through him at how cushy it felt. He looked over at the other one. "Um, are we doubling up?" As much as he trusted his companions, the thought of sleeping in the same bed as any one of them was uncomfortable.

Junella swatted his arm and pointed to the ceiling.

"Oh!" said Toby.

The room was its own horizontal reflection. Attached to the ceiling were two more identical beds, with identical lanterns and bedside drawers beside them.

"I call one of the batbeds!" Zinc shouted.

Junella rapped him on the nose like a stern schoolteacher. "No way. I'm not taking any chance you'll get startled and Pinchies One and Two'll fall down and kill whoever's sleeping underneath."

Zinc folded his arms. "Yes, dear," he snarked

"'Sides, I'm better at getting up to 'em." The skunk walked over to the wall and put her palms against it. Carefully, she raised one foot and touched it to the wall too. Then, like a gymnastic trick, she shoved off against the floor and managed to land four-footed on the vertical surface. Toby gawped as he watched her crawl up towards the second set of beds, then gravity seemed to pull her around so her feet connected to the ceiling.

Before the mouse could say anything, Junella called down, "And you're staying on the ground too, Toby! Same reason. I don't want you to get spooked and fall up onto someone tomorrow morning." She took off her scarf and piled it carefully on the floor beside the dresser. The hotel staff had indeed prepared a dollhouse bed for George. He trotted in circles around it for a few moments in sheer glee.

Toby's attention was pulled away by a large CLANK. Zinc, yawning, had unbolted one of his wrench-arms and let it fall to the floor. "Do you need any help with the other one?" the mouse offered.

"No, but thanks. I got it." He gave his shoulder a twitch and his remaining arm detached, clattering onto its brother. Zinc then padded over to the bathroom, made Piffle giggle, and returned with a glass of water in his mouth. He set it on the table beside his bed and leaned over it. With two little 'plop' sounds, his eyeballs did a high dive into the glass.

He grinned at Toby. "Gotta keep 'em moist."

Seeing the canine sans eyes made Toby's stomach roll over. "Ugh. Do you do that every night? And why don't they dry out during the day then?"

Zinc paused. "...Shit. I hadn't thought about that. You broke my suspension of disbelief, chief! I have no idea if I'm gonna have to start squeegeeing 'em now!"

Toby's ears drooped regretfully. "I'm sorry, I had no idea. I didn't mean to inconvenience you..."

That grin again. "You'll believe anything I say, won't you?" He snorted a laugh.

Toby tried to look unamused.

Unable to pat him on the shoulder, Zinc came over to sort of bump into Toby in a friendly way. "The real answer is, this is my bod and it does what I want it to. I just put away my eyes submarine-style when I sleep 'cuz it's comfier that way." He leaned over the dresser to disengage the metal lid over his half-dome. It rattled for a second like a spinning quarter. Zinc was now perfectly nude from the bridge of the nose up. He stood on one foot briefly to scratch at his headwound with a toeclaw.

Toby wished he could look away but his brain wasn't obeying.

"In case you're wondering how I wipe my ass, that's covered too," Zinc added. "I just don't! Got a big ol' phillips head screw up my tailpipe."

Toby narrowed his eyes. "I'm pretty sure you're messing with me now."

The canine cackled. "Home run, ace! You're startin' to catch on!" Also with his foot, Zinc pulled off his jacket, shirt and shorts. He then pulled the covers back and sat down.

Toby was impressed at how adroit he was with his toes, but was surprised when the canine slipped into a pair of slippers provided by the hotel staff.

Despite his lack of eyes, Zinc was not blind. After all, they could still see from within the glass, though the room now appeared to be underwater. "Classy joint like this probably doesn't have 'em, but most folks in Phobiopolis wear some kinda footwear to bed to keep out the footweevils."

Toby winced at what the name implied. "You're not trying to fool me a third time?"

Zinc chuckled and shook his head. "Scout's honor. They're nasty little bugs that drill into the soles of your feet while you sleep. Breed like crazy. Like I said, I'm sure Mrs. X can keep 'em out, but most people put on protection automatically. Just in case."

Toby looked around the sides of his bed and was very glad to see his own pair of slippers there. They were on his feet in less time than it takes to tell it. "Is that where the holes in your feet came from?" he asked, remembering seeing them earlier.

"Ha! Nope. Those're part of my original design. You'll see why later if you're lucky."

"Allright then." Toby was about to settle under the covers himself when he had an idea. He realized his earlier sleepiness had been chased away by the alarming sight of his friends losing their hearts, and he thought he might take a little time to practice reading. "Do either of you mind if I leave the light on for a while? I'll dim it."

Zinc said he didn't. Junella was already asleep.

Toby went to the bathroom. Piffle had Doll covered head to toe in bubbles.

"I'm kinda glad you can't taste anything," she told the toy. "I don't hafta worry about getting soap in your mouth. My teacher used to punish me with that. Blechh!"

"You're looking a lot better, Doll," Toby complimented.

Piffle beamed. "I'm real happy with how much of the dirt's come out! I'd thought we might have to take her to a toy restoration place, but I think I can get her looking good as new myself with just a bit more scrubbing. Plus a needle and thread." She noticed Doll's lack of a face. "Oh. Well, I'll fix that somehow too."

"Piffle," Toby asked, "I saw you pick up a bunch of pamphlets in the lobby earlier. Do you mind if I borrow them?"

"Sure! Go right ahead!" She was about to reach for them, then realized she was sudsy up to the elbows. "They're in my left pocket. I trust you to fish for 'em." She bumped her hips in Toby's direction with a flirty wink.

Toby gulped. He reached towards the paper with the careful touch of defusing a bomb. He certainly didn't want to do anything improper.

"Just grab 'em, silly!" she urged.

His cheeks were coral pink. He managed to slip the pamphlets out without actually touching any part of Piffle's outfit or anatomy. She looked disappointed.

"Goodnight kiss?" she asked.

Toby's whole body flinched.

She snickered. "Just on the cheek. I don't expect us to go steady yet."

Quivering a bit, Toby leaned in, touched his lips to her fur for a microsecond, then sped out of the bathroom and under his covers.

Piffle giggled so hard she got a soap bubble up her nose.

His cheeks felt like two little stove burners, but he was smiling despite that. Toby had at least some small knowledge of social interaction, but his mom had yanked him out of school long before his interest in girls manifested. His only interactions with the opposite sex had been nurses, doctors and the actresses on TV. He was mortified of doing or saying the wrong thing when it came to romance. But kissing Piffle had felt nice...

He opened a pamphlet and let it divert his attention.

As it turned out, he'd picked a good one to start with. It was about Coryza's town history. Just from the pictures, Toby learned that there was a gigantic protective pentagram painted across all the city's rooftops, visible only from a bird's eye view. There were other photos showing workers willing huge chunks of imaginite into becoming the city's metal walls. Once again, the words on the page were jumping around and not behaving themselves, but Toby concentrated hard and whipped them into shape.

Several minutes later, the sound of running water stopped. Piffle emerged soon after, drying Doll off with a fluffy towel. "Goodnight, everyone!" she sing-songed.

Zinc mumbled something with his face smershed into his pillow. Junella said nothing. "Sleep well, Madam McPerricone," George called down.

Piffle blew him a kiss, then gave one to Toby too.

He pulled his pamphlet closer to his face. Then risked a smiling glance over the edge.

She winked at him. Her shimmering wings spread out and she flew up to her bed, somersaulting in midair and landing gracefully. Soon she was changed into a pink onesie with lacy hems and had Doll tucked under the covers beside her. She reached up to turn down her lamp, leaving Toby's small flame the only light in the room.

Aside from Zinc's breathing, the room was now as silent as it was dark.

Toby had another reason for staying awake. He hadn't slept since exhaustion had driven him to it the day before, but now he remembered his awful nights in the cave. He didn't think his sleep would be so fitful and troubled now, but he worried nonetheless.

The little flame flickered, dancing to and fro inside the lantern beside Toby's head. His ears perked up at every sound. Every creak of settling wood and every car horn toot outside. He didn't think anything would bother him here. This room felt safer than any other place he'd been so far. And his braver companions were mere feet away.

Still...

There were those foot-bugs Zinc had mentioned. And what if he dreamed? He didn't think he had before, but on George's back he was simply too tired to, and in the caves he hadn't slept deeply enough. This was a land made of nightmares. So what could the nightmares here possibly be like? Would they be as bad as they were when he was alive, but constant? Would there be nothing but good dreams, since all the bad ones were out roaming the countryside? Or would the bad dreams be even badder? Nerve-rattling inescapable terror that would last the whole night long?

He was glad he had the brochures as an excuse. He did want to re-learn how to read. But what he really wanted, and was too embarrassed to say, was a nite-lite.

Toby went through as many brochures as he could, reading about museums and festivals and swap meets, until his vision grew too blurry to focus anymore. His eyelids weighed about a pound apiece. He could feel them scrape against his irises with every blink.

The little mouse fell asleep exactly like that: halfway sat up, paper spilling from his hands, with lamplight flickering across his whiskers.

*****

CHAPTER TWENTYONE

One possibly Toby hadn't considered was that he might not dream at all. Or rather, that his dream and his reality would be exactly the same. All night long, he simply saw a sleeping mouse, sitting up in bed and slightly snoring. It wasn't like he was present enough to try to help himself lie down or put the pamphlets on the dresser. He was merely aware. The heavy warmth and clean smell of his blankets, the paper in his paw, the room's air on his ears. There was no sense of time passing. Hours melted into one another and Toby only experienced a floating, comfortable 'now'-ness.

He was content. He felt at home. This was familiar, normal. Dozing away in a cozy bed. He would have been perfectly fine with staying here all-

WHANNNGGGGGG

Toby woke up screaming and flung pamphlets everywhere.

As Junella had predicted someone would, George was so startled by the tidal wave of noise that he kicked at his sheets, fell straight up, pinged off Toby's dresser and landed in Zinc's pants.

Piffle was alarmed as well, but being a flyer, managed to keep herself on the ceiling. Junella, an old pro, merely smacked her lips as she hauled herself vertical.

Zinc yawned so wide it looked like his upper jaw was going to fold back and fall off.

Toby had his hand over his heart, trying to convince it not to go into cardiac arrest. What Was That Noise!? It was like a thousand cannons being shot off! He looked out the window, expecting sunshine, but it was somehow still night. He could see the moon and the stars and...

He groaned. Obviously. The Coryzan walls clanged when they closed, and whanged when they opened up again in the morning. He bet almost everyone in town all woke up at exactly the same time every day. He wondered how many years you'd have to spend here before sleeping through it was possible.

Toby very much wished he could ask the others to just go about their business and let him sleep another twelve or thirteen hours. His eyes were gummy and blurry. The shock of being blasted awake had already worn off, but he couldn't imagine anything feeling better than returning to the warm cocoon of his blankets.

The others were the opposite. Zinc reassembled himself in less time than seemed possible and darted to the bathroom for a refreshing piss. Junella stood up to stretch, then started brushing bedfuzz from her grooves (resulting in such amusing phrases as, "you don't flowerpot", "my pistol's drunk again", and "I can't stop eating your tail".) Piffle was buzzing around the center of the room, greatly entertained by how the gravity would change with each parabola she made.

Junella got a firm grip on her bedpost and vaulted off, through the center of Piffle's flightpath, landing perfectly on the carpet above her. She advised Toby and Piffle to hurry up, since the breakfast buffet would be open in a few minutes and the best chunks of imaginite would go quickly, leaving just pebbles for stragglers. Piffle somehow managed to change back into her sailor suit in mid-flight. She was standing by Junella with Doll under her arm in seconds.

Toby was definitely more sleepy than hungry. He asked Junella if they could go on ahead, save him a plate, and let him rest another fifteen minutes. He saw the skunk readying for a snarl, but then it turned into an evil smirk. "Fifteen minutes?" she asked. "You sure?" He didn't like the way she was asking, but the bed was simply too seductive.

On the wall was a metal speaker with two buttons below it. Junella walked over, whispered into it a bit, then smiled with great schadenfreude.

Soon the room was peacefully empty again. The sounds of the city coming awake outside were like a lullaby to Toby, and he was soon blissfully back in slumberland.

Fifteen minutes passed.

Toby did not get a good look at the thing that materialized at the foot of his bed, but he knew it had a lot of eyes and drool and it was shrieking like thirty-five cats getting microwaved. He was up and down the hall in two seconds.

He was very glad to be in a land where no one minded him wearing just pajamas. He was also very glad the pants were self-cleaning...

***

Breakfast was good. The others hadn't teased him too much about the alarm clock, and they had indeed saved a plate of imaginite for him. Toby knew he could have transformed it into any food on Earth or beyond, but his brain was still a little fuzzy for adventurous thinking. He made himself a plateful of scrambled eggs, toast, and white grape juice. By contrast, Piffle made herself a miniature merry-go-round where the horsies were all made of meats, cheeses or fruits. (George investigated and Piffle nearly swallowed him by accident.)

Over the meal, plans for the day were made. Junella decreed that they should split up to run some errands first, then meet back at the hotel for some sightseeing and general wandering about. The skunk said she knew damn well Zinc wanted to drop in on Dorster again, so he should take Toby with him and get the mouse something better for defensive combat than a rusty hammer. Zinc lit up like a pinball table at this suggestion. Junella also said that she and Piffle would be taking Doll to the town hospital. As she explained to Toby, in a place where death is impermanent, hospitals have rather a different function. Mostly, they kill their patients. If someone came in with a grievous injury or some excruciating disease, the doctors would perform a painless coup de grace and the patient would reform in a new body, happy and healthy again. There were other tasks hospitals attended to though, and one of the main ones was reversing transformations. If Doll couldn't get back to her real self on her own, there were procedures designed to forcibly revert her. When Piffle heard about this, she lit up like a pinball table. The ladies decided to resize George and ride him, since their destination was all the way across town. The lads' however, was just down the street.

So now Toby found himself walking along Bustamante Avenue with Zinc at his side, helpfully pointing out all the interesting businesses along the way. Which ones had real good junk and which ones would stick you with overpriced crapola.

The canine had avoided filling Toby in on the exact specifics of their destination until just the right moment.

"Allright, Toby. You curious yet where we're headed?"

"Junella said it was something about weapons."

He put his arm around the mouse. "Ah! But of what particular kind are we concernin' ourselves with today, my fine pajama-clad chum? In a place as safety-conscious as Coryza, you can buy pointy kaka to kill people with at the grocery store. But that's cheap stuff. Rube stuff. If you want something you can rest easy bettin' your life on, there's three main places to go. If you want guns, you go to Red Velvet. If you want blades, that's Oliver St. Street's department. But if you want something a little more interesting..."

Zinc had timed his speech perfectly, so that when he flourished his wrenchhand to direct Toby's attention, it was drawn to a hanging sign which read simply, "DORSTER'S"

It was a white, square building. Or rather, it was a white, square section of one of Corzya's many block-sized buildings. There were bars on the windows. Toby couldn't see anything through the greasy glass. The place actually looked dingy and plain compared to most of the other baroque storefronts.

Zinc's eyes were swirling with the manic energy of a kid about to be cut loose in a candy store. "I can't even tell you how much I love this place. Honestly, it's like goin' to a whorehouse for me. We are gonna load you up with some serious armament, m'boy." With that, the canine pushed his way into the shop.

Toby blinked. The lights came on as soon as the bells above the door tinkled, revealing walls absolutely encrusted with wares.

Toby had watched a lot of action movies, and seen some documentaries on weaponry throughout the ages, but he only had the faintest idea what a third of this stuff was. Practically everything that anyone had ever used to send someone else to Hades was displayed here. Toby saw spears, axes, warhammers, halberds, chakrams, throwing knives, shurikens, morningstars, tridents, naginatas, urumis and more. There was a pair of gauntlets with horseshoes welded to the front like brass knuckles. A glaive ripsaw. A dragon beard hook. A battle aspergillum. A pair of blade boots. A war razor. A flying guillotine. There were other unguessable things that didn't seem physically possible. This was a collection of weaponry that spanned cultures, centuries, and worlds. The only common traits amongst the items was that they were all constructed of metal and wood (mostly), and there was nothing here that looked nonlethal. This place was a museum of murder. Toby could practically hear the dinky little hammer in his waistband whimpering.

Zinc tapped his wrenchtips together in glee, letting his gaze caress all the wonderful spiky things around him. "If I had all the will in the world, Toby," he breathed. "I'd come in here and buy these walls bare."

Toby noticed there was no one around. There were tables and glass display cases and a cash register, but no shopkeep. "Is it even open?"

"Sure. The door was unlocked, right? Dorster's probly fartin' around in the back." He cupped his wrenchhands to his mouth and shouted, "Hey!! A little service here!?"

At the back of the store was a doorway covered by curtains. Toby heard the squeak of a chair being pushed out, then the rustles of someone large moving through a narrow hallway.

Out from the doorway came a booming voice nearly as loud as Coryza's walls closing. "YOU FILTHY STREET PUNK!! I THOUGHT I TOLD YOU IF YOU EVER SET FOOT IN THIS STORE AGAIN, I'D GIVE YOU FANTASTIC DEALS!!!"

Toby was so terrified for a moment he would've turned white if he wasn't already. But that last part befuddled him.

From behind the curtain came a black-feathered bird, with another one on his shoulder. The nonev crow fluttered away to a nearby perch while the anthro approached his two customers. His width was nearly his height. He was stocky as a tank made of beef. He was wearing a leather apron, a kilt, and a bandana around his head; nothing else. Every inch of his body bore a scar or a burn. He looked like he'd been rolled back and forth through an iron forge a few times.

"HEYYY!!" Zinc and Dorster both shouted, meeting in the middle of the shop to embrace one another. They gave each other manly back-pats. "Come to steal more of my best stuff, you peaky bugger?"

Zinc stepped back to introduce Toby. "Nope. Brought you a new customer, you ungrateful blimp fulla birdshit."

The corvid cawed loud with laughter, then noticed the scrawny mouse's clear bewilderment at their colorful banter. "Ah. Didn't see him there. Might've put on my professional demeanor otherwise."

Zinc jostled Toby. "Nah. We're all palsy-walsy here, right?"

Toby had seen this type of male insult-affection before but had never personally participated in it. He put his hand out for a shake. "I'm Toby. Pleased to meet you. You, uh, large asshole."

Dorster laughed so hard he could barely see enough to take Toby's hand. "Now that's just fuckin' adorable!"

A handshake from someone with wings felt rather interesting, Toby thought.

"Client, I'm guessin'?" Dorster asked.

Zinc nodded. "He's wanting to get home. We're gonna try to get him all the way up the mountain to see Aldridge."

Toby had not thought someone without lips could whistle. "Jesus! What's he payin' you?"

"I'mma hafta show you sometime. There's no way in blazes you'll believe me otherwise."

Dorster looked Toby up and down appraisingly. Normally he would have taken one glance at this obvious tenderfoot walking around in his jammies and politely suggested this wasn't the place for the squirt. But Zinc seemed to like him, and that was worth something. And if the mouse could somehow pay to get Z&J to attempt the most dangerous journey in all the land, then maybe there was more to him than his appearance belied.

From the corner, the perched bird squawked.

"Nice raven," Toby said.

Dorster's eyes seemed to glow red. "You racist! He's a crow; I'M a raven!!"

Toby practically evaporated into his pajamas. "I didn't mean anything!"

The bird's belly jiggled as he burst again into laughter. "Sorry! Sorry! I just can't resist fuckin' with people!" He gave Toby a swat. "Fact is, I can't even tell corvids apart myself. You could be a jackdaw, call yourself my long-lost cousin, and I'd take you out for a steak."

"Oh. Okay then."

Dorster pointed a wingfinger to his pet. "His name's Nipple."

Toby got the feeling Dorster wanted him to ask why. "Why's that?"

"'Cause he keeps tryin' to bite 'em off every damn customer who comes in here!" he yelled at the bird. "You pervert! Don't I feed you enough!?"

Nipple skrawked back.

"Keep your shirt on, kid," Dorster warned Toby. Then he clapped his winghands together in a 'let's get down to business' way. "Allright gentlemen. What deadly needs can I satisfy for you this fine morning?"

Zinc said, "Junebug thinks Toby needs a better weapon than what's he's got if we're gonna be tacklin' the wild wilderness."

Toby sheepishly held up his hammer. "I was alone, I saw it lying there, I picked it up. I hit some rats with it."

Dorster plucked it from the mouse's hand and held it to the light. He was just about to giggle at it, then stopped himself. He brought it to his beak and nibbled the metal. "You know, either your friend's got good luck or a good eye," he said to Zinc. To Toby he asked, "Where exactly'd you find this?"

Toby rustled around in his memory for the name. His previous life was fading but events in Phobiopolis still seemed sharp. "Trapforest Path, I think it's called?"

Dorster nodded as if that made perfect sense. He tapped the hammer on the counter. "This isn't imaginite we've got here. This is nightmare-borne. Meaning, no one dreamed this thing up. This is something Phobiopolis self-created from its own essence."

Zinc added, "Translation: a hell of a lot stronger than what you can make with imaginite. Nice find!"

Dorster licked his beak. "If you wanted to sell me this, I'd knock a pretty good discount off of whatever you buy today. I can't get my hands on enough of this stuff. It's not like you can just go mine for it. And it's the whole head and handle too! Maybe two full pounds of real, actual steel."

As Toby watched the hammer being turned this way and that in the shopkeeper's wings, a sudden strange emotion came over him. The idea of his hammer being melted down and turned into something else gave his heart a pang of sadness. In that moment, Toby felt a kinship with it. Lost, abandoned to the elements, found by chance by someone who could maybe restore it.

"Is there... any way you could make it better?" he shyly asked.

Zinc waved his arms around. "Are you buggin'? Hundreds of bitchin' weapons you could choose from here! And you wanna keep something that coulda come out of my grandpa's toolbox!?"

Dorster held up a wing. "Cool it, Zinc. If he wants to, he wants to. Certain weapons just feel right to their owners, I understand that." He handed the hammer back to Toby. "And while I gotta admit I'm disappointed at missing out on the material, it's not a bad choice you're making. Like I said, it's the strongest metal you'll find anywhere, and the handle's not wooden, so no worries about it snapping. It is a small striking area though. Not much use against anything bigger than me. But a same-size opponent? Yeah, this thing'll break bone. Get in a good headshot and you'll leave a helluva sting."

Toby ran his finger along the rusty edge and smiled.

"What I can do for it is, I can polish that rust gone in a snap. I should also be able to scrape the remains of that grip off; it's definitely useless. I can make a new one that'll contour perfectly to your hand. No offense, but you look you need all the help you can get swingin' it."

"You're not wrong," Toby admitted. He handed the hammer back over.

"Allright then. I'll get started on this and I'll holler you over when I need your help makin' the grip. 'Till then, let Zinc lead you around the shop. You need more than just this: yes I'm trying to get paid, but no I'm not lying. Even if you've got two of the best bodyguards you could hope for, it's always a good idea to be more prepared than you think you need to be."

Zinc sparkled a bit at the compliment. "Even if we can't settle on anything for him, you know I can't leave here without filling your willwell."

The canine and corvid nodded to one another, and soon the shop was filled with grinding sounds as Dorster went to work polishing the hammer. Zinc took Toby on a tour of Dorster's wonderful world of bashing, gutting, and impalement. Toby got the feeling Zinc was mostly showing off things he hoped to buy someday.

It was decided that, due to Toby's thin frame and lack of fighting experience, he probably wouldn't do well with anything that required brute strength to wield. Toby tried just holding a mace and could barely bend his elbow with it. So that crossed off clubs, flails and axes. Zinc asked how Toby's aim was. Using a small mechanical crossbow and the shop's dartboard, they soon realized archery was not for Toby either. (Zinc skootched a spiked frying pan over to cover the hole in the wall, hoping Dorster wouldn't notice.) Toby pointed out that, back on Earth, he'd gotten pretty good at tossing things into his wastebasket from his bed. So Zinc suggested he try out some small throwing weapons. The mouse was actually able to hit the bullseye with a shuriken on his first try. Zinc congratulated him with a backslap that nearly sent him facefirst into a display case.

Zinc picked out a handful of various little pointy things and cautioned that they weren't really meant to deal damage unless you had a damn good line of sight at a fleshy target. Their main purpose was distraction. Toby said he was perfectly fine with providing support while Junella and Zinc handled the direct action. Zinc agreed that was a wise decision. He also heavily suggested that Toby purchase an enchanted pouch which his throwing weapons could be 'taught' to return to. "It's a pain in the ass not havin' one. Either you wait till after the battle and go around picking 'em up, or you buy new ones whenever you're in town."

Lastly, Zinc held up a pair of silvery oval objects. Bracers, he said. He didn't expect Toby to be able to walk in a full suit of armor or carry a heavy shield, but these would at least give him something to block with in a fight. He strapped them to the mouse's forearms. They were so cold they made Toby shiver, but were surprisingly light for their size. To demonstrate their effectiveness, Zinc nonchalantly pulled a morningstar down from the wall and swung it directly at Toby's head. Toby instinctively held up his arms. There was a 'whunk', Toby scooted back a few steps from the impact, but the heavy spiked club hadn't left so much as a scratch on the bracers. "Now all you need to worry about is your arms breaking," Zinc said blithely.

Dorster kept an eye on the pair, chuckling at Zinc's attempts at tutoring, and noticing when the pair began to run out of things to look at. "Boys! Come on over!" he hollered.

Toby stumbled when he tried to obey. With the bracers on, his arms felt like two grandfather clock pendulums. The metal was light, but not feather-light. Toby thought he'd get good exercise just wearing them.

He saw his hammer on Dorster's workbench and gasped. It looked brand new! The grody rubber grip was gone and the whole thing gleamed. It looked like it'd just been born at the factory.

Dorster cocked his head. "Ya like it?"

"It's... beautiful, actually."

Dorster was amused seeing someone so impressed by what was for him mere child's play. "It was easy, really. You do realize I made everything here, right? Well, I mean, I traded for a few things here and there. But eighty percent's mine. Even the tables!"

Toby nodded. "I figured. And it's all amazing craftsmanship. Still, it's cool seeing the change in this. I brought in this rusty, dirty thing, and you totally transformed it! I'll bet I'd be sitting there dumbstruck if I could watch you make anything really complicated."

Dorster reached out and patted the kid's head. "You give credit where it's due. I like that. I get people come in here, act like weapons just come outta the ground somewhere."

"Mine did," Toby blurted.

Dorster laughed. "Ha! We'll make a smartass outta you yet! Anyway, come on back here with me and stick your fightin' hand in this shit." He held out a tub of what looked like mayonnaise.

Toby flinched and stuck his paw in. It felt like mayonnaise too. "Is this to make a mold of my hand with?"

"Nope. This is to keep your hand from turning into burnt sludge when you grab the molten tonguerubber," Dorster said cheerfully.

Toby did not look happy about that.

Zinc had been fiddling with an iron boomerang that had some kind of gear mechanism coming out of it, but looked over his shoulder to reassure Toby. "There's a certain type of nightmare we call a licking cave, 'cuz it's basically all mouth and teeth. If you can kill one of those long enough to cut its tongue off, you can boil it down and make all sortsa nifty junk out of it."

"Perfect for custom handles," Dorster explained as he put on heavy gloves. There was a machine in the corner that looked like a cross between a stove and a pipe organ. Dorster retrieved a canister from it that hissed when it touched air. "You gotta keep it hot!" he yelled. "If it cools down for even a moment, it'll stick like that permanently! That's why I'm gonna have Zinc dip your hammer in, and then when I tell you to, you grab it like you're rubbin' one out, got me?"

Toby, hand dripping with gook, tried to convince himself that these people knew what they were doing. "Is it gonna hurt?"

"Yeah, a whole bunch," Dorster told him straight. "But it'll only be for a second if you don't fuck it up. You ready?"

Toby's tail was twitching. He took off his bracers and set them on the bench. "No, but I'll do what you tell me anyway."

"That's the spirit!" The raven popped the lid of the canister and noxious-smelling smoke poured out. It smelled like burning fat and asphalt. "Zinc! Dip the hammer!"

It took the mutt a few tries to pinch the hammer head up off the flat desk, but he eventually succeeded. Slow and steady, he lowered it into the tonguerubber.

Dorster made sure he had the mouse's attention. "Toby, right? I'm gonna start counting. On three, Zinc's gonna lift up the hammer, you're gonna look at where it's pointing and make damn sure that's how you wanna grip it from now on. Then squeeze that handle like your momma's tit. Afterwards you'll thank me, guaranteed. One!"

Toby took in a deep breath, readying himself for agony. He hoped he wouldn't sweat all the mayo off his palm.

"Two!"

He made careful note of which direction the striking surface was being held, not wanting to be forever holding his weapon backwards or sideways.

"Three!"

Toby acted without thinking as soon as he saw Zinc move. His hand sunk into the tonguerubber. Instantly, his whole arm up to his shoulder lit up with red hot pain. He nearly bit a hole in his cheek to keep from screaming.

"That's enough! Let go, let go!"

Toby literally did not need to be told twice. He jerked his hand away and plunged it back into the mayo tub, then exhaled in relief.

Zinc had been through way worse many times, but he could still recognize that his client had handled that better than expected. "Way to go! Just like clockwork. How was the pain?"

Toby took another deep breath. "Actually... not that bad. At least it was only for a second. I get nerve aches sometimes that're like that for hours."

Zinc winced in sympathy.

"Take a look. It's cooled already," Dorster said.

The black tonguerubber grip looked perfect, needing only a bit of sanding on the bottom. Toby took his hand out of the mayo, wiped it off and dared to touch it. Still warm, but not dangerous. It had a kind of pebbly texture. 'Like taste buds.' Ew.

When Zinc let go and Toby took hold of the hammer, he was genuinely impressed. It felt like his hand was sitting in a comfortable armchair. The rubber had a bit of a spongy give to it. It felt pleasant to hold, and seemed to be gripping him right back. Like the hammer was giving him a handshake. "Wow. Thank you," he told Dorster.

"Guaranteed," the raven said with a wink. He walked around the workbench towards a counter piled high with boxes of odds and ends. "Now, that hammer's fine on its own right now, but I'm gonna make you two offers that'll make it even better. Take one or both, your choice. The first is, I can affix a diamond tip to the head, right in the center. Doing that will concentrate the force of your swing into a single point. It'll be a devastating attack. You'll fuck skulls right open like cracking an egg."

Toby grimaced. "I'm not too comfortable with that. If I have to bonk somebody, I'd rather not get their brains all over me."

Zinc grinned. "Hey! 'Bonky'! That's its new name!"

Toby ignored him.

"I figured you wouldn't be too much into bloodshed," Dorster said with an understanding pat on Toby's shoulder. "My second offer is a sheath for it. Best one money can buy."

"That sounds much better," Toby said. "Keeping it in my waistband means I have to keep hoisting my pants up." Plus, it seemed somehow more official for a personal weapon to have its own holster.

"Allright then. Lemme find it..." Dorster shoved some boxes around, muttering under his breath, calling out like an owner to his dog. Eventually he slapped his forehead and crossed the shop to where the cash register was. "Found 'em!" He plopped a small cardboard box onto the glass and his two customers came over for a peek.

They did not look like sheaths. Sheaths were long, tubelike things made out of wood or leather. These were... weird. They were grape-sized purple pebbles with rings of energy zipping around them. Like the common depiction of an atom encircled by orbiting electrons. Dorster held one up and it made a fizzy little whine.

Toby narrowed his eyes. "How do I fit my hammer in that?"

"Ha! You don't! It goes in you!"

Toby looked to Zinc. Zinc's face said, 'I've never heard of this either.'

Dorster regarded the energetic little nubbin as if he still had no idea how it worked. "Somethin' my kid's been messing around with. You know Alfonzo, right Zinc?"

The canine nodded. "We've met a few times. He didn't seem too, uh, enthusiastic about carrying on the family business though."

Dorster nodded solemnly, hinting at many long conversations on exactly that topic. But then he brightened. "He wasn't. At least, not until I stopped being a stubborn, clogged-up old fogey and let him start doing things his way. I'm living in the past; I know it. I'm good at what I do, but it's all I know. He's on a different plane of thinking. All this sciencey stuff I can't even begin to understand. But finally he got through to my stupid head to let him try selling some of his experiments.

"You know me! I'm all about making sure my customers come back satisfied! He's asking me to unleash this science fair stuff on an unsuspecting populace!" Dorster mimed a heart attack. "But... I relented. And people started snapping his stuff up faster than mine." He chuckled proudly. "No complaints yet."

He held the purple pebble out to Toby. "So I can't tell you how this works, but I can tell you what it does. If you decide you want it, then you're gonna hafta rub it all over that hammer of yours. Let it get the scent. Then swallow it."

"...The hammer?" Toby asked.

"The pill."

"Just checking." 

Dorster grinned. "Once that li'l guy's inside you, it's gonna rearrange your geometry a bit and put a portal in your palm. Your arm is gonna hold your weapon from now on. Always there, ready with a single thought."

Zinc briefly wished he had arms. "Far out!"

Toby felt a bit of unease at the thought of essentially agreeing to reconstructive surgery. But from deep within him, a masculine thirst for coolness began to emerge. The part of a man that drinks in the sight of swords clashing, the sound of cars being crushed, and the invigorating stench of a thundering engine. Toby felt his heart speed up as he stared at the purple thing in his palm. Part of him wanted to gobble it down that very instant.

But practicality prevailed. "Um, no offense, but can I get some kind of reassurance that it works first?"

Dorster leaned in closer to him. Looming, actually. Then his smile stretched his face in half. "You wanna demonstration?" he purred.

Toby gulped. "If that's allright."

Dorster suddenly let out a mighty roar of wrath and held his arms skyward. There was a flash of lightning from the center of his winghands and instantly, two leather-wrapped, celtic-carved war axes unfolded into his grip. The burly bird smashed them together, spraying sparks in Toby's direction.

Then, with a mere gesture, the axes retracted and were gone.

Toby looked at Dorster, looked at Dorster's empty winghands, and looked at the pill in his own. He'd taken so many in his lifetime... Probably a pile that would fill a bucket...

So what was one more?

"May I ask for a glass of water?"

Dorster and Zinc both cheered Toby's choice. The mouse started rubbing the hammer with the pill like he was soaping up in the shower. Dorster darted to the back of the shop and came back a moment later, plopping a frosty can down in front of Toby.

Toby thought it was beer at first and was about to protest, but then he read the label: Anisocoria Rain. It showed a picture of a man holding out a bottle towards a mighty thunderstorm. 'Allright. Looks okay.' Toby popped the top and gave a sniff. It actually smelled like tornado weather. He took a sip and his eyebrows went up. "That's really good!"

He looked at the pill in his hand. He watched the little energy rings whizz around it. He took a hard swig of rain and gulped it down.

He didn't feel anything at first.

Dorster suddenly panicked. "Oh shit, I forgot! Not on the merch!!" He grabbed Toby's arm and slammed it down flat on the glass counter. Toby didn't have time to ask what this was about before the pain struck.

It made grabbing the tonguerubber feel like petting a kitten. It felt like someone had tied fishing line to all his nerve endings and yanked as hard as they could. He went deaf and blind for half a second.

Then a four-foot-long geyser of blood punched its way out of his palm. The sound of it was obscene. It left a quarter-sized hole in his hand and a trail like a dripping red tail all across Dorster's display cases.

"Fuckety hell," Dorster said. "I shoulda had you do that over a bucket."

Zinc was holding Toby up to keep him from crumpling to the floor like a washrag. "Toby! You okay!? That was a heckuva fire hydrant impression you just did!"

The mouse blinked as the spots in his vision started to dissipate. His arm felt heavy as lead, then weightless, then like it had turned into flowing ice water. Then it was suffused with a kind of warm electric tingle. When he dared to look at it, there was a crystalline white light emerging from his palm. He felt his hammer tug towards it.

The experience had rattled him to the core, but fascination trumped fear with surprising ease. Toby wondered if he was going into shock again. After the pain ebbed away, his arm now felt something close to pleasant. It throbbed like it had just been deeply massaged. He guessed the pill must have somehow made room inside it for the hammer, but he could still move everything like normal. 'Maybe it's like the doorway to Junella and Zinc's junkyard,' he thought. The glowing wound in his hand was positioned directly between the ends of his fibula and tibia, and was pulling needfully towards his hammer. So, Toby brought it a little closer.

His eyes slammed closed as a rush of sensation tore through him. Pain was only one ingredient of it; there were many more. It felt like his flesh and bone were being rearranged, then sewn back together with thread woven from raw electricity.

But when he looked and saw the hammer was completely gone, he moved his arm, turned his wrist, rubbed his fingers together... and it felt whole. There was no extra weight. Just a slight feeling of 'fullness'. He knew the hammer was there.

He willed it to come back out.

It was so sudden he nearly dropped it. His hand disgorged the hammer with a smaller flash than Dorster's axes, but it still made for a cool mini-lightshow. Toby felt the tonguerubber grip slide under his fingers like slipping on a silk glove. The renewed hammer gleamed regally under the shop lights, looking somehow proud of itself.

This weapon... felt like a part of his body now.

Toby stared at it. The mirror-polished head. The sheer weight of the steel. Static shivers spiraled down the length of his arm. He was breathing hard.

For possibly the first time in his life, Toby deLeon felt powerful.

***

It took Zinc a moment to wrangle Toby back to reality. The mouse had stared enraptured at his new hardware for close to thirty seconds without speaking. From his face, he looked almost like he was tripping. Zinc waved his wrenches around until Toby's pupils refocused, and told him it was time to pay.

Dorster was swearing a blue streak as he went through half a roll of paper towels getting all the red streaks off his display case and his feathers. A small wad of mouseflesh, like a champagne cork, had stuck to a shelf all the way at the end of the counter. Zinc encouraged Toby to finish up the rest of his Anisocoria Rain until Dorster was ready.

Zinc chortled at the look of awe on Toby's face that seemed permanently etched on. The mouse kept turning the hammer this way and that, watching the light gleam off it, taking small, careful practice swings. He let Toby know there was an area out back where they could go practice smashin' stuff afterwards. Toby nodded aggressively at this idea.

Dorster waddled back, shaking soapy water from his wings, and stood with a sigh by his cash register. It looked more like some kind of steampunk piano (Toby presumed that Dorster might have to deal in many different kinds of currency). Dorster totaled up Toby's hammer repair, the throwing weapons, the pouch, the bracers, and the sheath-pill. The number that resulted had so many digits Toby nearly shat bricks.

Zinc reassured Toby that he considered all of these new toys a business expense. He'd cover the lot, but encouraged Toby to have a go at the willwell nonetheless. Toby's cheeks flushed as he realized he'd forgotten to practice on his watch since last night at dinner. Dorster punched some keys and a dial lit up. The red line snapped back to the starting position. Toby readied his construction crew of mini-selves and shoved as hard as he could.

Zinc and Dorster tried very hard to be polite and not laugh at him. Not even when sweat beaded up on the mouse's forehead and he started grunting with strain.

Toby had moved the red line about a tenth of the way across the dial when he gave up, panting, and asked for another rainwater.

Zinc stepped in to take over. Toby watched as the canine braced himself, then planted his wrenches flat on the floor and stared hard at the red line. It moved exponentially faster than Toby's try. Zinc gnashed his teeth but otherwise didn't make a sound. His face was a stone carving of concentration. By the time Toby had half-finished his second can, the bill was paid. Zinc let out a whoosh of breath when the dial finally dinged. He snatched Toby's water away and drained it in a gulp.

Dorster began bagging their items. Toby decided he'd better start getting used to the bracers and strapped them back on. The metal seemed to naturally emanate a slight chill. It felt nice now after the heat of his arm's transformation and his exertion trying to pay for it.

Toby and Dorster shook hands and the raven expressed his hope to see the mouse back in his shop again some day. Toby regretfully said that if his quest was successful, that could never happen. Dorster remembered, and wished the mouse good luck and a safe journey nonetheless.

Just as Toby was turning towards the door, Zinc turned to Dorster. He looked like he was straining to hold in a bodily function. "Before we go, old pal... um... I know they aren't, but I gotta ask, since it'd be a really big damn help to me on this job." He whimpered, "...are they done yet?"

The bird sighed and leaned on the counter. "Fraid not. They won't be ready until, uh..." He looked up at the calendar. "...at least thirty more seconds."

Zinc blinked.

Then the very air seemed to rumble in anticipation of the grin that was about to explode onto the canine's face.

He rushed over and clamped his hands on the counter, cracking the glass. His tail was a brown blur. "Where!? How!?"

Dorster held up his wings in a 'calm down before you wreck something' gesture. But he was likewise grinning at the sheer anticipation Zinc was gushing out, and at having managed to keep a lid on the surprise for so long. "Remember all the excuses I gave you? How I kept trying this and that and the other thing, and I still couldn't get 'em to move right?"

Zinc's head waggled up and down. Oh how his heart had been crushed each one of those times!

"You can't believe all the stupid shit I tried! So many gear ratios and pulleys and crap like that. Every time I got it to move right, it was too heavy and too bulky to carry around. Every time I got the weight down, the torque ended up shitty. Every time I tried to up the torque, the thing'd rip itself apart!"

The raven sighed and scratched under his bandana. "It got to the point where I was skipping meals to work on the damn things. It was my white whale. Like, if I couldn't make this work, that proved I was a failure, y'know? And finally, I dunno what kinda Good Sense Fairy rapped me on the head, but I decided to stop killin' myself over it and just handed it to my son. I said, "Here. I can't make this work. But you can."

Zinc's eyebrows went up. "Alfonzo cracked it? Seriously!? Where's the little peeper at? Lemme congratulate him!"

Dorster indicated the curtains. "He's in the back right now. Junella's entrance last night got attention, and you 'n her are joined at the hip, so I told him he'd better get it ready. I bet him a candy bar you'd be our first customer this morning."

"Awww, you know me too well." Zinc turned to Toby, "This guy's like Santy Claus!"

Dorster walked around the counter to lock the front door and put up the 'On Break' sign. "C'mon, let's get you all dressed up to go dancing."

Zinc clamped Toby's hand and practically bounced the whole way.

***

The back room looked like shop class merged with a heavy metal album cover. 'This place has entirely too many skulls in its decoration,' Toby thought. Workbenches as burnt and scarred as Dorster himself were piled with machines for tooling, sculpting and carving metal. Curly shavings littered the floor. There were all sorts of looming machines that Toby flinched away from. Stuff that looked like it'd incinerate him, flay him, crush him flat, or all three if they suddenly turned on and came after him.

Speaking of crushing, he yanked his paw out of Zinc's excitable grip and tried to caress the zigzag ridges out of it.

Standing on a high metal stool to give him access to a tableful of frighteningly-complicated-looking parts and implements, was a boy who looked no more than eight. Not a corvid though, so he was possibly adopted. He appeared to be a kingfisher: long beak, long wings, short, round body. Fluffy black feathers encircled his face like a cartoon bomb had just gone off in it. He had on a lab coat that hung down almost to the top of the stool, and a set of jeweler's loupes that might have been permanently affixed to his eyes. 'Or maybe they are his eyes,' Toby thought.

The bird boy looked up at the approaching footsteps and flipped through the interchangeable lenses in his loupes for far vision. "Ah, Zinc! Dad was right!" He reached in his pocket for a Suet Cashew Delight and handed it over.

Zinc held out his wrench for the young bird to shake, careful not to damage those talented little wingfingers. "And he was just tellin' me you've finally got my little project road-ready, yeah?"

Alfonzo nodded proudly. "The fix was obvious to me, but I'm not surprised Dad never hit on it. He's stuck in the clockwork age."

Dorster, standing off to the side, 'hmph'ed but didn't dispute this. He unwrapped the candy bar and started munching.

Zinc said, "Before you get all technical, I'd like to introduce my pal Toby. He just got a dose of your handiwork." He literally picked the mouse up from where he'd been staring at a drophammer and positioned him in front of Alfonzo.

"Yipes! Uh, hello," Toby shook hands as well. "Yeah, that pill I just took was yours, right? Whew! It felt like a rhino charging through my arm, but I like the end result."

Alfonzo was glad to see the small, faint glowing line at the bottom of the mouse's palm. "Good, good! D'ya mind showing me? They're just past the prototype stage and it does my mind a world of good to see them behaving properly."

Toby was more than happy to. He made sure he wouldn't bonk anything in its path, then willed the hammer into his hand again. A flash and there it was. Easy as winking, and taking about as long.

Alfonzo clapped and danced, making the stool wobble. "Marvelous! It does work just as well with shapes I hadn't planned around! I'd tested all the common hand weapons extensively, like Dad's axes, but realized too late I'd forgotten to anticipate other choices. Oh!! This means it could work for wallets as well! Money at your fingertips!" The fledgeling turned around and scribbled his idea down directly on the table so he wouldn't forget it. "We can double our business, Dad!"

Dorster's belly shook and he chuckled crumbs all over the floor. "That's the kinda thing I like to hear! Keep thinkin' like that and I can retire before I start balding!"

Alfonzo reached out to feel all along Toby's arm, not even noticing the mouse flinching back at this sudden invasion of personal space. "Make it go back in, then out again. As fast as you can, please."

Well, he did say please. The bird was concentrating entirely on Toby's musculature; the rest of the world didn't exist. Toby let the hammer suck itself in, then popped it back out. He did this six more times. It actually felt good! The hammer slid in and out as easily as a hotdog down a waterslide.

"Keep doin' that and you'll go blind," Zinc muttered, and giggled sophomorically.

Alfonzo squeezed in different places, checking to make sure the internal portal was keeping out of the way of bone and muscle like it should. He was delighted by the results and wrote some more numbers on the table.

Zinc unsubtly cleared his throat. "Not to, uh, impede scientific progress, but... I've been a good boy all year and I'm kinda juiced up to unwrap my Christmas present, dig?"

"Right, right! Let me apologize. I got so caught up in a research opportunity I forgot why you're here!" Alfonzo started shuffling things around on the cluttered table. "It's all prepped and ready, I assure you. Just gotta... find all the pieces..."

Toby poked Zinc. "So uh, what is this wonderful thing you're so excited about?"

Before the canine could answer, Dorster held up a wingfinger. "Since I'm just standin' here feelin' useless and fat, how 'bout I explain it? That way Zinc 'n the kiddo can concentrate on getting it all hooked up."

Toby walked around the table and Dorster literally took him under his wing. "Allright. So, Zinc comes in a few months ago and tells me he's got this idea. He wants me to dream up a weapon he can attach to his wrenches. Something to give combat a bit more 'oomph', y'know? And I really puzzled over that, because how do you improve a big goddam wrench? You can already smash with it, crush with it, block with it, etcetera."

Zinc had his shirt and jacket off and Alfonzo was taking measurements across his shoulders and down the length of his arms.

Dorster went on. "But then I thought, 'What if he could clamp down on some poor bastard with both wrenches, yet still be able to give them an unholy beating? I thought of something attached to the shoulders. A pair of spiked clubs at first. But nah, that's too specific a range. For flexibility, what you really want is a flail." He pointed to the table and Toby saw two softball-sized black metal spheres on chains. Unlike most flails, each had only one spike. A big, fat, expertly-placed point that looked perfectly capable of tearing through a tree. Or a truck. Flesh, certainly.

Toby shivered at such a gruesome thought, but also grinned slightly.

"I dreamed up the stupidest, most desperate mechanisms you can imagine trying to get those things to work!" Dorster said. "Making the balls and forging the chains was the easy part; I could do that sleepwalking. But getting them to swing! Gah! Like I said, I drove myself nuts with it 'till I decided to let junior give it a go."

Alfonzo had been keeping up with his dad's descriptions. "Once Dad gave me the project and told me about Zinc's physiology, the answer was obvious: bloodpower."

"Bloodpower?" Toby repeated.

"Haven't you wondered how your friend can move inanimate metal and feel with it like real flesh? Tiny grooves, drilled by trained grubs, run all throughout his wrenches, like veins. When Zinc puts them on, his blood flows in. I've applied the same principle to these." Alfonzo held up two small fez-shaped metal objects. They had clear windows at two points, and a channel where the chain would snap onto them via a carabiner. They also had a six-inch syringe coming out of the base, each needle a centimeter in diameter.

Toby felt all the blood drain out of his face when he realized where those would be going.

Zinc looked stoked. "Cool."

"Some things you need to know first," Alfonzo said, making sure he had the canine's full attention. "One, I've worked out the chemistry to write new instincts for you. You'll adjust the chain-lengths subconsciously, so hopefully you'll never dent your own wrenches or knock yourself unconscious. The balls can retract snug against the base, or extend approximately two feet beyond your wrenchtips.

"Two, and I gotta give credit to Dad for this, he worked out the problem of losing momentum when they impact. He forged a lump of paradox-locked imaginite at each sphere's core. They're forever in flux, never able to coalesce into a solid form. This means their physical properties are determined entirely by your will; except for the base weight of the iron they're encased in, of course. They can change as fast as you can think. In combat, you'll want to make the cores into something like tiny neutron stars."

Zinc cocked his head and 'erf'ed, uncomprehending.

Alfonzo 'grrr'ed. "Really, really, really dense. Do it right and they'll melt through almost any material. The only things I can imagine that might stop them are nightmare-essence items or a stronger will."

The canine nodded approvingly. He looked over at Toby. "I guess I'll hafta test 'em against your hammer and Junella's tantrums."

Toby hoped he was joking, because he did not want his nice shiny hammer to shatter before he'd gotten the chance to whack something with it.

"Three, when you're done injuring people and objects, your flails will store conveniently in your flesh. It's a variation on the sheath I designed. Just swing them over your shoulders and they'll be absorbed into your back. I have faith the effect will work through clothing so you won't have to keep buying new jackets." Alfonzo noticed the canine's gaze was wandering and snapped his wingfingers. "Focus! Did you get all that, Mr. Zinc? Will you remember it?"

"Sure, sure! Just because I don't have a brain doesn't mean I don't have a brain!"

The bird groaned at that. "Allright then. Are you ready for me to begin the procedure?" He picked up a power drill with a terrifyingly long, thin bit. Zinc's wrenches were mounted on thick metal bolts sunk into his flesh, so Alfonzo touched the drilltip to the center of Zinc's left shoulder mount.

Zinc turned his head to stare at nothing. He breathed in and out, filling his lungs, flexing his muscles, getting the adrenaline flowing. Toby saw his eyes practically glow with lustful eagerness as he psyched himself up. "I'm ready, 'Fonz. If all your calculations line up and all the screws are tight, then bring it on!"

"There may be a bit of stinging," Alfonzo understated.

Zinc cackled. "DRILL ME, BABY!!! YEAH!!!"

WHIIIIRRRRRRRRNNNRRRRRIIIRRRRRRRRRRRR

The noise was like having your ears ripped in half. The drill whined and growled and sent flecks of metal flying all around the shop as it sunk into Zinc's shoulder like a vampire's tooth. Dorster produced a pair of safety glasses and plopped them onto Toby's face. Alfonzo's expression was one of concentration mixed with semisadistic glee: the mad scientist at play.

Zinc was howling and hooting and barking like a mad dog. From the visible tension of his neck muscles, Toby could tell the pain must have been excruciating. But the mutt was doing everything he could to embrace it, to ride it like a mechanical bull. His drooling grin was a mile wide, his eyes rolled loose like dice.

The drill's sound changed to a throaty gurgle as it sank through the last of the metal and entered bone and blood. The debris spraying around the workshop changed from silver to red. Toby kept his mouth covered.

And then Alfonzo repeated the whole thing again on the other side.

Zinc's vocalizations were unholy. Yips and growls and frenzied laughter. The workshop floor was splattered in a wide diameter with silvery shavings, bone chips, and blood drops.

Finally the drill's scream turned into a passive purr. Alfonzo unplugged it and set it aside. He held up his devices. "Mr. Zinc, are you ready for phase two?"

"Ready, Teddy. Let's go steady," he gurgled.

Alfonzo lined up the tips of the needles with the edges of the drilled holes. Then he suddenly shoved them both in until the trapezoidal machines clicked into place.

This time, the sound Zinc made was a strangled shriek of pure agony. He hyperventilated for a moment, but then an eerie giggle bubbled up from the depths of him. Saliva rolled down his teeth and made little grey dots on the floor.

"Turn 'em on," he rumbled.

"You'd better get up on the table first," Alfonzo advised. "Don't step on anything!" He helped guide the canine up onto the wooden surface, scooting tools and spare parts away.

Toby held Dorster's winghand unashamedly. The look in Zinc's eyes... It was the unhinged stare of a berserker on the verge of being unleashed. He now knew for sure: whatever Zinc's species happened to be, his soul was that of a werewolf.

Alfonzo worked swiftly to attach the ends of the heavy chains to the slots in his devices. "Try not to swing these," he said. "I'd leave them off for safety, but the 'juice' has to flow through them when I give you the catalyst pill." He blinked. "The pill!" He started patting his pockets. "Just give me a moment, it's around here somewhere!"

Zinc's voice was not normal. It was a sound half-buried in graveyard dirt. "Don't keep me waitin' too long, doc. I feel like I could chew a hole through an atom bomb right about now."

Toby couldn't see the bird's eyes, but there was probably a bit of panic in them. The mouse looked up to gauge Dorster's expression. The raven's gaze was steady. He was keeping out of his son's work. Letting the boy handle it. Toby got the feeling Dorster would not step in unless absolutely necessary, but if he had to, would swoop in like the wind itself.

The younger bird found the pill, lying in plain sight amidst the table's other doodads. This one was as big as a golf ball. Bright red with black thorns all over and orange rings of fire whizzing around its surface. "Think you could swallow this?" he asked as he held it up to Zinc.

The canine leaned in and licked it off the kingfisher's palm, gulping it while never breaking eye contact. He grunted as it hit his stomach. "Better'n Thai food."

Toby's eyes widened, remembering what had happened when he'd taken one of those. He hid behind Dorster. "Oh geez! Is he gonna explode?"

Alfonzo hopped down off the table and backed away. "I'm counting on it."

Zinc stood there breathing in the center of the table, shoulders hunching up and down, feeling the spiky thing inside him revolve.

The shop was dead silent as they waited for it to work.

Then they all heard a watery 'BOOM' and Zinc's whole torso lit up from inside.

A split second later he screamed and heaved as he could feel the pill twisting and tearing at his insides, forcing them into new configurations. Blood was rerouted. Electricity crackled along the edges of Alfonzo's devices and down the length of the flails.

Then Zinc roared his throat raw as twin strips of flesh ripped themselves off of his back. They went flying across the shop like a pair of unreturning boomerangs.

The blood erupted out of him in slow-motion, or so it seemed to the three dumbstruck onlookers. Zinc's mouth was wide, cheeks flapping, as a howl of pure feral power blasted out. His backblood hung suspended in the air like a great red Japanese fan, then reality seemed to reverse. The blood sucked in. Every drop rewound itself back into Zinc's body and surged into his new anatomical additions. The clear windows on each device filled up with crimson. They surged with power, glowing like sunlight, and the glow snaked its way down each link of the chain, finally turning the iron spiked balls into jack-o-lanterns.

Every ounce of metal in Zinc's body turned white hot. His eyelids boiled his eyeballs. Smoke poured out of his ears. His wrenches burnt sizzling ruts into the tabletop.

And then it all simply ended. The glow, the blood: it all went away. Zinc's roar fizzled to a choke. The remains of his eyes dripped down his cheeks like runny eggs. Steam trailed from his cooked flesh.

He fell backwards off the table in a clattering heap.

Toby was too stunned to walk over and check to see if his friend was still anywhere close to living. But then he heard a scrape, and a shuffle, and a weak voice husked out:

"That was fun. I ain't ever doin' that again in my life."

The two birds and a mouse crowded around to help the canine stand up. He coughed, snorted, and puked up a teacup of blood, but managed to keep himself vertical.

Alfonzo flitted around him, checking the shoulder-mounts. "We'd better get you outside quick. After a surge like that, I'm guessing you'd like to test them out."

Zinc dragged his blurry head to point in the kingfisher's direction. His eyes were starting to reform, looking like two wads of wet cauliflower. "You betcher ass I do," he slurred.

Alfonzo nodded. He ran ahead to get the door while Dorster grunted and heaved his customer towards it. Toby followed behind.

Outside it was still night, but in the square courtyard at the center of the block, a series of angled mirrors trapped and reflected the moonlight to make it about as bright as an overcast afternoon. The courtyard itself could have been called with more accuracy a junkyard. There were scrapped cars, trucks and other assorted heavy machinery piled around. Everything, especially the ground and the walls, was full of holes. This was definitely Dorster's practice area.

Zinc just stood there, looking at all the lovely junk he had free rein to demolish. He giggled like a ghoul.

"Go for it!" Alfonzo shouted. He clutched a clipboard, ready to write down all results.

Toby kept his safety goggles on, and was glad for that decision when Zinc started his new motors up.

It sounded like lawnmowers in stereo. Zinc held his wrenches out in front of him and the devices on each shoulder started vibrating. A normal engine gives off exhaust, and these did too: a fine mist of burnt blood. Zinc was a walking can of brownish-pink spraypaint.

"How come they ain't turnin'!?" Zinc yelled over the din.

"You're already up to speed! Engage the flails manually!" Alfonzo yelled back. 

Zinc could feel his new additions like parts of his own flesh. He suddenly knew just what to shift to get the gears within the devices to lock on. And when he did, there was a K-CHONK and the metal whirled to life. Zinc screeched a mighty "YEEEEHAW!!!" as his shoulders became two silver rotating death fans.

He took a step, then another. Having a wrecking ball rotating insanely fast on either side of your head takes a second to get used to. But he could feel Alfonzo's pill giving instructions to his body. His muscles tensed and twitched, learning how to move to keep the motors spinning in sync and preventing them from flinging him around (or turning him into an accidental helicopter). Zinc became aware of each spiked orb's placement at all times. Keeping them out of his way was now as easy as not tripping over his feet. He broke into a run towards the trash.

At that moment, Dorster helpfully flipped a switch and all four speakers around the perimeter of the courtyard started pounding out psychobilly guitars. Zinc somehow managed to grin wider. Toby watched without breathing as Zinc pounced like a junkyard dog towards a family sedan that had seen its last road trip. He added his own percussion to the music around him by biting into the roof with one wrenchclaw, and Alfonzo's motors did the rest. The heavy spiked iron came crashing down into the hapless car at four times a second, chewing through it with all the effort of eating a banana. Zinc dug in with his other wrench. It too was followed up by a volley of flail-blows. The combination of his new armaments, the strength of his wrenches, and his own crazed joy soon had the whole car mangled into a spaghetti-like state in about two minutes.

Toby was rendered speechless by this blood-spraying fusion of animal and machine before him. Zinc's savage giggles were like a hyena on amphetamines. Truly, a scene like the one he was witnessing could only take place within a nightmare.

The brainstem-level emotion Toby was feeling was a prey's terror, imagining what such a combination of crushing power and spinning kinetic force could do to his soft tissues. But was there another primal emotion mixed in somewhere in there? Almost... jealousy?

Dorster patted the mouse on the back. "G'wan. Try yours out too. Backstage passes are free with any purchase."

Toby tore his eyes away from Zinc's maniac playtime long enough to give Dorster a "Huh?"

"Your nice shiny hammer! Go dirty it up! That's what it's for!"

Toby had almost forgotten about his own upgrade. His hammer seemed just as pathetic as before in comparison to Zinc's unstoppable weaponry. But as he felt it slide out of his arm again and the grip pour itself around his hand, he felt that spark of power again. He squeezed the handle.

Maybe it didn't matter that Zinc was stronger. Maybe it only mattered that Toby was stronger than his earlier self.

The mouse's features darkened. He tensed his muscles. With a warcry that was barely audible above the din of Zinc's rampage and the blaring rock 'n roll, he charged towards a rusted old stove.

His first swing sent a burner tiddly-winking out of sight. Then he screamed and bashed, turning rust and paint flakes into confetti. His strikes were awkward. Anyone watching could tell he'd never had any practice at this. But what they couldn't see was the inner satisfaction that pulsed through Toby's veins every time he watched a dent appear in the metal. This, what he was seeing, was a physical manifestation of his will upon the world. Yes, he was just a mouse in a junkyard wailing on a stove with a fancy hammer. But it felt like more. With every hit, Toby let himself feel the panic, the nausea, the anguish, the dread, the hopelessness, and the pain Phobiopolis had put him through. This was his moment to give it all back. His lips were stretched in a rictus. His hammer reflected the shine of his gritted teeth.

Toby lost himself. For a moment, he left behind everything he was and became rage. It was not an emotion he had ever really explored before. There had been despair, frustration, and annoyance before. But Toby had never needed nor practiced anger. When it finally blossomed in his heart, it overgrew everything else with frightening speed.

Toby's arm did not end in a hand, it ended in a hammer. Toby's body and mind existed only to move that hammer up and down. Toby's body did not exist: he was the hammer. His eyes watched the hopeless metal beneath him change shape with every blow. His ears heard nothing but white noise.

Toby experienced what some might call a moment of transcendence.

***

Meanwhile, Alfonzo stood by scribbling furiously as he watched his most complex project to date meet and exceed his expectations.

Dorster patted his shoulder. "Nice work."

"You too, pop."

"I want you to look out there and remember that." The proud raven pointed towards the two screaming guys destroying everything they could get their hands on. "That, son, is what a returning customer looks like."

Nipple, meanwhile, was enjoying a king's feast of canine backflesh.

*****

Part TWENTY-TWO

Dorster killed the music and suggested that he couldn't stay on break forever. Toby was panting, exhausted, soaked with sweat, and more than a little afraid of himself by the end of it. He never knew he was capable of such savagery, even if it was only against an appliance. His body radiated heat and ache. He should have been in physical misery, but instead he felt... great.

Two more Anisocoria Rains were waiting for him and Zinc when they re-entered the shop. Toby was glad for the chance to sit down and just breathe, while Zinc began paying off the unspeakably gargantuan bill for his new toys. (The mouse was flabbergasted to hear that this was actually his last payment. There'd been four more!) Dorster and Alfonzo now had enough concentrated will to eat steak and lobster every night for a month. They certainly had enough to replace the autos and appliances which Zinc and Toby had rendered into pencil shavings. The door ding-a-ling'ed as the mouse and mutt left through it, with both avians waving and wishing them many happy uses of their wares.

Afterwards, the duo headed back to the hotel. They plopped down in a booth at the mostly-empty thoughtstaurant to wait for the girls. Still giddy from adrenaline, they talked about the carnage they'd just wrought. Zinc had caused far more damage, of course. Toby was a little bashful about that. But Zinc reassured him, "In the school of mayhem, you're just a freshman right now. You'll learn. Soon enough you'll be causing major havoc with Bonky." Toby asked him to please stop calling his hammer that.

The two of them had already finished off a pitcher of root beer and nearly fallen into naptime by the time Piffle, Junella and Doll returned.

The first thing Toby noticed was that Doll was still a doll. She'd been cleaned up considerably and looked toystore-new, but still remained trapped in inanimate plastic. (Also, the edges of her face-hole had been sanded down into a smooth square. Toby couldn't tell if that was less creepy or more.)

The second thing he noticed was how absolutely frazzled Junella looked. She had the eyes of a shellshocked war vet. There were places on her body where she'd actually scraped off curls of plastic in irritation.

When she saw Zinc, she made a beeline for him. She clamped her hands down on his shoulders, "SAY SOMETHING PESSIMISTIC!!" she exploded.

"Uh... uh... uh..." he tried to think of something. "Uh, you'll never finish eating a whole kark roast, we'll never get Tinder outta our backyard, and our chances of reaching Anasarca without getting our minds wiped forever are about as good as a fart in a windstorm."

The skunk sighed loudly in relief and sank into the booth next to him. A vinyl finger stabbed out, pointing at Piffle. "You don't know what she's like! The... the CHEERFULNESS!!! It's infinite! Relentless! You ever drink an entire bottle of maple syrup!? That's what being stuck in a waiting room with her for five hours is like!!"

Zinc checked the clock on the wall. "You weren't gone for more'n two."

"IT FELT LIKE IT!!"

Piffle merely giggled and hugged Toby. "She's just grouchy," she whispered in his ear. "I'll get her to lighten up someday."

While Zinc consoled the trembling Junella and ordered her a stiff drink, Toby looked down to Doll and gave her plastic paw a shake. "So, how'd the hospital thing turn out? I mean, I can see they didn't cure you. But did you at least learn anything?"

Piffle ran her paw through Doll's curls. "They were mystified! Utterly bumblezoozled! The doctor was a very nice porcupine, with a stethoscope 'n everything. He and the nurses ran poor Dolly through a zillion tests. They threw all the voodoo they could think of at her. They melted her down, poured potions in her, fed her to this snakey-mouth-lava-thing; none of it worked! The doc said it was like her curse was alive and fighting back at them."

"Gosh, that's horrible." Toby squeezed Doll's hand. "I'm sorry."

When the waitress arrived with Junella's drink, Piffle ordered herself a blueberry milkshake. "We even tried giving her a face," she told Toby, "but that didn't work either. Here, watch." Piffle picked up a napkin, dumbfounded a tube of lipstick into existence, and drew a smiley on it. She placed the napkin over the hole in Doll's head, and it only stayed there for a second before suddenly decomposing to nothing.

Toby flinched back. "That is really weird!"

"And how!" Piffle concurred. "We tried it over 'n over with all different materials! Every time the same thing. Voop! Gone! They'd never seen anything like it before." She picked up Doll and held her around the waist. "But I don't mind. I still think you're pretty." She gave her a smooch, and to Toby she said, "All in all, a disappointing start. The only good parts were spending time with Junella-"

"Say my name once more in this lifetime and I will grind your soul to powder and piss on it," the skunk rumbled from across the table.

Piffle 'tee-hee'ed and continued on blithely. "-And the nurse's uniforms! They were so cute I got jealous!"

Toby honestly could not tell if the hamsterfly was just totally immune to Junella's temper, or was more aware than she let on and having a blast teasing her.

"Me 'n Zinc went to Dorster's," Toby said.

"Didja? Didja buy some neat stuff?" Piffle finally noticed his bracers and she ran her paws all over the metal, enjoying the texture.

"Got my hammer fixed up too."

He popped it into his hand, making Piffle go, "OOOOOHH!!"

Junella gave the mouse an especially dirty look. "Is the whole world fuckin' with me today!? I sent you to that shop to get yourself something better. Not to shiny up that shrimpy thing you already got!"

Zinc rotated Junella around so he could start giving her a shoulder massage. His wrenchhands gouged huge ruts in her plastic flesh, but it must have felt good from the way the mustelid moaned. "Chill city, partner. His hammer's nightmare-born. It's tougher than it looks. You shoulda seen what it did to that stove! Plus he's got a not-too-shabby pitching arm on him, so we threw in some ninja stars 'n daggers 'n shit."

The massage was working. Junella was practically melting on him and could barely lift her arm to respond. "...awrightIguess."

Zinc smirked, proud of himself for dousing her fuse. "Plus, oh happy day, I think I got an upgrade big enough for both of us."

She angled her head backwards, finally noticing the silver fezzes on his shoulders. She snorted at them. "Hell's bells, you're always bumpin' into me in close quarters as it is."

"Hey, they're removable!"

"I can't wait to see what they do," Piffle cooed.

He winked. "If someone tailgates us in traffic later, maybe you will."

"I don't wanna spoil the surprise, but trust me, they do some serious damage," Toby said. "Really cool. Really loud too! You shoulda seen how many cars Zinc destroyed! He went totally nuts!"

"I'll bet he did," Piffle replied with a bit of a flush to her cheeks. She turned to Junella. "So, what've we got planned for the rest of the afternoon?"

The skunk rolled her head towards the hamsterfly. "We're gonna play a game. A game where you stand in a hole sixty feet deep and I go get a shovel."

Piffle giggled. "Aw, you're so funny!"

Junella's orange eyes seemed to catch on fire. "Nothing I say works!!" she sang to Zinc. "She's a brick wall! She's titanium! I couldn't knock her down with dynamite! Could I be beaten? Zinc, I've killed things as big as submarines. I've seen more of this hellhole than most people have seen on maps. Why can't I make her shut up!?"

"Because secretly you like me," Piffle dared to tease, then slurped her milkshake.

"I must! Because ya ain't dead yet!!"

***

George had been left in the parking lot, since the girls' intent was to only be inside long enough to refresh themselves and pick up the fellas. The equine didn't mind this. In fact, he ended up having a fascinating chat with the otter attendant about chess.

When his passengers emerged, he noticed right away that Sir Zinc's shoulders seemed wider, and that Madam McPerricone and Madam Brox were keeping as far apart as possible. Also that Sire Toby was giving Madam Doll a piggyback ride.

They'd discussed sightseeing plans inside, but quickly rehashed them for George's benefit. Junella let Zinc plan the route, since she planned to spend most of the time in the car getting some goddamned peace and quiet. Piffle and Toby both said that they were up for whatever he suggested.

They retrieved the Fearsleigher from storage and Zinc tipped the attendant with a smooch on the cheek. George found it surprisingly satisfying to be harnessed again. Having a weight behind him and passengers depending on his effort made his nonexistent heart swell. "A feeling of usefulness gives one self-confidence," he observed.

Junella took the passenger seat this time. Toby and Piffle were in the back once more, giving Doll a reassuring hug between them. She drew little hearts on both their legs when they weren't looking. Zinc hoisted himself up to the driver's side and nearly fell back to the pavement when he forgot to account for his new shoulder width. At the insistence of Junella's scowl, he unscrewed the devices. As soon as he did, the chains popped off and absorbed fully into his flesh. "Handy," he noted, and tucked the fez-parts in the glove compartment. He didn't anticipate any heavy combat while they were still in Coryza anyway. With a cry of "Haul ass!" to George, they were off on their excursion.

And so began the longest and most pleasant afternoon Toby had so far spent in Phobiopolis.

After so many days spent in constant tense alertness (or eviscerating shame, or sheer blind terror), the calm of Coryza was a balm for Toby's soul. But there was something more than simple comfort he'd been missing since his arrival in Phobiopolis. Fun. He hadn't been able to relax enough to smile for most of his journey, much less laugh. But here he was in the realm's safest city, surrounded by people who'd proven worthy of his trust. Toby let his tension melt. He let thoughts of Anasarca be forgotten. For those few precious hours, he was simply a friend among friends.

Zinc, being a born showoff, relished his role as tour guide. As George ferried them to their first stop, Zinc had his head out the window the whole time, endlessly pointing out places worth seeing and people worth knowing. He said he'd actually lived in Coryza for a time, but started worrying all the safety might make him soft.

Toby was a bit surprised when their destination turned out to be the Coryzan Historical Preservation Confederation. Zinc did not seem the museum type, yet his tail was wagging wildly as he and the others exited the car. When Piffle and Junella had retrieved it from the parking space earlier, the otter had asked if they wanted to buy a resizer of their own so George wouldn't panic anyone else. This offer was eagerly agreed to. By now, George was highly amused with becoming tiny, and practically giggled when he was shrunken down to rodent-size again.

Zinc tried to coax Junella into coming along, but she said she really did want some time to herself. He respected that. So she laid down in the back seat of the Fearsleigher while it was reduced as well (to save on parking fees). Piffle picked it up with the skunk inside, George too, and handed them both to Toby. She said they'd be safe and toasty warm in his pajama pockets. Toby placed them inside, and reminded himself to be very careful in his movements or else they'd be walking the rest of the way minus two companions. (A moment later, he realized his pajamas hadn't had pockets until Piffle had said they did. His mind sputtered and rolled around on the floor for a moment, trying to figure that one out.)

Toby was already enjoying the museum even before he'd gotten past the lobby, simply because it was the site of his very first successful willwell-filling. True, the admission was so small the others paid theirs with merely a glance, but to Toby it was an important baby step. 'If I can do it once, I can do it again,' he told himself.

It did not take long to discover why Zinc was so fond of this place. The group passed through an immense marble doorway into the biggest room in the building: the hall of Coryza's founding. Here there was nearly as much weaponry on display as at Dorster's place. Toby was struck by a wave of solemnity. As his eyes roamed around, he saw dozens of paintings illustrating the struggle for civilization to conquer wilderness. There were depictions of great battles against hopeless waves of wild nightmares. And the actual weapons and construction tools were here to see too. Here was a display case full of swords, each damaged in a different way from secretions of different beasts. There was a front-end loader, its surface pockmarked and gouged by innumerable tooth and clawmarks. Kids were sitting in its scoop and getting their pictures taken.

In the center of the hall, people were crowding around a cluster of gilt-edged glass boxes. Each seemed to contain a thundercloud. When Toby investigated, his jaw dropped. These were memory clouds! Recollections assembled from the minds of the people who had really been there and died there. As Toby stared into one, he felt his perceptions being drawn to it. The deeper he let himself fall, the more the sights and sounds of battle filled his senses. It was deep night. Strange purple beams lit the workers pouring concrete for Coryza's foundation, a giant disc miles in diameter. Warriors encircled them, holding back the monsters so the work could progress. The dry desert ground was made muddy from the blood of men and beasts. Toby could hear the pounding of construction, the shrieks of death, and the clash of metal on armored flesh.

When he looked away, he was shaking. And actually crying. Just those brief seconds were overwhelming. To have actually lived in that time, to have risked so much for the benefit of others... Toby knew this was courage beyond his own comprehension. And too, this was a land without permanent death. So these men had gone to work knowing that sometimes the nightmares would win. They'd rip them to shreds and blot their minds with agony, and they'd have to do it all over again until the work was done.

Toby felt a duty to visit each and every memory. He watched the immense plates of Coryza's walls being forged. He watched riveters walking nonchalantly along beams four stories high. He watched night guards sending out arrows as fast as imaginite could make them, to stop the creatures that menaced the crews trying to fit the walls into place. He watched through the eyes of an unlucky welder as he was ambushed by something large and toothful, and his head went sliding down its gullet.

Toby was very glad that had been the last one in the room, because after that he really wanted to look at something else.

Thankfully, other rooms were smaller, quieter, and featured less bloodshed. There was an exhibit on storefront architecture. There were portraits of famous Coryzan citizens, along with artifacts from their lives. Toby was a little surprised to learn that the very first willwell had been invented here and was itself on display. It looked a lot like one of those massive old-timey radios.

The second floor was wholly dedicated to the arts. It was so silent Toby could hear the soles of his feet squeak on the hardwood. Here were paintings, sculptures, even graffiti, all depicting Coryzan life from a multitude of perspectives. It struck Toby deeply to see such evidence that the will to expression was truly unconquerable. Here, in this realm of eternal fear, people not only survived, they defiantly kept the fire of creativity alight. One particular painting stopped Toby dead in his tracks. It filled a whole wall from floor to ceiling. It depicted the wasteland around Coryza, filled with monsters so hideous they hurt to look at. Lolling eyes and slithering tongues. Great clawed hands, tendons straining. They were piled up against the wall, scratching and banging, standing on top of each other's trampled corpses in their frenzy to get inside. Toby could practically hear them. Yet on the other side of the wall was a pleasant city street. A small boy was skipping along next to his father, holding a balloon. The pair were laughing. They must have been able to hear the hammering, screeching horde outside. And yet they easily ignored it, seeing only one another.

The others, after losing track of Toby for several minutes, eventually found him standing in this same spot, still looking.

When Zinc gently suggested that they might like to move on and have something to eat, Toby nodded and let Piffle take his hand to lead him away. He hadn't seen everything in the museum, but he didn't think anything else that would top that painting.

Back outside in the fresh air and noontime traffic sounds, Toby seemed to snap out of it. He asked what Zinc had in mind for lunch. He pointed a few blocks away with his wrench, and Toby saw a group of people sitting on empty air fifty feet above an intersection.

Acrophobia seized him. But as they walked towards the uncanny sight, Zinc managed to explain it among bursts of trivia about everything else they were passing. (They resized the Fearsleigher long enough to retrieve Junella, whose mood had improved quite a bit after her Piffleless rest.)

No one was sure why it was called The Glass Triangle, since it was actually a square. Maybe it just sounded nicer. But years ago, when an enormous pane of nightmare-born glass had been discovered, someone got the idea to balance it on the far corners of four buildings and serve food there. Toby and the others went up a wrought-iron elevator to the fourth floor, to a small room where a waiter welcomed them. Like at the hotel, it was mostly a thoughtstaurant, though they did also serve drinks and appetizers. When Piffle saw the menu, she highly recommended the nurps. Toby asked what they were. Nurps were like snuds, she explained, but orange and pointy at one end. This did not leave Toby any clearer on the concept, but he said he'd try some if Piffle ordered them.

Walking up to the dining area, Toby came perilously close to soiling his pajamas for a second time that day. The wind was not terrible, but it was definitely bad. There were no guardrails. Just a flat pane of glass with tables and chairs and people all standing on it as if this were completely normal. Toby wrapped himself around the post at the top of the stairs and couldn't bring himself to move. Junella walked out like it was nothing and gave him a 'get over it' look. (Of course, that was easy for someone with the natural friction of grooved pawpads.) Piffle tried to make Toby feel better by saying that, even if he did fall off and go splat on the pavement below, he could just pick his guts back up and come back up to his meal. This did not make him feel better. Zinc tried too, saying that the glass was the same stuff as Toby's hammer. It would support their weight just fine. He even gave it a hard whack with his left wrench to demonstrate. It didn't shatter, didn't even wobble. (Though it did leave an ugly white streak which Zinc quickly stood on and hoped the waiter wouldn't notice.) Eventually Toby decided that maybe he could walk over to a table if Piffle had her hands around his waist the whole time, ready to fly him to safety if he slipped. She was, of course, perfectly happy with this arrangement.

After many cheek-nuzzles from Piffle, Toby found himself seated. He looked down and saw cars the size of hedgehogs doodling around below him. The glass was so crystal clear it genuinely looked like he was being held in the air by magic. It didn't help that the tables were transparent too. Toby's muscles were tight as violin strings, but a part of him had to admit that this was a pretty cool feat of engineering.

He ordered a mere pound when the waiter came back. Piffle got four again, plus a basket of nurps. When these arrived, Toby saw that they were definitely orange and pointy. And bizarrely delicious. They tasted somewhat like a combination of french fries, cheddar, and seafood, with just a hint of gasoline fumes. Toby turned his imaginite into a club sandwich. Piffle had a plate of ribs that soon resulted in her face and torso becoming a bloodbath of barbecue sauce. Junella chose a salmon steak, while Zinc had a borgelnuskie: a type of heartburn-inducing footlong sausage. They both enjoyed coconuts full of rum. George once again enjoyed everything everyone else was enjoying.

As they ate, they chatted. About the museum, the food, how they'd slept last night, etcetera. No mention was made of the journey ahead of them. This moment was like the celebration before shipping out for military service. The calm before the storm. It was a time to concentrate on the happy present instead of the perilous future.

Toby actually managed to relax enough to eat. So long as he didn't look down too much, he could pretend he wasn't really so high up. He focused on his food, and also the pretty little park a block away. Its presence made sense. In this city-in-a-box, people would need some natural beauty to stay sane. There was a little lake down there. Kids were splashing in it. People were biking past the trees. Toby smiled.

When everyone's plates contained nought more than puddles and crumbs, the group filled the willwell for their bill and headed to their next attraction. George was rebiggened and carried them to the aptly-named House Of Impossible Architecture. Zinc realized and admitted that this was probably not the smartest place to go to after a meal. They might run the risk of seeing their food come back to wave howdy.

One step inside and Toby already felt his brain breaking. Corzya's architects had, purely for amusement, utilized the properties of imaginite, uncertainty ore, and their own wildest dreams to bring all the classical optical illusions to life. The rules of gravity and physics were given the middle finger in here. Every surface of the large building was completely explorable, with padding wherever people were most likely to fall off. Zinc started off running sideways up a ceiling and the others followed.

Toby's stomach didn't enjoy this place very much, but the rest of him definitely did. This was like Escherland: The Theme Park. He defied gravity with ease, running upside down on floating ramps that would suddenly invert to position him upright again, but only so long as he perceived that he was. He took a drink from a fountain where the water flowed up, curved in midair, then went sideways out the window. Zinc challenged him to race to the top of a Penrose staircase. Toby tried for a while before realizing he was being duped. Zinc cracked up and Toby playfully shoved him off the edge into a portal which soon had him falling from the ceiling about ten times before he managed to grab solid ground. No hard feelings, of course. 

Toby found a display of impossible objects. All sorts of geometrical figures which couldn't exist in three dimensions, yet did. He could even pick them up and turn them around. There was also a wall of mirrors nearby. Toby could see himself reflected in each one, but behind him was a different part of the building than he was standing in. And by stepping forward into the glass, he could actually go there. At one point he found himself on the inside of a möbius arch. Piffle was below, and they both stood on tiptoes to touch noses.

Junella had been keeping track of time. She took up the responsibility to herd everyone else together when the clock showed they were getting close to when they'd promised Lady Xenoiko they'd check out. Even though they had all their gear with them, they still had to go back and pay for the room, which Junella admitted she should have thought of earlier. Everyone else had forgotten too. So they bade farewell to the House Of Impossible Architecture and everyone wobbled a bit as they crossed the sidewalk outside.

They were halfway back to the hotel when Zinc got beestung by an idea. He begged and cajoled and wheedled Junella to let him make one more stop. She snarled some, but allowed it. George pulled off a beautiful U-turn in the middle of traffic and soon the Fearsleigher was wedged in an alley beside Pick's Used Books.

Pick turned out to be a furson made entirely of mud. Their gender was unguessable, and so was the question of how they managed to keep all the books clean. Zinc zoomed to the back of the store and the others soon heard a triumphant, "They're still here!" The canine returned with a bulging wrenchload of old hot rod magazines which he enthusiastically paid for.

Toby didn't have much time to look around, but the shop was small enough that the time he had was all he needed. Like many of its kind, this bookstore's shelves were crammed full and tight. Dust sprinkled down from some of the top-shelf volumes. Toby noticed with a bit of bitterness how all the titles turned to pure craziness when he tried to read them: 'Abernarthry And The Vellum Snorpengrvlrd6r', 'Goopnose Borks Damp' 'Quillflautin's Drembrubeastness', and '10 Ways To Kelk Shreempf This Summer!' Though in the young adult section, he knew at least one book on sight from the cover illustration. It was one of his favorites from home, and it was short enough that he had half a chance of actually finishing it before they reached Anasarca. He brought it up to the register, where Piffle had somehow selected a massive stack of reading material that had to be held in place with her chin when she walked. Junella bought a political thriller and a paperback about lumberjacks.

Soon they were back at the Tatterdemalion and Zinc flirted with the otter attendant some more. As they headed up the steps to the main entrance, Piffle felt a grooved black hand give her arm a tug. She turned, puzzled, and Junella was giving her a 'No more bullshit' look.

In the calmest tone she could manage, she informed Piffle that this was the point where their journey would really begin. If the hamster wanted to come along to support Toby, that was fine. But she'd have to find a way to make herself useful. "I am no one's babysitter. You got any weapons stored under that skirt? Combat experience?" The implication was clear: 'If you don't, this city is the best place to drop you off while we head on.'

Piffle straightened her hem and said primly that, though she wasn't fond of fighting, she could handle herself just fine. "I ain' no palooka, but I get by," were her exact words.

Junella sighed and, clearly ignoring her better instincts, said she was willing to give Piffle a fair shake. But she strongly "suggested" that anyone who rode in her car oughtta at least have a defensive weapon on them. She told the hamster to flutter on over to Dorster's and pick up something, anything, "And make it quick!!" she yelled as Piffle buzzed off.

Junella hopped up the steps to rejoin the boys. Zinc was showing Toby how package delivery worked in Phobiopolis. Delicately, he separated out the ones he wanted to read most eagerly from his stack of new magazines, and placed the rest in a pile next to a gravestone-shaped gape in the lobby wall. After tying them up with a spool of provided twine, he stepped back and hollered. Toby managed not to scream as a rat the size of a panther poked his grizzled snout out, took the package in his teeth, and presumably carried it back to the Jennie-Mae.

Toby had earlier been curious how the mouse-post system handled things larger than a letter. "But if they can carry bigger things, why don't people just ship themselves place to place?"

Zinc cringed. "A good question. See, the Vermillion only handle inanimate objects. As in, that's what you'll end up as if they handle you. Kinda like what Doll's got. Clear enough picture?"

Toby cringed too.

Lady Xenoiko was tending to hotel business at the moment, leaving Mr. Xenoiko to handle the cash register. The tiny simian was a flurry of movement and good cheer. His eyes were magnified to the size of baseballs by his glasses and his beard grew down to his belt. When the group of five was assembled before him, he shook all their hands quite vigorously for someone his age. He asked everyone lots and lots of questions about their satisfaction with their stay. His delight whenever they said they liked something was off the charts. He would frequently leap into little improvised dance moves.

Then he played the register like a ragtime piano, totaling up their room, the alterations to it, and the parking fees. When he showed them the willwell, Junella offered Toby a try at seeing how much of it he could fill. He gulped. He reminded himself he'd been able to pay for his book back at Pick's, and no one expected him to fill the whole thing. So he stood calmly, cleared his mind, and focused on the red line. His construction crew readied their ropes and chains. He tried to channel the feeling of watching the workers build Coryza's mighty walls. And the red line moved a bit. Not much, but more than Toby was expecting.

He pushed and pulled and shoved until his eyes started to cross. Junella observed. When she thought he was about to hurt himself from the strain, she gave him a 'not too shabby' nod, then gently shoved him aside.

The skunkess stood in front of the willwell, took a deep breath, then gave it a look like it had just murdered her sensei. Toby watched the red line move much, MUCH quicker than when he'd tried. Toby had gotten a few centimeters in as many minutes. Junella had it almost to the halfway point in half that time.

Then her concentration was shattered by, "Hiya, fellas!! I'm back!!"

Junella turned slowly to face Piffle and growled murderously at seeing the hamsterfly's hands empty. "Were they closed? Did you get lost!?"

"Nope!" she bubbled. "In fact, soon as I said I was pals with Zinc 'n Toby, Mr. Bird Man got real nice! I flitted around and saw all this mean-looking poky stuff. None of it suited me. But then near the back, I saw it! I knew I wanted it the second I laid eyes on it!!"

Junella's face screwed up in a grimace of unfathomable irritation. "What, exactly, did you buy?" she rumbled like a bluesman singing about drowning his wife.

Piffle made a 'tsk tsk' gesture. "You nosy thing! You'll just have to wait and see. But I did take your advice and got something that'll be real good in a scrap, I promise!" She pulled up her blouse, revealing a faint glow coming from inside her bellybutton. "He even gave me a place to keep it!" she said, adding giggles for punctuation.

The side of Junella's face twitched. "I don't wanna know," she said flatly. "If I know, it'll kill me, I know it. So I don't wanna know it."

Piffle looked behind her and noticed the cash register. "Oh! You're payin' for the room?" She fluttered over. "Let me take care of that for you, please! You've been so nice, letting me stay with you. It's the least I can do. You shoulda waited and let me get the whole thing."

The skunk's expression towards Piffle did not exactly soften, but she shrugged. "I ain't gonna stop nobody payin' my bills for me."

"Thank you, Junella!" Piffle shook both the skunk's paws before she could be stopped.

Junella hissed like a cobra.

Piffle took her spot before the willwell, stuck out her tongue a little, and thought at it.

What happened next was extraordinary.

Toby had been facing Junella, and saw her expression change from frenzied annoyance, to disbelief, then confusion, then outright disbelief, then realization, and finally an equally-frenzied look of 'Holy shit, I have stumbled onto a gold mine.'

When Toby looked at the willwell, he realized that Piffle had paid off the entire remaining half of their total in a mere seven seconds. And without batting an eyelash.

Toby connected the dots. Junella obviously believed her own will was pretty strong. She and Zinc could fill a willwell pretty fast. But they were go-karts compared to Piffle. The hamsterfly was a turbine-powered racecar. Which meant that her will was stronger than any of them had suspected.

In Phobiopolan terms, she was a golden goose.

Toby could practically see dollar sounds and 'ka-ching' noises pouring out of Junella's ear-holes. She was damn near salivating on the carpet.

The willwell 'ding'ed and Piffle turned around, smiling as usual, not showing a hint of exertion. "All done! So are we ready to hit the road?"

Junella swiveled to Zinc and asked with her expression, 'Did you fucking SEE that!?'

Zinc looked like a bullet train had just gone past an inch in front of his face. He nodded.

They both looked at Piffle.

And they grinned.

*****

Part TWENTY-TWO

Outside the Tatterdemalion, Junella told Piffle and Toby to go amuse themselves while she and Zinc did a full check of the Fearsleigher. Just in case anything had come loose or got stolen.

Piffle fluttered off to check out a floral display on the second floor of the building across the street. But Toby kept an eye on the skunk and canine. He held Doll and kneaded her forearm worriedly.

N-E-R-V-O-U-S-? she spelled.

"Maybe," he whispered back. He could see that Junella hadn't lied about checking the car or their stuff, but she and Zinc were doing an awful lot of hushed, urgent talking. And their faces were still stuck in predatory grins.

"I don't think they'd do anything bad to Piffle, but..." He fidgeted. "Should I say anything?"

Doll thought a bit. U-P-T-O-Y-O-U

Toby looked at the duo, standing shoulder to shoulder while they rustled around in the trunk. Then he looked up at Piffle, hovering in place and blissfully sniffing blooms. Occasionally, Junella or Zinc would steal a glance at the hamsterfly like they wanted to dissect her.

Gathering the microscopic traces of bravery within him into something resembling a spark, Toby set his jaw and headed over.

He overheard whispers. "...could buy our own willwell and have her fill it during the ride!"

Toby cleared his throat. "Excuse me. Are you two planning to exploit Piffle?"

Junella turned around and Toby swore her eyes were glowing. In a flash she was standing an inch in front of him with cutlass in hand. She was so close he could almost read the record labels in her eyes. "Don't you dare say a word to her!! I know you, goody-two-shoes. We ain't planning nothin', so just go back over to where you were and keep your lips zipped!"

Toby trembled but did not flee. Instead, he scowled. "Piffle is my friend. She cares about me, I care about her. Whatever it is you were saying about her, I wanna hear it too."

Junella looked on the verge of shrieking for a second, then she blinked. She looked down at the sword in her hand, then clumsily sheathed it out of embarrassment. "...Jesus, that was out of line. I'm sorry. It's just... I mean..." Her upper lip flared in frustration. "Zinc, dammit! You tell him!" She stomped off towards the back of the Fearsleigher and pretended it needed inspection.

Zinc rubbed the back of his head. "Yeah... that got ugly. Sorry if you thought we were gonna tip her upside down 'n shake her like a piggy bank. Because... we kinda were." He winced, then got defensive. "You saw what she did in there! NO ONE can fill a willwell that quick! Well, almost no one. It's like finding out you've been riding around with a millionaire in yer car."

Toby crossed his arms and said nothing. (Doll didn't either.)

"C'mon man! Think about it from our position! We do this adventurin' shit because it's in our blood, not for payday. Sure it rockets up our own wills, and we get a lot of shiny souvenirs, but road trips are expensive! The food, the fuel, the survival gear!"

"Did it cross your mind to just ask Piffle if she minds helping you out with that?"

Zinc flinched as if Toby had whacked his nose with a newspaper. "...No."

Toby kinda pitied Zinc for that. He walked closer and put a hand on the mutt's shoulder. "You saw how much she wanted to help pay off the hotel bill. Probably anything you asked of her, she'd be happy to do. Some people like to be helpful."

Zinc's tail was tucked between his knees. "Yeh... Again, sorry. We got greedy. Greedy breeds paranoia, y'know?" 

Toby nodded. "There's this mystery show I watch a lot, and the detective's motto is, 'It never hurts to ask politely.' It works out for her a lot."

Zinc 'hmmph'ed a little. "Ain't always been my experience."

Toby gave him a 'you just watch' look. He turned around and cupped a hand to his mouth, "HEY PIFFLE!"

Zinc freaked out a bit, gesticulating wildly in a 'what the hell do you think you're doing!?' way.

Piffle's antennae twitched, she gave a last big sniff, then zoomed towards them. She landed as delicately as a rose petal. "What's cookin', gents?"

Toby quite bluntly said, "Junella and Zinc were both amazed at how quickly you took care of the bill and they were plotting how to trick you into paying off all their trip expenses."

Zinc clutched his cheekfur and whimpered.

The hamsterfly tossed back her head and laughed. "That's silly! Why wouldn't they just ask me?"

Zinc was honestly surprised by that reaction.

Junella's head popped up from behind the Fearsleigher.

Piffle waved to her. "If ya want me to be your financier, I'm fine with that! Didn't I already tell you?"

The skunk sheepishly slid around the vehicle. "Yes. You did. I just didn't believe it."

Piffle gave her a genuinely warm smile. "Aw, I understand. You're not used to people bein' nice to you just to be nice, huh?"

"Not in our line of work, no," she begrudgingly mumbled. "So... You're actually serious? If we get to EC and run up a few million grit in gear, you don't mind paying that off?"

"Sure I don't!" she giggled. "If it helps us get where we're going, why not?"

Junella had a hard time understanding things from Piffle's purely philanthropic position, though that last bit of self-preservation logic clicked with her. "Allright, allright..."

Piffle gave her a quick squeeze before she could protest, then twirled over to kiss Zinc's nose. "Though if you guys do decide to tie me up 'n tickle my feet with feathers 'till I pay for everything, that'd be okay too!"

She traipsed off to the backseat while Zinc and Junella both sputtered and Toby slapped a paw over his mouth to keep from giggling.

***

They were five miles out of Coryza when Junella suddenly made a face like she just realized she'd left the water running. "SHEEEEIT!"

George, who had been thoroughly enjoying seeing how much of a dust plume he could kick up behind him, intuited that such an exclamation probably meant she wanted him to stop. So he planted his hooves and let the Fearsleigher come to a thumpy halt against his bony tush. "Something the matter, Madam Brox?"

"Yes!" she spat, obviously furious at herself. "I got so keyed up about money, I completely forgot about what we're heading into." She opened the skatecar's door and indicated everyone else should do the same.

Zinc looked puzzled, then was struck with the same realization she'd had. "We forgot to chain the car! Five-fucks-and-a-half, that coulda been bad!"

Coryza was a spot on the horizon by now. The group was surrounded by miles upon miles of desert. The ground was as cracked and dry as week-old brownies. The moon was full in the sky. The fact that Coryza's walls were down indicated that this was the safer part of night, but Toby was still concerned about stepping out of their vehicle into the open. He remembered the monsters in the painting...

Like an orchestra conductor, Junella waggled her scarf to line the others up beside George. "This shit's important! It's better if I can see all your faces so I can make sure you're listening."

"Aye aye!" Piffle said, giving the girl scout salute.

Junella blended with the night, creating a strange illusion. Her feet were clearly visible against the dusty, bleached ground, but the rest of her melted against the sky. She was visible mostly as her scarf, her eyes, and the slivers of moonlight reflecting off her curves.

She pointed dramatically in the direction they'd been heading. "THAT," she started, "is the quickest route to Ectopia Cordis. But it's gonna be one bad picnic. Zinc and I have been through it. You four haven't."

"Amaurosis Fugax," Zinc moaned balefully.

Junella nodded, glad he'd said the name so she wouldn't have to go hunting around herself for the syllables. "...What he said. It's not physically dangerous, but it WILL mess with you. Out there, we're gonna start runnin' into roaming clouds of phobias. You can't see 'em, you can't smell 'em, you can't do anything about 'em. They're gonna get in your brains and kick stuff around. One minute everything'll be fine. The next, you'll be so scared you literally can't think straight."

"Of what? Piffle asked.

Junella threw her hands up. "Anything!! Any damn thing anyone's ever been afraid of; it's somewhere in there. That's why we gotta lock ourselves in the car. We got these bigass heavy chains in the back. George, you're gonna have to make sure they're secure once we're all in."

The spectral stallion nodded. "I may not possess thumbs, but I shall do my very best."

"And since you're a nightmare, I'm gonna roll the dice and say the clouds won't have any effect on you."

"I do dimly remember this area. I never encountered anything similar to what you're describing, so you are very likely correct."

She looked relieved. "Good to hear."

Toby raised his hand like he was in class. "Um, what would have happened if we went in there without the chains?"

"Maybe nothing, Maybe we'd get lucky. Or maybe we'd hit a cloud of claustrophobia and all run out into the wasteland and our minds'd turn into permanent soup. Or maybe we'd run into a fear of bugs, or skunks, or whatever the hell Zinc is." He chuckled. "I know for damn sure that if we ran into a fear of dolls, I'd claw over all the rest of you to be the first one to throw that nasty thing out the window."

Piffle hugged Doll protectively. "I wouldn't let you."

Junella smiled a sick little smile. "Oh really now? You think you could resist it? That's the worst part about the place. It's one-hun-dred-per-cent irrational. I don't care how much more willpower you got than me, it doesn't matter. Whatever cloud we run into, that's what you'll fear. End of story. We've gone through here before and I've been so terrified of Zinc I've straight-up panic-murdered him."

Piffle looked to Zinc in horror.

He shrugged. "I've done the same to her," he said. "At least with the chains on, we re-form inside the car and keep going. S'better than getting lost."

Toby paled. Physical monsters were frightening enough. But there was something much more insidious about having your thoughts and perceptions come under attack. And to the point of being deathly afraid of one's own friends! "Is there any way to avoid it? I mean... I'm sure if you're taking us through, it means any other route will be worse..."

Junella nodded. "Betcher ass. Like I said, this place can't physically harm us. Much as I hate it, I'd rather drive through a carnival funhouse than a real minefield."

"Allright, that's logical. But, um... Could you maybe just hit me in the head and knock me out for the whole thing? I don't think I can handle it!"

She chortled at the suggestion. "Nice thinkin'. But all that'd happen is the fears'd get in your dreams. And that'd be worse. If you're awake, you're only reacting to what you can see. If you're dreaming, your brain can play fill in the blanks with whatever the clouds want."

The mental images Toby's mind conjured up from that idea were almost enough to make him pass out. Piffle put an arm out to steady him. "How long will we be in there?" he whined.

Junella considered George's speed. "It's always taken us about two hours. We might do better if the pony express puts some zoom on it."

"That shouldn't be any trouble," George said proudly. "Though I have a question of my own, Madam Brox."

"You ain't gotta be so formal. Just ask it."

"Ah. Yes. Anyway, my night vision is quite excellent, and there appears to be a pack of cactusyotes a mile off, attempting to approach stealthily. Shall I kill them now or let them get closer first to allow them a false sense of confidence?"

Junella chuckled. "Whatever floats your boat."

"That seems a little mean," Toby muttered. Whatever the creatures were, they were probably just looking for food.

"I assure you, Sire Toby," George said, "They are nightmares, the same as I. They do not want our meat. Only our terror. Besides, unless it truly makes you uncomfortable, I sometimes feel a need to act upon my more vulgar instincts. Best I direct these outbursts at non-sentient beings, true?"

Toby made a sound like, 'I can't argue with that.'

"Go for it then. Keep 'em away while we prep the car," Junella sang.

George's aura burned brighter. "With supreme pleasure, Madam Brox!!" He let out a fierce bray and went charging off towards the concealed beasts.

Soon enough, even over the sound of the chains being dragged out of the trunk, they could all hear squealing yelps of pain and George's delighted, demented laughter.

***

Closing padlocks with your teeth is not easy. Especially if you don't have any lips. Especially if you happen to be harnessed to the front of the thing you're trying to lock up.

Once the others had put as many chains around the skatecar's body as they could, they all squeezed through the one remaining entrance and gave George the signal. Piffle cheered him on while he tried to loop the last lock through two chains at once, then keep it there while he clamped it shut. Finally, after a lot of fiery snorting, 'click'.

"Whatever money nightmares use, you definitely deserve some for that," Junella praised.

"Thank you, Madame Brox! And though I have no need for currency, the sentiment is very much appreciated."

The skunk slapped her hands on the dashboard. "Allright! We're 'bout to get going. Any objections?"

"I gotta use the little boys' room," Zinc piped up.

Junella parted his hair with her sword. "You better learn to piss through your nose out the window in the next ten seconds."

He 'tee hee'ed. "Kidding, Juney, kidding!"

She rolled her eyes and sighed. "Any REAL objections?"

Piffle shook her head. Toby did too, though he was compulsively wringing his pajama sleeve to manage his fear. He did not like this one little bit. But if Junella said it was the best way through, there wasn't anything he could do about it.

Junella shouted to George. "When I say go, you take off in that direction and don't stop for nothing. I mean it! NOTHING! No matter if we're screamin' bloody murder for you to let us out, don't listen!"

George nodded. "Understood, Madam. Though... what if there is an actual emergency, and for whatever reason you do need to be let out?"

"There won't be," she snapped.

"But what if there is?" Piffle asked.

Junella growled, "Then we'll just yell louder!"

George was confused. "But you said not to let you out even if you do scream."

Junella did scream.

Toby had a sudden flash of logic. "I've got it! Since you said we'd be scared out of our minds with irrational fear, if an emergency comes up and we do need George to stop, we'll just ask calmly. Thus proving we're in our right minds."

Zinc made an 'impressed' noise. "Makes sense."

"That actually does," Junella admitted. She reached behind the seat to give the mouse a thumbs-up. 

Toby felt rather glad to have contributed. Doubly so when Piffle tickled his ear with an antenna.

With that out of the way, Junella consulted her compass-like device one more time just to be absolutely sure, then dumbfounded it away and pointed forward. "Let's go, George."

And go he did. Everyone was thrown back in their seats as the luminous nightmare went from 0 to 60 in about three seconds. He kept accelerating until he reached the same speed as when he'd been racing to reach Coryza.

Toby let out the breath he'd inhaled sharply. "How long until the clouds start showing up?"

Junella shrugged. "Hard to say. Coming from this direction, it'll be desert turning into wasteland: not much difference. Nothing can grow there since even the grass is too scared to stay."

Toby winced. He did not like the idea of having no advance warning. He worried about which fear would be the first to smack into him.

Piffle noticed his expression and put Doll on his lap. "Here. Hugs always help."

He squeezed their toy companion and smiled to Piffle. "Thanks."

I-M-S-C-A-R-E-D-T-O-O, Doll wrote.

Toby rested his chin on her headfur. "Maybe we can help each other not be," he whispered.

As George sped on and the moon stared at them from above, worry eventually melted into boredom. Toby had been keeping an eye on the landscape so he'd notice any changes. But after several minutes of staring at the same fissured ground, he began to wonder if it ever would. He also began to wonder if you could only transition from one section of Phobiopolis to the next if you weren't paying attention when it happened. No, that couldn't be, could it? There had to be taxi drivers or truckers or some similar profession that needed to keep their eyes on the road. Or maybe they just pointed their cars in their desired direction, put a brick on the accelerator and took a nap?

Toby did not discover whether or not a watched landscape never boils, because eventually he grew too restless. He took out the book he'd gotten from Pick's and found that he could read the title with ease now: The Dot And The Anchor, by Gordon Delevane. Even the table of contents was easy. Toby guessed this was because he had an expectation of what would be written there. While Piffle played cat's cradle, Toby started on chapter one. He tried to lose himself in the story, knowing the phobias would start hitting him soon. He figured he'd just make it worse on himself if he dwelt on anticipation.

He was a respectable seven pages in when he felt his heartbeat speed up. "There aren't any centipedes in the car, are there?" he asked.

"I was just about to ask you the same thing!" Zinc yelped.

Toby looked up and saw Piffle. He gasped and drew back in the corner. "You're not a centipede, are you!?"

"No, no!!" she protested. "They eat flies like me! At least I think they do. If they can catch us!"

"Everybody shut up about centipedes!!" Junella howled from the front seat. She caught a glimpse of her own scarf in the corner of her vision and jumped.

Toby looked all around the interior of the car, dead certain that those hideous insects with their endless tiny legs were squirming their way through every crevice, slithering through the upholstery, swimming in the gas tank, crawling all over the roof and doors and-

The fear suddenly vanished. Toby exhaled.

He looked out the window. Things had changed. But as Junella had said, not by much. The ground was sandy now, not cracked, but it was an even grayer color that reminded Toby of powdered bone. Here and there he saw dead trees and shrubs. All were contorted horribly. They looked like they really had been scared to death.

"Are the fear-things all gonna be that short?" he asked, daring to hope.

"No way to tell," Zinc said. "A minute? Ten? Fifteen? I heard about a guy who drove through here once and was crapping his pants over piranhas for half an hour straight." He rubbed the sides of his head. "This place makes my guts knot."

Toby reached out to take Piffle's hand. She gave him a look that said they shared a wavelength. They both looked out the window. Junella had told them the clouds were invisible, but they still squinted ahead nonetheless.

Suddenly, Junella shouted, "YAAH!!" and started frantically trying to cover every inch of her body with her scarf.

A second later, Toby felt it too. He checked his pajamas all over, mortified that anyone else might be able to see an ounce of indecent flesh.

Piffle blushed hard and smoothed her skirt down.

"Zinc you bastard, gimme your jacket!!" Junella was already tugging it off him.

"Careful, you'll rip it! Besides, wait a second and you'll go back to not caring!"

"I CAN'T!!" she screeched. Having no success at getting the leather sleeve past the giant wrench, she popped open the glove compartment and covered herself with a road map. "None of you fuckers saw anything! Not one of you!!"

Needless to say, she was quite embarrassed and apologetic when they left the nudity cloud a few minutes later.

She'd only gotten the map folded once before they drove into fear of the dark and all hell broke loose.

Moonlight was definitely not enough. Everyone in the car (minus Doll) all screamed constantly as Junella and Zinc both fumbled for the interior light. He nearly amputated her hand in the process. When the overhead glow came on, they all sighed in relief and huddled as close to it as they could. Junella held her wrist to stop it bleeding and gave Zinc a dirty look.

This was a long fear. For about eighteen miserable minutes, all four of them clustered around the ceiling bulb. Junella turned on the floodlights too, and Piffle managed to dumbfound a flashlight to point at their feet in case anything nasty was coming from below.

After the cloud passed. they all sighed in relief and plopped fully back in their seats. Zinc laughed weakly at how ridiculous they all looked, but it hadn't been funny to live through. Toby said it reminded of him of when he was on some of his more hallucinogenic medications, lying in bed in the dark, his fevered brain feeding him all sorts of imaginary horrors.

Thankfully, their respite was fairly long as well. Nearly six minutes.

Then the fear of heights hit. This one was easy to deal with so long as they all avoided looking out the windows. Whenever any of them did, the relatively minor distance from the chassis to the ground seemed like miles. Junella hummed quietly to distract herself. Toby buried his face in his book and read the same sentence twelve times.

But all the phobias they'd suffered through so far were nothing compared to the next one. The others were merely cruel pranks. Then it got bad.

Fear of mice.

Piffle had been tracing a finger along Toby's leg when suddenly she whipped her hand away like it was stuck in shit. She screamed ear-shatteringly loud. Doll fell off of Toby's lap and was immeasurably grateful for it, since it meant no one was looking at her and she could crawl as far under the seats as possible.

Junella and Zinc looked up in the rear view mirror to see what the hell was going on. There in their own back seat was a rabies-carrying, buck-toothed, flea-ridden vermin. A huge one! Grotesque pink eyes! A tail like a worm! Zinc shoved himself away from it so hard he nearly cracked the windshield. Junella had her cutlass out and was trying to simultaneously stab the monster to death while keeping as far away from it as possible.

Toby had no idea what was going on at first. Everyone was screaming and pointing at him. Junella's sword slashed his knee open. He gasped in pain and looked down at the wound. At himself.

Furless feet with curved claws. Bleach-white grimy fur. His hands were hideous, scrabbling bony things. He looked around and saw his reflection in the mirror.

Toby's scream was the loudest of them all.

He started trying to escape from his own skin.

He was out of his pajamas in an instant, shredding through them like paper. He scratched at the backs of his hands but the skin wasn't coming off fast enough. He ripped at his legs. He pulled on his tail so hard he dislocated it twice. He punctured his own eyes so they wouldn't have to see that unspeakable thing in the window. He clawed his ears in half. He dug his fingers into his face and pulled with the strength of a madman. Blood and screams poured out.

The others screamed too and tried to tear their way out of the car any way they could. Junella's needles destroyed the ceiling. Piffle broke her own fingers trying to pry the chains away from the window. Zinc smashed the windshield to smithereens and tried to force himself through. He wedged his head through the chains and had nearly snapped both his collarbones when suddenly the fear wore off.

Pain rushed in to take its place.

Toby's screams died out in a whimpering gurgle. He could not see anything, but he could feel hot, sticky blood covering him head to toe. And every single part of him was on fire with agony. A thin, wavering cry started within his throat. He choked on it as it grew in volume, until it was the siren wail of someone who cannot bear to spend one single second longer in the reality they found themselves in.

Piffle immediately crawled across the seat to hug him with all her heart. She rubbed her cheek to his and the tears washed some of the red away. "Toby, I'm here! We're not afraid of you anymore! I'm sorry I couldn't stop you from hurting yourself! I'm so sorry!"

Junella looked behind her. "Oh jesus!!" Blood was everywhere. It looked like a paint can had exploded. She was starting to smell it. She realized her sword was in her hand and there was blood on it too. "Oh Toby, I apologize! Sweet holy fuck, I apologize!"

Zinc was rather stuck in the chains. And he could now feel all the broken glass that was digging into his ribcage. "What happened!?"

"Toby peeled himself like a banana," she said.

Zinc was suddenly really glad he was stuck. Just thinking about that made him taste his lunch again. "You're gonna be okay!" he shouted towards the back seat, trying to sound encouraging.

Toby heard none of this. He was sobbing so hard he was nearly hyperventilating. The pain was indescribable. His mind was a burning electric web. He held onto Piffle for dear life.

Junella hated this, but she knew what she had to do. "Move back a bit, Piffle."

Piffle saw the sword in her hand. She gasped at what the skunk was about to do, but realized it was the only option. She tried to pull away but Toby was holding her too tight. "I guess, just try to aim good," she whimpered.

Junella nodded. She tried to block out the sounds of Toby's tortured weeping. She carefully positioned her cutlass.

She thrust her arm out and smoothly buried the blade right down the center of his throat.

The mouse gurgled and spasmed for a second. Then Junella gave her wrist a sharp turn and he went silent.

She got her sword out of the way just in time as the mutilated Toby twisted out of reality and a perfectly healed Toby snapped into its place.

There was no shock-induced denial to retreat into this time. Toby was 100% unavoidably aware of what had just happened to him. Fresh tears splashed his cheeks. He looked down at his whole, unharmed self. Then at the gargantuan splatter of mouseblood he was sitting in. Piffle looked like she'd been drowned in barbecue sauce for the second time today. He nevertheless fell onto her in a hug because it was the only thing he could do. As he shuddered, Piffle ran her paws through his fur.

That was when they passed through a cloud of ornithophobia; the fear of birds.

This actually ended up being beneficial. For one, it gave Zinc the motivation to get his head the hell out of the open and back into the safety of the car. Secondly, it gave Toby's mind something else to think about other than having just lived through the worst moment of his life.

Junella kept her sword at the ready, just in case any filthy motherfucker with claws and beaks came flapping through the shattered windshield. She leaned in to touch Toby's shoulder. "You okay? Your mind's not fried, I hope?"

Toby's whole body was locked up. He'd curled into a fetal position on the seat. He tried to squeeze words out through his breaths. "No, I'm... still here..." He turned his face to the skunk and said something she didn't expect. "Thank... you."

She cocked her head. "For killin' you?"

He managed a nod. "It made... the pain... stop. No har... hard feelings."

Junella slipped down off her seat and slithered closer to put her arm around him. "I think you're toughening up, mouse. I wouldn't've expected you to be so rational after what just happened."

The trembling mouse looked up to Piffle, then over at Zinc, down to Doll, and back at Junella. "I've... been through a... lot of fear already. I'm... starting to get u... used to it I guess. And having you all with me... helps."

Zinc leaned closer to give him a light, companionable tap.

"I hate to say this," Junella started, "but something just as bad's probably gonna happen again. With just two of us in a car goin' through this place, Zinc and I usually end up a bit bloody. With five?" She shook her head. "I'm sorry, Toby. It's gonna get worse before it ends."

He groaned a bit.

Piffle kissed him behind his ears.

He mumbled something into her skirt.

"What was that?"

"Can you help me... get my pajamas back on?"

***

It was a good thing they'd spent the afternoon in Coryza relaxed and happy. It not only gave them memories to retreat into, but it had brought them closer to one another. There was no way to stop the waves of fear that kept infecting their minds, but at least they could console one another after each one passed.

Fear of needles was next. Junella managed to plunge her fingertips under her seat before she got a good look at them. If her reflexes hadn't been so quick, she knew she would have likely chewed her own hands off and spat them out the window. The others talked her through it, saying anything they could to keep her from thinking about the thin, shiny, pointy needles right at the ends of her own fingers.

That one was mercifully short, but then they plunged into fear of social interaction. Altogether, it was probably the easiest to deal with. But everyone squeezed themselves as far away from the others as they could in the cramped vehicle. Everything they thought of to say seemed incredibly stupid. They knew the others would laugh at them and ostracize them forever for it. For once, Doll was grateful for her inability to speak.

Then came fear of broken glass. Junella and Zinc both took one look at the remains of the windshield and screamed themselves into the backseat.

This had the unfortunate consequence of one of Zinc's wrenches accidentally smashing Piffle's left eye into pulp. She squeaked in pain and was soon the center of many comforting hugs. Zinc apologized about a thousand times, kissing her paw again and again. When she had calmed down enough to concentrate, she tried to let herself heal back, but couldn't manage it. She nodded to Junella, who killed her back to normal. Toby wished he could be so composed. Piffle said she'd give him more lessons sometime.

The phobias persisted. A seemingly endless parade of them. Fear of spiders. Fear of trains. Fear of, bizarrely enough, octagons. The fear of skeletons had them all huddled in the back seat again, shrieking and throwing anything they could get their hands on at George. Thankfully, most were stopped by the chains over the windshield. A few projectiles did get through, but he weathered them silently, knowing his friends knew not what they did.

Then came fear of betrayal. There was a flurry of motion and then it was over. No one even had time to scream. Junella had already been tense as a bowstring, so the instant the fear hit, her cutlass decapitated everyone else in the car. She sat there, panting, sword arm shaking, watching the four corpses with wide eyes. When one of the bodies twitched, Junella made it stop. By the time they'd passed through the cloud, she was backed into a corner amid a sea of blood and fleshy puzzle pieces.

She cried when they came back to life. She tossed her sword as far away as she could. She hugged each one of her friends in turn. Even Doll.

Then after fear of death, fear of cancer, and fear of playing cards, fear of dolls came. Doll was just quick enough to scamper under the passenger seat and lock herself in the glove compartment, while the others banged their fists against it and screamed, "Kill it! Kill it! Kill it!!"

Piffle had to give her an extra big hug after that.

Fear of mosquitoes. Fear of flying. Fear of mirrors.

Fear of blood.

Oh, you can't even imagine what happened when that one came up.

After the absolute chaos of five fursons trying not to touch any surface of the very vehicle they were trapped in, next up was agoraphobia. This was an extremely welcome relief. Everyone held each other close in the center of the vehicle and were immensely glad to be locked in a tiny, enclosed space.

After that, fear of germs. Which produced similar results to fear of blood.

And then, to everyone's relief, it was over.

George called out, "I can see signs of plant life ahead!"

Everyone rushed to the front window and looked out. There was still a mile or so of dead desert left to cross, but up ahead, the bravest little shoots of grass struggled to exist on the fringes of Amaurosis Fugax. They all cried in overjoyed relief and hugged each other over and over. But they were still tense. There was no telling if they might pass through one more cloud before the nightmare ended.

In the Fearsleigher, four pairs of eyes (and one hollow face) looked around in every direction. Coiled in exhausted terror, readying themselves in case one more ugly surprise-

They all felt it starting.

The fear of chains.

The metal loops surrounding the car on every side tinkled and shimmered in the moonlight.

"FASTER, GEORGE!!!" Junella screamed.

His companions' mental torment had already driven him to scrape the upper limits of his own speed and the Fearsleigher's structural integrity. But hearing the excruciating desperation in that voice, George knew he could not fail. He pushed his nightmare-born body harder. The edge of the desert was so close now.

Inside the skate car, the five passengers were damn near drilling through one another trying to escape the clanking, constricting tentacles just outside the windows.

George felt sure all four of his legs would snap like tree branches at any second.

But he made it.

Toby, Doll, Zinc, Junella and Piffle all felt their fear start to wane. Its grip loosened from around their brainstems. They looked at one another and all the bruises they'd accidentally caused. And they started screaming again, this time in laughter. Their throats were as raw as if they'd been under a cheese grater, but they laughed nonetheless.

And when George finally felt actual soft, wonderful green grass under his feet, he simply collapsed to a stop and let the Fearsleigher run over him. It sheared through several of his limbs, which actually felt kind of refreshing. Though it was a bit startling when a bone-rattling tug on his harness was the only thing that made it slow to a stop.

"LET US OUT!! LET US OUT!!"

George crawled over on his splintered stubs. "Is it safe to? Have the effects of the phobic mists worn off?"

Zinc poked his muzzle past the chains. Calmly and politely he said, "George ol' buddy ol' pal, we would very, VERY much like to be out of this car. Could you get the locks off? Bite 'em if you have to. And hurry. Please."

"Post haste!" he assured, and regrew his legs to aid in the task.

Zinc, who was splashed head to toe in layers of blood and terror-barf, tossed a smile to Toby. "I remembered."

The very instant George chewed off a padlock and one of the chains came loose, all five passengers squeezed through the tiny gap and flung themselves onto the grass, rolling back and forth and letting out feral cries of boundless relief.

Not too far from the borderline, snow had begun to fall. The six travelers crawled on hands and knees towards it. The cold was just what they needed. Bracing, exhilarating, and wet. They rubbed as much of it as they could on themselves, shivering like mad but also moaning and giggling at the relief of finally getting some of the repulsive red fluids off of them.

They yelped and giggled and hugged and acted like toddlers. Their joy at finally being out of that living hell was indescribable. They threw snowballs at one another. They made snow angels.

And then, shadows fell upon them.

Giant figures had approached so silently, the group was surrounded before they'd heard a sound.

"WE ARE THE COLD COVEN. YOUR LIFE IS MEANINGLESS WITHOUT OUR TRUTH. JOIN US AND BE SAVED."

Junella looked up at them with an expression of abject disbelief at her rotten luck. But then a chuckle bubbled up out of her raspy throat. A smile snaked its way across her lips. She braced herself against the grass and, grunting, got to her feet.

Her sword was in her hand. She looked towards the others.

An unspoken agreement was shared. Zinc flexed his wrenches. Piffle punched her palm. Twin flames danced from George's nostrils. Doll tensed herself for the moment when everyone else would be distracted.

Even Toby slid his hammer into his hand.

"YOUR LIFE IS MEANINGLESS WITHOUT OUR TRUTH. JOIN US-"

Junella spared just enough time to say, "I'm gonna ENJOY shuttin' you the fuck up!!!"

And then the air was filled with the sounds of a billion shattering ice cubes.

*****

Part TWENTY-TWO

"Man I'm glad we didn't run into claustrophobia and agoraphobia at the same time. What a Chinese firedrill that woulda been!" Zinc said, as he stood on the edge of Amaurosis and pissed as hard as he could into it.

This part of Phobiopolis was called Polycoria, as was later explained to Toby. It had the peculiar property of always being covered in snow, yet always being warm as midsummer. The landscape was clearly tundra, but green leaves showed through the white snow blanket. A furson could be standing around with their feet freezing, yet also feel sweat pouring down their face. This was all made even more confusing by the fact that, while it was constant nighttime here as well, the moon was so huge, the sky was bright as an overcast afternoon.

Toby didn't actually mind the June-like heat, since he was currently drenched head to toe in icewater. He almost had to thank the Cold Coven. The aftereffects of battling them were as close to a shower as he was likely to find out here. Toby knew there was no chance he could distract himself from his blood-drenched pajamas long enough for them to clean themselves.

Junella was still doing some literal saber-rattling to scare off the last of the fleeing angels. Everyone else was standing around in the snow, washing themselves with the rapidly-melting body parts of their foes. It seemed the Coven could only carry their own coldness with them if they were still in one piece. George breathed warmly on Doll and Piffle to dry them off.

Toby looked at the little light in his palm where he'd put his hammer away. He remembered his face being tightened up into a clenched grimace, breathing hard through his teeth as he brought down his hammer again and again and again. And Dorster was right, the tool was deceptively dangerous. The nightmare-born steel shattered ice with ease. Toby had swung far more than he hit, but when he did, the shudder running up his arm as his hammer connected and smashed through like a wrecking ball... it was disturbingly euphoric.

"I feel kind of weird about what we just did."

Zinc had anticipated this. He trudged through the slush to his friend and patted him on the back. "You're a lover not a fighter; I get it. But remember what I said before about the Coven. Nightmares 'n forced converts, the lot of 'em. You didn't do anything that won't self-repair 'ventually. And hell, we probly freed some folks."

Toby nodded. "Still... when I was fighting them... It felt good. I'm not that kind of furson normally."

The canine shrugged. "We just went through something that rattled all our heads like shakin' an ant farm. No one could blame you for getting' your axles a bit out of alignment."

That was true enough. The mental meat grinder of Amaurosis Fugax had been as emotionally draining as anything Toby could ever remember. Worse than his bouts of nerve pain. Worse than that test at the hospital where they'd shaved his head and rubbed on cream that felt like fiberglass. Worse than his bout with fifteen-hour dry-heaving. When the relief of making it through the fear-clouds had been rudely interrupted by a new nuisance popping up before they could even fully catch their breath, his frustration had found a target just like lightning finds metal.

Not a single Coven member had so much as laid a finger on Toby. The ice-beings had stumbled onto six individuals who could not get revenge on Fugax itself, but could sure as shit transfer that desire onto a bunch of holy sno-cones.

Junella returned with a grin on her lips and a spring in her step. She saw Toby's expression and rolled her eyes. "They're just ice! Get over it!" She strode past towards the Fearsleigher.

"Basically what I said," Zinc had to admit. "Just shorter and with less tact."

"Allright. I know. I just hope I don't have to hit anyone else anytime soon," Toby said.

"Depends. Lotta nightmare critters in this neck of the woods. I 'magine George can probably handle any that get too close. Still, Bonky's just got its first taste of blood. It might yearn for more," he teased.

"Please stop calling my hammer that."

Zinc snickered. "Oh, hey, are you afraid of ladybugs?"

Now that was a grand champion non sequitur if ever there was one. Toby was a bit stunned. "...No?"

"Great. Juney's just about to wash the car. Let's go look." And he dashed off.

Toby was thoroughly befuddled.

Over by the car, Piffle was petting George all over and telling him in babytalk what a good horsie he was. He ate it up. His aura was crimson from blushing. Meanwhile Junella took a wooden cigar box from out of the trunk. As Zinc and Toby arrived to watch, she opened it and inside were eight little partitioned compartments. Three were empty, while the others contained little plastic sandwich baggies full of... gold dust?

"What, um, is that?" Toby asked.

"It ain't Tinkerbell's dandruff," the skunk replied. "This might freak ya out a bit if you're not into bugs, but if there's no car wash for miles, it's the next best thing." She chose one of the bags and set the cigar box carefully back down. She bit open the plastic, widened the hole, then threw the whole thing up into the air.

Immediately, the buzz of six thousand wings drowned out all other sound. The gold powder had apparently been in hibernation, as it suddenly came alive in a swarm of sparkling golden insects. They flew around in a disc-like formation for a few seconds, getting their bearings, then they all dove into the Fearsleigher's backseat.

Toby took a step closer. They really were ladybugs! A whole writhing golden carpet of them! He'd never seen any that weren't red before, but these were the right shape, the right size, the right spots. They were concentrated mostly around the bloodstains. "Are they mechanical?"

"Nope, just colored that way," Zinc said. "They're nightmare constructs, like George. People used to have to deal with these swarms of carnivorous ladybugs. You think piranhas are bad? Holy cow! But then someone got the idea to capture a bunch, breed 'em, and now we got these. Perfectly trained to eat anything that used to be alive."

"Thank god the seats are faux-leather," Junella commented.

"Are you SURE they're perfectly trained?" Toby asked.

"Never had one bite me." And to show it, Zinc dipped a wrench towards the largest mass of bugs. They stampeded up his arm and all over him, nibbling away any last trace of dried bodily fluids. "Hee hee! Tickly li'l cooties!"

As soon as she heard laughter, Piffle wanted to join in. She dipped a paw in the ladybugs and soon their little legs were all over her too. Junella and Doll got their turns as well, but neither of them made a sound so Toby didn't know if they were also ticklish.

He looked down at the still-considerable amounts of mouseblood on himself. Icewater can only do so much. The thought of being covered in bugs did not fill him with gusto, but it was either that or walk around in nauseating-smelling brown-over-blue pajamas. He approached the ladybugs.

Toby was unprepared for how tickly they were and spent the next few minutes giggling insensibly.

It was quite an enjoyable release, actually. He was dizzy and out of breath when it was over, but he felt loads better. A good laugh can drive the blues away.

When his vision stopped blurring, he noticed everyone was nice and clean. The car's interior was almost done too. Several of the ladybugs were flying away, dipping and weaving from their full bellies.

Junella watched them go. "Now if only I could afford the ones that'd come back to the box after they finish..."

***

Soon enough the group was back on the road. George would have preferred to rest a bit longer, but he spied a cluster of nearby nightmares that looked like a cross between a haystack and a pile of pig snouts. Whatever they were, they acted hungry. One fight was enough. So they all quickly stowed the chains, piled in, and took off.

A few pigstacks chased after them, but Junella pulled the lever that deployed the Fearsleigher's spiked surprise. Like the heavy tail of an ankylosaurus, it was a chunk of metal on a chain with all sorts of unpleasant pointy bits welded on. Junella asked George to shake his ass. That was plenty wobble enough to send the tail-ball swinging back and forth across the road, scaring the shit out of the pigstacks and sending one unfortunate fellow flying over the treeline.

Toby had to admit, this part of Phobiopolis was a lot easier on the eyes than the usual sickly-looking locations. Polycoria appeared as a grand snowy forest high in the mountains. Some of the pine trees were weirdly-shaped, and of course the temperature was bafflingly high, but aside from that it was almost nice. They were on an unpaved path that had been somewhat-unintentionally created, since it was the shortest, flattest route to Ectopia Cordis, and many passing travelers had worn the flora down smooth.

Toby saw a few more beasts. There was a rather large herd of animals that resembled cattle or bison, but their faces were like steam shovels made of flesh. Toby cringed at their appearance, but they didn't seem to take any interest in the horse and sleigh passing by. A few small cat-shaped four-legged barracudas ran along beside the skate blades, jaws snapping, but they couldn't do much but get themselves run over.

So, Toby decided it might be safe enough to get back to his book. He felt around under Zinc's seat for it, and his hand came across something that was no longer book-shaped. After all the chaos in the backseat, it'd gotten shredded into something like a cheerleader's pompon. He groaned.

"Oh, I can fix that!" Piffle said. She snatched it out of his hand and, without hesitation, twirled it into the air. She juggled it between her paws a few times, and when she handed it back, it was restored to exactly the condition he'd bought it in.

He accepted it with a hanging-open mouth and much gratitude. "Wow! Thank you, Piffle! How'd you do that?"

To answer him, she snatched an ace of spades out of the air. Then winked.

"Don't tell Junella," Toby stage-whispered. "She'll have you dumbfounding up treasure till your hands fall off." They shared a conspiratorial giggle.

From the front seat, Zinc snickered and Junella rolled her eyes some more.

"Just promise me you'll let me read it when you're through," Piffle said.

"Oh, definitely. In fact..." That reminded him of the hotel pamphlets he'd borrowed from her. He found them in his pocket, somehow unharmed after all they'd been through. 'Probably because I didn't stop to think they wouldn't be.' Maybe he was getting the hang of this dumbfounding thing.

Piffle and Toby settled into happy reading. They were only jostled out of their concentration briefly when a nearby shovel-cow decided they were trespassing and charged at the car. Thankfully, Zinc and Junella had put enough spikes around the perimeter that all it accomplished was a skullful of pain and embarrassment.

An hour or so passed this way. The majority of Polycoria's native fauna was either too small to pose a threat, or had the barest bit of sense to turn tail when George snorted fire at them. There were a few bumps as the skate-car was either rammed or ran over something, but for the most part the ride was smooth enough that Toby could get absorbed in his book.

Toby was happy to see that reading was becoming exponentially easier the more he practiced. It helped that he knew this book cover to cover. On the pages ahead, the words and letters all seemed to be having a wild orgy. But as his eyes passed over them, they snapped to attention. They fell into orderly sentences as if a zipper was pulling them together.

Piffle read through her pamphlets and would occasionally poke Toby about places in Coryza she wished they'd visited.

Zinc was hungry and searched around in the supplies for some of that extra Piffle-meat he'd saved. To his annoyance, the ladybugs had gotten it all. 'Can ask for more later,' he thought, and opened a bag of pork rinds instead.

Junella had her feet up on the dash, clipping her toenails. Each one made a guitar-plunk sound as it came off.

Doll, out of sight of the others, was sitting in the dim light under the seats and reading all the pamphlets Piffle had finished.

George was just happy to be out in the fresh air and sunshine. He wouldn't have minded pulling the Fearsleigher for a thousand miles in such a pleasant setting. It wasn't just his long underground incarceration that gave him such steady patience. Nightmare constructs are 'born' with simple minds. This was not to say George was stupid. But he'd lived for centuries as a literal creature of habit. Seek souls, chase souls, kill souls, repeat unto infinity. He was more than comfortable with repetitive tasks. Though the last few days had offered such variety he wondered if he'd died and gone to Heaven. Surely, his long night of the soul (and the soil) had been observed by someone and recompensed.

Zinc had shared around the stash of snacks. Junella was halfway through a bag of peanut brittle when her ears perked up.

The far-off hum of motors.

She wasn't entirely sure of the sound. It could have been some snorting animal nearby. She leaned out the side window as far as she dared and tilted her head back and forth.

Another fragment of audio on the wind. Definitely internal combustion. And laughter too.

"Twelve kinds of shit..." she swore as she pulled herself back inside. "It's the Hell's Bozos."

Zinc looked up over his hot rod magazine. His own ears swiveled around until they caught the sound. "Think you're right, Junebug. Christ," he snarled in frustration. "First the coven, now them. Think maybe we can slip around without catching their attention?"

Toby marked his place in his book with a finger. "Something new we have to worry about?"

"Maybe not," Junella said, though she didn't sound convinced. "Like Zinc said, we might be outside their radar. And all we really gotta do is outrun them." She tapped the buzzer. "George! We might need some speed again soon! You allright with that?"

"Always, Madam Brox!" he shouted back. "A brisk jog would be rather delightful at this time."

"Good. But keep your voice down. We don't wanna advertise our location."

"Oh, you mean to the large group of motorcycle-riding individuals approximately five hundred yards to our port side?"

"You got it."

"Well, that shouldn't be a problem then."

"How so?"

"They are already well aware of us and are drawing nearer as we speak."

"BUCKETS OF PISS!!!" she exploded.

From behind the trees, everyone could now clearly hear the approaching sounds of two-stroke engines, honks, and guffaws.

"Agitate the pavement, Georgie!!" Zinc shouted out the window.

Toby was once again knocked back in his seat by the force of their equine engine's acceleration. The mouse bookmarked his page with a candy wrapper and wisely put the paperback in his pocket, just in case they were heading into another nasty patch. "Who are we running from?"

Zinc actually looked visibly nervous; a rarity. "Same deal as the Cold Coven. Nightmares that trap and convert you. Only these ones are a lot uglier 'n louder!"

"Clowns," Junella spat, like she had a bad taste in her mouth. "Even worse, biker clowns. They're pussies compared to some of the other stuff you encounter out here, but bad news nonetheless. If one of them gets you and touches you with their red nose, bam! You're in permanent greasepaint 'n polka dots."

Piffle became intrigued.

"Someone physically restrain her!!" Junella barked. She looked up at the hamsterfly from the rear view mirror. "I can already see it in your eyes, you weirdo!"

"Shucks," Piffle said. "What if I want to get turned into a chopper-ridin' clown? That sounds fun! You could throw me to them as bait!"

Toby reached out to pat her paw, concealing a laugh at how adorably odd she was. "I guess you can let them catch you on the return trip. But if you left now, I'd miss you."

"Aww!" She pounced on him in a hug. "That's super-duper sweet. I won't leave ya, Toby. Maybe we can be clowns together sometime? We can dress up real silly and rub our noses together in eskimo kisses and dance the charleston in our big red shoes and-"

VVVVRRREEOWWWWWWWWW!!!

A scout from the Bozos had ramped off a dead log, backflipped through the air, and landed on the path just a few feet behind the Fearsleigher. They could hear her bobble-headed chortling over the whine of her rice-burner.

Piffle and Toby both looked out the back window. The hamsterfly began to reconsider getting caught by these guys.

This was not, after all, a regular furson dressed up in a funny costume for the amusement of children. This was a literal nightmare of a clown. Her bright purple lips were as fat as sausages, dripping with drool. Her cartoonish white gloves were veiny and wrinkled. Not gloves at all, but hands. She had on a scorching pink leather jacket with motoring goggles and an explosion of orange hair. Her furless skin was the patchy, sick blue of a drowning victim. Her neck stretched out like a turkey's.

Zinc plunged his face back into his magazine. "I ain't lookin'!"

"Keep it steady, George!" Junella yelled out the window. Once again she leaned out as far as she could, the wind making her scarf flow like a cape. She dumbfounded her trusty revolver into her palm. It was far easier to conjure up objects that one intimately knows the feel and weight of.

The giggling banshee behind them was weaving back and forth on the road, but Junella knew these things were too stupid for self-preservation. She fired off four misses and the Bozo didn't even flinch. That is, until Junella's fifth round made her head explode into literal confetti.

Toby watched the clown's body and bike go careening off the road into an old stump. The fact that her laughter hadn't stopped was rather disturbing.

Rather than reload, Junella simply tossed the revolver away and conjured up a new one. "That's just the first. There'll be more."

This was not a prediction she needed psychic powers for. The surrounding forest was already ringing with rumbles and hooting. Toby could see flashes of neon-colored hair amongst the trees.

They seemed to be taking their time, toying with their prey. Then one of them blew on a slide whistle: that was the signal.

They came in from both sides like a flood. Their wheels kicked up divots of dirt and grass as they exploded through the forest onto the path.

Toby had honestly never understood the fear of clowns until now. When he'd seen them on TV, they just seemed colorful and friendly. But if this was what other people saw when they looked at one,  terror was a perfectly sensible response.

Rolling, bulging, veiny yellow eyes. Blood-red dots on cheeks. Feet as long as floorboards. Some of them were as repulsively obese as a plastic sack of cottage cheese, others as thin as a crowbar. Some were tall, some were short, but all of them had grotesquely extreme proportions. Carnival mirror bodies.

Either they'd all shaved themselves or the clownification process had rotted their fur away. They were bare except for headfur and bushy eyebrows, which were every color not found in nature. Their outfits were too. Gruesomely bright motorcycle gear: jackets and fingerless gloves and chaps and bandanas. Toby saw a chrome-plated, smoke-belching oversized bowtie. Their skin was wrinkled, splotched, festering with boils and sores. They were all covered in bleeding tattoos of hearts or balloon animals or other festive imagery. The only thing each and every one of them shared was a bright, shiny, unnaturally-red nose.

That, and the fact that they were all violently laughing as loud as possible.

The cacophony was like dropping a truck full of parrots off a cliff. Toby curled his ears up to block out the awful din. The clowns revved their engines constantly too. Toby's nose was soon full of the smell of exhaust.

Their bikes were every bit as grotesquely contorted as the riders themselves. Caricatures of bikes. Choppers with tiny back wheels and ridiculously large fronts. Or the reverse. Handlebars seven feet long. Seats like high chairs. Tricycles or quadcycles or septupcycles. Some of them had sidecars, out of which the bulbous heads of half-formed monster clowns rose. They looked like melted octopi, their expressions looking somehow stupider yet far more dangerous than the rest.

The riders couldn't seem to manage enough speed to catch up to George. Or maybe they could and they were just playing with their food for now.

Junella's gun cracked like lightning as she blew away four Bozos in a row. There were so many of them packed in so close, it was hard to miss. Each time, their heads would explode like a party balloon. The other clowns seemed to think this was hilarious and would laugh all the harder as they maneuvered their bikes around fallen chums.

The first pie hit the Fearsleigher. Dozens followed. Toby didn't have to wonder what flavor they were: the slight sizzle and chemical smoke that resulted wherever any of them hit was a good enough clue they were acid meringue.

Some of the more brazen Bozos dared to zoom closer and bump against the side of the skate car. That just made them easier targets. One fat specimen in a Kaiser helmet, round glasses, and a muumuu came charging in on his Harley. Junella put an expertly-aimed bullet in his back wheel and sent him crashing into a half-dozen of his amigos.

"Clown bowling!" she shouted triumphantly. She looked beside her and snatched the magazine out of her partner's wrenches. "Zinc, goddammit! Get your nose outta that thing and come help me splat these motherfuckers!"

He whined and cringed. "They give me the howlin' creeps, Juniepoo!"

"Don't Juniepoo me, mister." She elbowed a panel in the ceiling that dropped down a shotgun into his lap. "The more they give you the heebie-jeebies, the more satisfyin' it'll be killing 'em. Am I right?"

He sighed heavily and fished a box of shells out of the glove compartment. "As always..." he grumbled.

The shotgun was one of Red Velvet's special jobs. Custom-designed for Zinc so he could fire it with his lack of hands. The canine opened the side door, took one look at the sea of white-painted lunatic faces, and nearly fell out onto the road. He steadied himself. He held one wrench open just a crack to peek through. He aimed for a harlequin doing a handstand on her seat and blew her ass to sprinkles.

"See? What were you complaining about?" Junella encouraged.

Zinc whimpered and reloaded. "Just as long as I don't gotta look at 'em."

There was a leader-type one coming close now, with a big blue greasy pompadour and a toothpick set in his mold-green teeth. He chuckled low as he revved his engine; his arms were so over-muscled they looked like hams shoved into pantyhose. Feeling a particular hatred for this asshole, Zinc actually did keep his eyes open enough to turn the greaser-clown's face inside out.

Junella noticed Toby in the backseat looking anxious. "Hey mouse! You wanna be useful?"

He was startled and swiveled around. "Huh? I thought I was supposed to keep an eye on Piffle."

She grunted. "You haven't figured out yet when I'm not serious!?"

"No," he said bluntly.

Junella had to give him a 'fair enough' look. "Fold down the back seat and get in the trunk. Rustle around 'til you find a burlap sack that feels like it's fulla cats' claws. Caltrops. Zinc said you got a pretty good arm. Prove it by throwin' 'em under some tires."

Toby gulped but nodded. This was the first time he'd actually been asked to do something somewhat combat-like. He hoped like hell he wouldn't screw it up.

Piffle helped him find the latch for the back seat, and she actually spotted the caltrops first. "Can I throw some too?" she asked Junella.

"The more the merrier."

"Yaaay! I can help!"

The mouse and hamster poured the bag of four-pronged metal nasties out onto the back seat. Toby grabbed a handful and stood at the window, leaning out as far as he dared and clinging to the window frame for dear life. George was not up to his fastest velocity at the moment, but he'd still pass most cars on the freeway at this speed.

'Holy heck there's a lot of them!' Toby thought. The Bozos completely clogged the road behind them. It looked like the entire population of Sturgess had been clownified. And the noise! The motorcycle sounds weren't so bad, but the endless psychotic laughter made it really hard to aim.

Toby tried his best nevertheless. He targeted a green-skinned beanpole with a black mullet and rainbow tattoos who looked particularly dangerous. Toby threw his deadly jacks and watched as they tumbled through the air in slow motion.

To his amazement, not only did they hit, but the green guy skidded out and took at least ten other cycles down with him.

"Yeah!!"  Toby shouted.

"Way to go!" Piffle cheered. She tossed her caltrops too and caused a similar pileup. One yellow-tufted unfortunate was decapitated and had his still-laughing face impaled on a low-hanging tree branch.

Doll ran back and forth on the backseat, handing Piffle and Toby more caltrops whenever they ran out.

The problem was, there were simply more enemies than ammunition. No matter how many clowns went down, dozens more simply bulldozed the crashed bikes out of the way and kept on hounding the Fearsleigher. Toby and Piffle both had to duck incoming pies. Toby got a dab of meringue on his ear and it felt like someone had pressed a hot iron to it. He shrieked and whipped his head around. This caused him to let go of his entire handful of caltrops all at once. Happily, this caused a forty-cycle pileup. Unhappily, there were hundreds more.

Junella popped a balloon-headed buffoon with her current revolver, then chucked the gun at another with hair shaped like traffic cones, wiping the smile off his face. She'd reached the point where she was simply dumbfounding up a new gun after every shot, leaving a trail of disposable snub-nosed revolvers in her wake. (She often wondered if they disappeared after she stopped thinking about them, or if someone would later come along and find a ridiculous amount of identical guns laying around. Typically she didn't return to places where this trick was necessary to check such things.) "Zinc, I know I can't run out of bullets, but I'm running out of patience! This isn't working!"

"Waddaya want me to do about it!?" he yelped back.

She thought a bit, then pulled herself back into the car long enough to deploy the tail-weapon again. It clunked onto the road and tried to sink its metal fangs into tires. But unfortunately, it did no good. The clowns were quick enough to stay just outside its range.

Junella realized this quickly and pulled the lever to retract it. 'Wish we had a bigger one,' she thought to herself.

Then, slowly, she grinned.

Zinc did NOT like her plan when she told it to him. What finally convinced him was the chance to give his new toys from Dorster and Alfonzo a field test. He was annoyed as heck at having forgotten to put them on against the Coven.

And if nothing else, at least he could keep his eyes closed the whole time.

Soon enough he found himself up on the roof again. Piffle and Toby were being extra-careful to trip up any of the clowns that looked like they were aiming to pie him. (Toby finally noticed that they were producing an endless supply by vomiting them up, pan and all. 'Bleahh!') Junella scrambled up top as well. She readied the turret while Zinc readied himself. He ejected the flails from his backflesh and crowed with pleasure. Even in the midst of his own personal nightmare, that felt damn good. He spun his shoulder-fezzes up to maximum but didn't engage the flails just yet.

Junella got the hookspear loaded and aimed the turret into the densest patch of Bozos. "Allright. Get in front of the barrel!"

"I want a cheeseburger after this, Juney!" Zinc yelled back as he got himself into position. "A triple-decker! With bacon, fries, and a chocolate shake! And you're payin' for it!!"

"Perfectly acceptable, partner!" And with that she pulled the trigger.

Zinc clenched himself up into a ball as he felt the harpoon plunge through his guts. The force of it sent him flying off the Fearsleigher and into the heart of sheer terror. Right smack dab in the middle of all those cackling, leering, grinning demonic fucking clowns! He clamped his metal eyelids shut.

In the instant before impact, he clicked the gears into place inside his shoulder devices.

What happened next is difficult to describe.

Imagine a fireworks show. But instead of colored sparks: clowns. Shit-tons of clowns. Zinc had wrapped his wrenches around himself, clamping down tight on the harpoon line in back, making himself an armored wrecking ball of unlimited destruction. His spiked flails did their jobs to perfection. They were a part of his body now, and reacted as reflexively as his own limbs. They swam gracefully through the air at a pound and a half, then at the slightest microtouch of impact, a subconscious command sent their mass skyrocketing, cleaving through literally anything. Metal was like toilet paper to them. Flesh was like water.

George swerved back and forth on the path, sending Zinc pinballing from one side of the road to the other. He was a lawnmower, and any clown's ass in his path was grass. Zinc's flesh had quickly become so covered in bruises, dents and lacerations, the pain plateaued in a brain-blanking buzz. Zinc sent his mind elsewhere. He thought about tits and cheeseburgers.

It was an absolute slaughter. Zinc's balls tore through motorcycles like bullets through balloons. The moonlight above was nearly blotted out by sprays of clown-blood-confetti. Through it all, the Bozos never stopped laughing.

What the caltrops had done to a few bikes at a time, Zinc did to dozens each second. Clownflesh hung from trees like deflated balloons. Bent wheels were everywhere. Junella fired potshots into the remaining zanies purely for fun.

Of course, the Hell's Bozos could not be killed for long. And since their bikes were essentially extensions of their bodies, they too would regenerate. But for now there was so much twisted metal and rubbery flesh clogging the road, nobody could have hoped to drive through it. The last few multicolored and mirthful survivors got themselves stuck in the debris and their hyena cackles faded as George sped onward. Junella and the others would have a comfortable head start long before the Bozos could begin to regroup for revenge. 

The Fearsleigher was a mess. The caltrops had been depleted by two-thirds. Zinc was extraordinarily dead by the time Junella reeled him in. But it was nonetheless a decisive victory.

Junella sliced her partner's corpse off the retrieved hookspear and gave him a kiss on the nose. He shimmered back to life just in time to appreciate it.

And of course, when he slid back down off the roof into the passenger seat, Piffle and Toby were all over him. They kissed his cheeks and gave him hero's hugs. He tried to play it off like this was just the kind of thing he did every afternoon for kicks, but Junella knew he'd gone above and beyond on this one. She promised as soon as they got to Ectopia Cordis, she would buy him a junkfood banquet that'd have him peeing pure grease.

Zinc tail-waggingly accepted the praise. It helped to drive the image of all those red-nosed atrocities out of his mind.

When George was informed that the crisis was behind them, he let his speed drop to that of a leisurely Sunday drive. This was serendipitous, as the road through the forest soon curved around a cliff. They followed the curve for a mile or so. On their left was the same pine trees and snow as always. To their right, the ground sloped away into a sheer drop. They could see hills and valleys at the bottom. Acres more trees. It was a rather beautiful sight.

And because of this, coupled with their flush of triumph over the Bozos, none of them were braced for the sudden earsplitting attack that knocked the skate-car over like a giant sonic fist.

*****

Chapter TWENTY-FOUR

It was entirely due to George's quick thinking that they didn't tumble down into the ravine. His skull was contorted in agony like the others at the excruciating tone that was suddenly carving through it, but he nevertheless managed to plant his hooves and cause just enough friction to prevent his passengers from going over the edge.

This was not just a noise. This was not an irritating sound like someone rubbing a balloon or scraping a chalkboard. It was a directed vibrational attack powerful enough to flip a car off a cliff.

Though due to George's instinctive actions, and the fact that the Fearsleigher's construction made it twice as heavy as a normal vehicle, it merely slammed on its side and slid perilously close to the drop's edge. Another few feet and it would have tumbled to the bottom. Such an impact would likely have killed most fursons, and left any survivors with half their bones broken. Easy prey for the things that waited in the woods.

Wherever the sound was coming from, it did not let up. Every few seconds, the tone would be repeated, kicking the Fearsleigher another inch towards oblivion and renewing the searing pain inside its passengers' ears. It was unbelievable. Impossible. Take the worst headache you've ever had in your life, bad enough to make you vomit, and double that. It made the acid burn Toby had endured earlier feel like a kiss.

But it was only pain. It couldn't compare to the physical and mental agony of being so terrified of your own skin you start ripping it off in chunks. And having been through exactly that less than an hour ago, was why Toby, despite the pain, was able to think semi-coherently.

He was in a heap in the backseat, lying on top of Piffle. She was writhing and groaning and clutching her head just like Zinc and Junella. Doll was nowhere to be seen, and Toby deeply hoped she wasn't lying somewhere at the bottom of the cliff. The Fearsleigher's interior was a mess. Broken glass was everywhere, along with anything else that hadn't been belted down when the car had tipped. Toby was immeasurably glad he'd had the foresight to put the caltrops away quickly, otherwise he and Piffle would have been the bread in a very bloody sandwich.

He tried to make his thoughts drill past the pain. He had endured pain before. Chronic, crippling, nerve-chewing pain. Fear could still knock him out with little effort, but pain was something he'd at least fought to a stalemate on occasion. He noticed Junella trying to pull herself up towards the shattered side window. Toby tried as well.

At least in the car there was something between them and the auditory assault. When the two of them poked their heads out, they got a fleeting glimpse of what was attacking them: a brown-furred male in a white jacket. But they also got a concentrated dose of audio power. Red blood sprayed from Toby's ears and black blood sprayed from Junella's. Their hearing turned into a dull void, but it didn't lessen the pain one bit. Whatever was happening to them, it seemed to target their heads from the inside out.

Toby fell back and accidentally elbow-dropped Piffle, who cried out in misery. He looked down and saw tears pouring from her eyes. In addition to the pain-vibration, she had broken glass punctures all over her side. Toby tried to say something comforting, but of course he couldn't possibly be heard. So he brushed her cheek gently, then gave it a kiss. That seemed to help. She managed a smile for a brief second.

Junella was finding success at beating back her pain with sheer fury. Whoever had done this to her and her passengers was fucking dead. She stepped around Zinc's moaning body to get to the glove compartment. She retrieved the crumpled map and wrote on it in her own waxy blood. She poked Zinc to get his attention so he could read it: "TIP CAR OVER. I'LL GO KILL"

Woozily, he nodded. He lifted a wrench to give Junella a boost and she hopped through the window to huddle behind the car. It was relatively safer here. Very relatively. Even though there was slightly less vibration getting through to her now, there was also a mere few feet of snow and slippery grass between her and a hell of a long drop. 'Never a guardrail when you need one,' she thought. She sunk her fingers in the ground to anchor herself as she peeked over the edge.

Just as she'd thought. This was no naturally-occurring nightmare; this was a carefully-planned trap. She'd only seen what was causing it for a second, but that was enough. At the top of a small nearby hill, a tuning fork nearly as tall as a goalpost, with some kind of cone attached, was pointed down at them. Beside it was someone operating it. Junella didn't know how it was possible to be anywhere near that thing and not feel its effects. Maybe the cone directed its vibrations to a certain spot? A sonic laser? Whatever. Even if she didn't know the details of how, she knew this fucker's motive. Down at the bottom of the cliff she could see a minor junkyard of vehicles crushed like empty potato chip bags. Whoever was doing this, their game was scavenging. Causing wrecks and then looting whatever they could from them. There might even be a second furson below whose job was to pickpocket the corpses before they could come back to life.

This only increased her anger. No one did this kinda shit to her and lived to tell about it. She was already thinking of ways to trap whoever this was in their own personal inescapable hell. But first she had to get to them.

'Think,' she ordered herself. Cutting her ears off wouldn't do any good. Her eardrums had already blown out and she was still experiencing a migraine so bad she wanted to borrow Toby's hammer and bash her skull in with it. 'Wait... would that work?' Nah. How could she squash her own brain yet still remain alive to go after the guy? So, could she shield herself somehow? She mentally rooted through everything in the Fearsleigher. She could maybe pry a door off and walk behind it, but the sound had force behind it, and every additional pulse was punching the car another inch towards the cliff. Any kind of shield would just act like a kite and send her sailing. Whatever she was gonna do, she didn't have much time to do it.

Just then Toby jumped down from the back window to join her, slipped, and nearly went off the cliff. Junella had to leap forward to grab him.

"Thanks!" he said. Even though she couldn't hear, it was easy enough to read his lips.

That gave her an idea. Something about different senses, and getting around them. And Toby. Toby hitting the moon with a paint can.

Oh, this idea was so stupid she had to act on it instantly before her rational self could destroy it.

The skunk leapt up the side of the Fearsleigher and wriggled through the window. Piffle had gotten herself standing, which was excellent. "Mind if I borrow these!?" Junella shouted.

Piffle heard a trace of mumble and looked up. Then she yowled in shock as the skunk grabbed both her antennae, yanked them straight off, and plugged them into her own head.

As utterly dumb as the idea was, it worked. Junella felt an entirely new sense awaken within her. Her antennae swiveled around, seeming to feel the environment like a blind man's fingers. She directed them at the tuning fork. The 'vision' was blurred and wavy from the extreme vibrations, but she could still 'see' the bastard standing there.

Junella cackled with vicious glee and jumped off the car towards her foe, needlefingers glinting in the moonlight.

Meanwhile, Piffle was a bit miffed that her friend had stolen two very sensitive parts of her anatomy. But when she saw what Junella was using them for, she couldn't help but be astonished at the ridiculous brilliance of it. She rubbed the little round divots where her antennae used to be. She was in so much pain already, that extra burst had startled her to her senses. She looked around and saw that Zinc was standing through the open window, trying to tilt the car up from the inside with his wrenches.

He looked over and saw she was looking back. He over-enunciated each word, hoping she could make them out: "Get George! Help me!"

Piffle nodded and saluted. She jumped and used her wings to carry her up and out of the car. Another head-splitting pulse hit her then, and this time it was Toby's turn to catch her before she slid off the edge.

With Piffle's weight no longer added, Zinc tried to convince himself this would be easier. His wrenches were as strong as Satan doing pushups, but leverage was important too. Tipping the Fearsleigher would be a hell of a lot easier from outside, but that would mean exposing himself directly to the sonic pulses, which might knock his eyes and ears clean off. Then he'd be really screwed. So he clamped his wrenches to the window frame and pulled. He moved it perhaps an inch. Turning around and doing it from the other side, he got a bit more leverage, but he was going to need some horsepower to help him, and soon.

Together with Toby, Piffle huddled in the meager shelter of George's ribcage and managed to convey the plan while they unstrapped him from his harness. She communicated mostly through hand gestures, since everything she said was blasted to nothingness as soon as it left her mouth. Poor George was not used to pain. As a normal nightmare, he'd rarely ever felt it. In the old days, he'd been swift enough to outrun anything that might cause it. This sonic attack hurt about half as much as the alchemical fire that had gotten him imprisoned, and it was only the strength of George's duty to his masters that helped him stagger to his feet and leap behind the car. George could not hear Zinc's shout of relief when he put his skull to the metal, but with all four of them pushing together, they actually got the skate-car back on its skates. The others slumped to the snow from the effort, but George had to remain standing and brace himself against what little ground there was remaining between the car and the cliff, to keep it from retreating any further towards the edge. His skull was battered with fresh suffering with every new pulse. Yet he dug his hooves in and persevered. The others hunkered down behind the car's massive metal blades to consider their next move.

Meanwhile, Junella was enduring suicide-inducing levels of agony. Her plan with Piffle's antennae had worked; she could sense their attacker clear enough to head towards him. But that also meant she was walking forward into the tuning fork's sensory assault. This was pain that would have driven an average furson into a coma. Junella was pinning everything on the hope that her sheer raging need to kill this motherfucker would overcome whatever he threw at her.

The vibrations seemed to boil her organs. She could feel cracks appearing in her skin. Little black dots appeared on the snow below. Her scarf was streaked like zebra hide. She was driven to her knees, but she dug her finger-needles into the snowy soil to pull herself onwards.

With her antennae, she could 'see' that the little man was not yet fleeing. He still thought he could stop her by thwacking the fork again and again and again, pummeling her to pieces with the vibrations.

Her forehead split and black wax drizzled down her muzzle like hot fudge. She licked at it. 'You're just giving me more reason to keep on going, genius.'

Meanwhile, Toby, Piffle and Zinc were trying to think of a way to help Junella. Any attempts to shoot or throw something at their mysterious assailant was impossible. Getting a good shot meant exposing one's head to direct contact with the vibrations, which meant one was instantly too scrambled to aim. But that gave Zinc an idea. The turret. With wild gesticulations and a lot of screaming, he conveyed to the others that it had a scope you could look through to aim, it had gears to hold it in position wherever it was pointed. Plus the turret itself would provide a bit of shielding. And, best of all, Junella had already reloaded it since last time.

Toby gave the plan a thumbs-up and gave Zinc a 'good luck' pat on the shoulder.

Zinc grinned in a 'Who said I was gonna fire it?' way.

Toby unsubtly freaked out: 'ME!?'

Wrenches are not good for playing charades, but Zinc managed to get across his worry of losing his arms and ears the second he poked his head out. He would not be good at aiming if that happened. And he pointed out Piffle's compound eyes and lack of antennae. She nodded, acknowledging that she wouldn't be that good of a shot either.

So, despite still feeling like fiery hands were crushing his head to a pulp, Toby accepted his assignment. Zinc and Piffle helped him climb up on George's back. Toby weighed so little, being a stepping-stool was not a distraction from bracing the car, even though their vehicle was shuddering like it might break apart after each successive pulse.

Toby crouched behind the turret. He'd gotten a faceful of vibration for a split second and it was not something he wanted to experience ever again. He grabbed onto the metal and pulled himself weakly up towards the scope. The glass cover had exploded outwards and the innards were somewhat cracked, but the metal crosshairs were intact. Good enough. Toby swung the turret around, trying to decide what to hit. He saw the furson banging on the tuning fork. 'Might be a rabbit.' Big feet and buck teeth, but where were his ears? Toby didn't think he had the stomach for shooting another furson directly, and the guy was darting back and forth behind the giant fork anyway. Poor Junella looked like a chocolate bar under a heat lamp. Chunks and streams of her were turning the snowy ground around her a murky grey. But still she kept crawling forwards. Toby could not hear her screaming, but he was sure she was internally. He couldn't imagine the pain she was going through.

A thought materialized in his mind: 'I have the power to stop my friend from suffering.' It gave his courage a boost. Despite the lighting and thunder tearing his own brain to shreds, he looked through the scope and tried to think where to aim. The base of the fork? Could he tip it over? Maybe if he hit it at the middle he'd topple it. But that was a big if. What was a better target?

The cone. Obviously.

Toby ratcheted the turret into firing position and slammed his hand down on the button.

The ever-oncoming sonic pulses nearly drowned out the sound of the turret firing, but the hooked spear sailed from its barrel like a stork in flight. It passed over the road, over Junella's twitching form, and impacted the directional cone, tearing it away like shredding newspaper.

The rabbitish furson shrieked and spasmed. The effects of the fork were no longer aimed in only one direction, but instead radiated out to slam anything within its perimeter. Including its operator.

It was exactly the advantage Junella needed. The rabbit had flung himself away from the fork and was now rolling and twitching on the ground several feet away, which meant he sure as hell wasn't pounding on it anymore. The effects of his last sonic blast faded for her, but he was still dealing with it.

Junella willed the parts of her still capable of movement to head straight towards her enemy. She'd kept her cutlass stored safely in her hip to keep it from being knocked away, but now she retrieved it to use as a crutch.

The rabbit was wailing in pain, back arching, feet kicking. He caught a glimpse of what looked like a living oil spill coming straight at him with a big curved sword, and he jumped to his feet pretty damned fast. His head was still ringing and his vision would not focus, but he knew what direction 'away from that monstrosity' was.

Junella watched the coward trying to stumble away towards the trees and snarled. She knew there were hunks of her legs melting down the hillside and it should have been impossible to stand. She did anyway. Blood gushed from the cracks in her vinyl flesh as she braced herself against her sword and hauled herself vertical. She let out a pitiful wail and was glad it was silent.

The rabbit stumbled into the snow. He got up again with surprising quickness. He looked back at the gooey black zombie pursuing him. His horror turned to hate.

Junella couldn't see his eyes behind the cobalt-glass safety goggles he was wearing. But she could see he had a nosebleed. And from within his jacket he pulled a double-ended tuning fork that he brandished at her like a weapon.

She did not want to find out what that thing did. She wondered if her arm was strong enough to throw her sword accurately.

As it turned out, she didn't have to.

The rabbit shouted "Awwk!" as two surprisingly strong tiny plastic hands grabbed his right ankle and yanked. He faceplanted hard, like someone had kicked a barstool out from under him.

Doll, now that Junella was aware of her again, fell backwards too. Inanimate as usual. But she had achieved what she'd set out to do.

When she'd been thrown from the car during the initial attack, it was only pure luck that kept her from tumbling down the cliff. Thankfully, no one was looking at her so she was able to dig in with her stubby fingers and keep herself from falling. Despite her hollow head, the vibrational attack still hurt like hell. Doll saw red. It had taken her a long time to circle around the car into the forest behind their attacker. Crossing the road was especially worrisome since she had no cover. But the fact that everyone else was too distracted to notice her helped a lot. She kept on the edges of the tuning fork's range, running as fast as her pudgy plastic legs could carry her. And when she saw the rabbit take a dose of his own medicine and start running right towards her location, she quickly positioned herself where he'd trip over her. She'd figured he'd see her and immobilize her before she got the chance to attack. When he turned his back on her, it was like giving her a Christmas gift.

Seeing her enemy humiliated by a kids' toy gave Junella's will a shot of schadenfreude-fueled energy. She limped quickly over to him and planted the tip of her cutlass in his back. Not enough to kill him. Just enough to touch bone and make him squeal.

"You don't even wanna imagine what I'm gonna do to you if you don't stay still!!" she roared. She'd noticed before that his ears seemed awfully tiny for his species, and up close she realized that, oh yes indeed, he was definitely deaf. It looked like someone had long ago ripped both of his ears out at the root, leaving two mangled, ugly, badly-healed stumps of scar tissue behind. Apparently he was a fan of comic books, as he'd turned his disability into a crime theme.

Junella could not let him know that in her current condition she probably couldn't even take Toby in a fight. 'Well, maybe Toby,' she rethought. Still, there was no shame in calling for backup. "GEORGE!!!" she bellowed, hoping the others had recovered enough to regain their hearing.

They had. In fact they were all whooping with joy that the headache was finally over. Their skulls still rang with the aftershocks, their facial muscles still twitched, and every sound hurt, but that couldn't stop them from celebrating. George, being a nightmare construct, recovered quickest and quite clearly heard Junella's call. He nodded to the others to indicate where he was going and galloped off.

George arrived so swiftly Junella almost hated him. Crossing the distance between the Fearsleigher and the fork had felt like eighty miles to her.

"Yes, Madam Brox?"

"Stand on his limbs," she ordered. "Gently though. Hurt him, but don't break anything. Yet."

"Yes, Madam Brox!" he said with a grim smile. George would have been about the size of a Clydesdale if he'd had any meat on his frame. But the weight of his bones alone was near 200 pounds. One can imagine a rock-hard hoof pushing that much weight onto one's arms and legs would not feel very good. Both he and Junella relished the thin whines of agony their attacker squeaked out when George got himself positioned.

'He's not going anywhere soon,' Junella thought with a smile. She gave a thankful nod to George, then walked over to Doll and picked her up cringingly by two fingers. She brushed some snow off the toy's dress. "Credit where credit's due; that was a nice assist. Thanks. Keep it up and I might be able to stand the sight of you."

Doll did not respond, but thought of some things she could have said to that.

Junella plopped her down on George's back. She didn't want to hold the thing any longer than she had to, but honor demanded she at least spare her inanimate passenger from having to toddle back to the car on her tiny feet.

"Am I to incinerate him, Madam Brox?" George asked with a gleam in his eye.

"Nope. Just keep him cozy for a moment. I'll be back in a jif." She turned and began limping down the hill. Her purpose for this was twofold. For one, her vinyl body had its advantages, one of which was that she could slowly-but-surely heal without needing to die first. So long as she could reassemble any pieces she'd lost, they'd eventually ooze back together and re-solidify. Also, her will automatically kept her from melting in hot temperatures, but the same was not true for anything that fell off of her. This was actually fortunate, because it meant she could simply step in any little puddles of herself she found and feel the little tickly trickles of herself flow up towards her core. (The flecks of herself on her scarf were already on the move.)

Her second purpose was to ask Toby to come back up the hill with her.

At the moment when she'd pinned the rabbit down with her sword, she'd felt a small twinge of guilt. This was not normal. And it took her a moment to identify where it had come from. Her client. Or rather, her knowledge of what he'd no doubt say at seeing her do such an unladylike thing. She imagined him cringing at such cruelty, and thus, she cringed as well. This would not do.

When she'd been crawling towards the bastard, she had wanted nothing more than to kill the living shit out of him. But that wasn't going far enough. Whatever death she put him through, he'd regenerate after. No, she had to teach him a more permanent lesson. Her mind flipped through its internal photo album of obscene tortures she'd witnessed or participated in. Now here she was flinching at such monstrous acts, and all because of her milquetoast client. (Piffle too, to a lesser extent. Junella didn't know as much about her, but she was sure the hamsterfly would have given her at least a stern look and a 'tsk tsk' for kicking a downed opponent.)

Junella arrived at the car, where Zinc, Piffle and Toby were all lying against the skate blades and panting in relief. "Much obliged," she said as she ripped off her antennae and threw them back to Piffle.

"I hope they helped," she said as she screwed them on.

Junella nodded. Then she looked down to Toby. "Mouse. Come here. I need you for something."

Toby looked startled. "Me? What for?" He'd assumed George was perfectly capable of whatever it was Junella was doing up there (and he preferred to not know the details of it).

The skunk reached out a hand to help him up. She did not say another word.

Her expression was as cold as the snow he was sitting in. Though he couldn't tell what that chill was directed at. Toby took her hand and followed when she turned to walk back up the hill.

"What do you want from me, boss-lady?" Zinc called out.

Junella didn't look back. "Play patty-cake with Piffle if you feel like it," she grunted.

Piffle giggled at this.

A few steps later, Junella had a better idea. "Actually, see if you can get the windows fixed!"

"I liked the first idea better!" came his reply.

Toby got a smile out of that, but it quickly vanished as he looked back at Junella's face. The skunk's eyes were clear but her expression was locked tight as a fortress. Her gaze was somewhere indistinct in the distance, like she was giving intense thought to something.

The mouse looked ahead and could see the squirming, struggling rabbit trying to wiggle out from underneath George's hooves. The stallion was as placid as could be, not needing the slightest effort to keep his captive captive.

Toby's heart sank. He had an idea of why Junella had brought him over to see this. "Do you want me to kill him? Is that it?" he asked in a weak voice. "To toughen me up? I honestly don't think that I could."

"I don't either," Junella sang simply.

He felt uneasy. Whatever she had in mind, it was going to make his mouth taste sour. "Then what?"

"I want you to watch, that's all." Her voice was toneless. Her expression like still water.

"Why!?" Toby yelled. "What are you going to do to him?"

She flinched at his tone. She turned angry, but only for a moment before her calm returned. She took a step towards the mouse and put a cracked, leaking paw on his shoulder. "This isn't a judgment of you, Toby. Just some much-needed advice. Your attitude is going to get you killed someday if you don't change it."

He didn't have time to ask what the hell she meant by that, because she put the fingers of her other hand over his mouth. Gently.  Neither could speak now, but she told him with her eyes to just listen.

He fidgeted in embarrassment and confusion for a second, but then nodded. He would at least hear her out.

"You still believe in mercy, Toby," she said when she took her hand away. He noticed that she was calling him by his name now. Not just 'mouse'. And there was a trace of concern in her voice too. "That's not a bad thing. But too much of anything is poison. Too much mercy will kill you."

He was about to protest, but she put her hand back on his lips, firmer this time.

"This isn't back home. And this isn't a storybook with some sappy happy ending. This is here. And right now, we have in our possession someone who just put us through a living hell. And only because, by luck, we didn't die in a crash at the bottom of a cliff like he'd planned. He was going to kill us and loot our bodies, Toby. Do you understand that?"

"Yes, but..." He tried to think of a way to articulate the slithering knot in his gut. This felt wrong no matter what the rabbit had tried to do to them. "But what are we, if we have him helpless and then torture him? What does that accomplish besides we get revenge? I'm not saying we let him go free, but... Can we throw him in the trunk? We're going to this Ectopia place, right? Don't they have cops there?"

Junella had to give him credit for at least coming up with an alternate option. "No dice, sorry. That'd only work if EC's cops gave a damn about anything that happened outside the city. And even if they did, they'll interview him too. Why should they believe us over him? We ain't got what happened on video."

Toby nibbled his finger in frustration. There had to be another way besides whatever horrible thing Junella was planning.

She saw what he was thinking and squashed it. "No. You're not talking me out of this. That's the point. That's why I need you to stand here and keep your mouth shut and your eyes wide. I get that heroes don't kick the bad guy when he's down. But I ain't no fuckin' hero. I'm a survivor. And I'm someone you're relying on to keep you surviving too. This is a hard, ugly lesson you need to learn, Toby. You need to see what people like me have to do to get by in a world like this."

Toby looked desperately to George, hoping he might back him up.

The stallion was as stone-faced as Junella. He spoke in as neutral a tone as he could. "I fully understand your reluctance, Sire Toby. But I find myself in agreement with Madam Brox's logic."

Toby gnashed his teeth. He briefly considered pulling rank on George and reminding him that he was still a servant and Toby was his master. But he knew if he did that he'd hate himself for weeks (and rightfully so).

So he stood with his feet in the snow and watched as Junella turned away from him and towards their prisoner.

"Thank you, George. Now please, roll him over. Face up. I want him to see me." She looked down to the shivering mess at her feet.

George's hooves were swift. As feather-light as he could, he stepped off the rabbit's limbs, then repositioned the wretch with a careful kick. Figuring it was expected of him, he stepped back on to make sure their prisoner did not have a hope of escape.

The rabbit let out a fresh groan at this. It wasn't bad enough having divots slowly dug into his flesh on one side...

Junella noticed he was sensible enough to not start yapping at her. Nice. At least he recognized that he was screwed good and hard, and there were no magic words to make his situation any better. She leaned down to pull off his cobalt goggles, then tossed them aside. She wanted to see his eyes. They were wide and brown and alert. He was scared shitless, but smart. Hopefully that meant he'd be responsive to what she was about to teach him.

She took a closer look at those gnarled ear-stumps. "Deaf, huh? Can you read lips?"

He nodded a strong affirmative.

'That makes this a hell of a lot simpler,' she thought. She positioned herself so her face was right in the center of his vision. She normally didn't need to move her lips when she spoke, but now she made sure to enunciate perfectly, so he'd get every last drop of her message. "What's your name?" she asked softly.

He sputtered at first. She was a quiet one. Oh fuck, the raging ones were bad, but the quiet ones were far more dangerous. "...R-Rither!" he finally forced out of his trembling throat. "Calvin Rither!"

Junella stood with her hands on her hips, looming over him. "Why are you alive right now, Calvin?"

He felt quite sure that if he didn't get this question right, he would suffer plenty for it. An 'I don't know' would be worse than suicide. "Be-because..." He stalled for time. "Because killing me would be too quick?"

A broad smile unrolled across Junella's face. "You are smart."

Toby cringed and started wringing his tail in his paws.

Junella knelt down and picked up the double-ended tuning fork he'd wielded at her. From the way he grimaced, she could see it was important to him. "Oh? This your favorite toy? I've got a sword I like a lot. It'd make me plenty mad if someone took it from me. But then again, that's exactly what you were planning to do, wasn't it?" She sheathed the fork in her other hip. "Mine now."

His face screwed up into a tight rictus. He barely restrained himself from screaming at her.

"Aww, don't like it when the tables are turned?" she cooed. "You're lucky I don't know where you live, else I'd tie you up and make you watch as I stole everything you own. I might even take your clothes if I feel like it. This big-ass fork of yours? It's going on our roof rack. Someone in EC'll pay a pretty penny for it." She grinned at how much he struggled when she said that. "No more meal ticket, asshole. This racket of yours is over."

He couldn't contain himself any longer. "And what if I have a family to feed!? What if I have to provide for them out here in this godforsaken forest!?"

Junella's eyes narrowed. Her volume rose like she'd turned the knob till it snapped off. "WHAT IF WE'D BEEN ONE, HUH!? What if we'd been a family with a buncha babies in the back!? What then, fuckface!? Would you have tipped us over the cliff then too? I'll bet you would have! Cowards like you are the WORST!!" She spat black saliva in his face, then pried his eyes open to make damn sure he could see her words. "When I fight someone, when I kill someone, I make sure they see my eyes first. So it's fair. So they know exactly why they're gonna die. Not like you. You wanna kill without getting your hands dirty? Just flick 'em over the edge and they're nice and quiet and still when you get to them? You don't have to deal with seeing the lights in their eyes go out. Fucking coward. There is NO ONE worse than your kind!"

He was shuddering, trembling. But his eyes had gained the defiance of someone who knows they're in so deep there's no farther down they can dig. "This is what people like me have to do in a world like this," he parroted back to her.

Junella pushed one of her finger-needles up into the soft triangle beneath his jawbone. "Excuses, excuses," she purred darkly. "You don't need to. Why don't you pack up and move to Coryza? Or can't you get through the clouds? You're two hours' walk from EC; why don't you go there and panhandle until you can afford a taxi ride? You don't NEED to take from innocent people, you liar! You do it BECAUSE IT'S EASY!!!"

He flinched hard. And he stared back into Junella's eyes with molten hatred. But he didn't say one word of denial.

Junella took a moment to gather her composure. She didn't anticipate hating the little germ this much. "You don't think about what your victims go through," she whispered. "But you will." With a few swift strokes of her cutlass, she rendered his jacket and pants useless. They'd fall off him the moment he sat up. If she drew a little blood by accident, she didn't care.

She stood back up. She still spoke to Rither, but turned her eyes to Toby. This was the part she wanted him to see. "I told you I wouldn't kill you, Calvin, and my promises are gold. But that just means I won't kill you today. I'm going to leave you here, but I'll be coming back this way in a while. And when I do, I'll hunt you. If I find so much as one of your fingernails left in this forest, I will personally deliver you to Dysphoria and drop you in. Got me?"

The rabbit was utterly stunned she was giving him any chance at all. Moving would not be easy now, but he believed her. He was smart enough to know when to be afraid. "I got you."

Junella moved as if she were about to walk away, but then stopped. She turned back and leaned against George's leg, looking down at her prey. "Oh, I almost forgot to tell you. There's a bunch of Bozos 'bout a half mile away. We fucked 'em up good, but they won't stay that way much longer. I'm surprised they're not here already. Wherever it is you live, you'd better get there quick and lock your doors."

"I will, I will!!" Rither shouted. "Thank you for letting me go!"

She smirked. "I didn't say it was gonna be that easy, did I?"

Seeing the playful twinkle come to her eyes, the rabbit's hopes plummeted. Those eyes were windows to a plane of infinite sadism. Oh god, whatever she was about to do to him was going to be unspeakable.

Junella actually giggled, glad that he'd had this revelation. "Let's make your situation a bit more interesting, shall we? George, would you be so kind as to give each one of your hooves a good sharp twist?"

The rabbit's heart skipped a beat.

"YES, Madam Brox!!"

Toby was about to cry out to stop this, but he was too stunned to react in time.

*CRUNCH*SNAP*SNAP*SKLUTCH*

The sound of bone breaking is awful enough to make some people heave. Toby nearly did.

Rither was shrieking high-pitched yelps of mindless excruciation. The left and right humerus. Both femurs. All four bones destroyed with the slightest effort. His limbs were a casserole of muscle, marrow and sharp little shards. The pain was so intense, he started to go blind as well as deaf.

Junella sighed with satisfaction. "You can step off now, George. You were fantastic."

George did, and gave her a nod to signal a job well done. "What a delightfully insidious mind you have, Madam Brox. I look forward to many years of service with you."

"Ditto." She was doubly pleased to see that, without even being asked, George then went over to the big tuning fork and began knocking it loose so they could take it with them.

Rither was still lying on the ground blubbering, so Junella gave him a light kick in the ribs to get him moving. "Clowns comin', remember? Better haul ass unless you wanna get caught!"

The rabbit was in no condition to speak complete sentences, but he did manage to push his agony aside just long enough to let her know with a look how unfathomably deep his hatred was.

Junella just smiled. And as he began the impossible task of rolling himself back into a crawling position so he could attempt the even more impossible task of getting away in time, she kept on smiling.

She walked over to where Toby was doubled over in shock, holding a hand over his mouth to keep his puke in. She leaned her elbow on his shoulder. "There you have it. I just ordered the merciless torture of a helpless prisoner. And a handicapped one too! Pissed at me yet?"

Toby shoved her away, sickened. "You don't have to act like you enjoyed it so much!"

"But I did," she said. "And I won't lie about that."

Toby turned away from the sobbing, wailing man trying desperately to make his broken body move. He skittered back down the hill towards the car.

Junella followed the mouse, not allowing him to simply turn away from this. Her tone was close to mocking, but not all the way. "If you care so much, why doncha just go back there and hit him on the head with your hammer? He'll die and go back to normal. You can end his suffering in a flash. Why not?"

He stopped and looked back. He could. She was right about that. He felt the presence of his hammer within its portal sheath. "...Because I don't know what he'll do to us then."

She nodded. She was glad to see that her lesson had had some effect. The mouse was practically steaming from how furious he was at her, yet he still realized she was right. "Good."

Feeling helpless with frustration, he pointed in her face. "But what makes you any better than him, huh!? How are you any less a monster!?"

She actually stepped back a little, not expecting such volume from him. But she was ready for it. It was an argument she'd heard many times, and it was one she absolutely despised. "Because I don't treat innocent people like that, Toby. I don't sit and wait for someone I've never met to come by, then ambush them and take what they've got. Every ounce of pain he's feeling right now? He wouldn't be feeling NONE of it if he'd just left us alone. We wouldn't have even known he was there. He's in the position I put him in because he chose to make himself a part of my life!"

Toby stood there staring at her for a moment longer. He wanted to argue. He wanted to call it all bullshit. But he couldn't. From every angle he looked at it, Junella's reasoning was rock solid. But it felt like a tumor on his heart nonetheless. And what made it worse was not knowing if that ugly feeling inside him was right or wrong.

He clenched his teeth in frustration and started walking towards the car again, nearly crying. "Fine!! You're right about everything, Junella! But I hope you don't care that he's gonna hate you forever for this, and he's probably gonna come after you someday!"

She kept pace behind him, just long enough to reply. "Better me than someone else, Toby. Least I'll be ready." And then she let him go.

She stood there, a few yards away from the road, and watched the mouse run back to join the others. She didn't know how things would turn out with him now. She wondered what names he'd call her. This client had some honor to him, and a bit more spine than she'd first assumed. So she was relatively confident he wouldn't just stomp off again. But he'd hate her for a while for this, and she didn't blame him. She hoped she hadn't wrecked his relationship with George too. But this had to be done. This was a bitter pill that had to be forced down his throat eventually. She believed, genuinely, that his sense of mercy would sooner or later have dire consequences for him. Forgiving someone unwisely is a great way to paint 'stab here' on your own back. A long time ago, a friend of hers had said, 'the fight is never over until your enemy is no longer your enemy.' She liked that. It allowed room for forgiveness when a foe showed they were worthy. But it also conveyed that, if someone is a threat to you, it is in your best interests to erase that threat.

She looked over her shoulder at the moaning rabbit. He'd actually managed to start crawling. 'Huh. Hardy li'l bastard.'

The sensible thing to do would have been to cut off his limbs, cauterize the stumps, then put him in a sack and drop him in Dysphoria like she'd said. (And she hadn't made that threat idly. She would be back here on the return trip.) But for now, little Calvin would attempt to run along home and almost-inevitably find himself surrounded by red noses. If he had a partner-in-crime, they'd probably rescue him from the Bozos after a while and kill him back to normal. Then they'd plan their revenge.

Junella did not like knowing that she had enemies. She liked loose ends cut off cleanly. But maybe the mouse's influence had rubbed off on her a little after all. This was more mercy than she'd normally show. At least if the rabbit had the tiniest shred of decency, he might find some empathy with what he put his victims through. He might take her advice and move the hell away. Or he might start up a new ambush somewhere else.

Junella did not find it easy to trust the better nature of other people.

But if he was a fool, and did what she was expecting, she would be ready. At the slightest sound of a tuning fork from now on, her cutlass would be in her hand and she would use it till it got satisfied.

She turned back up the hill to help George, then rejoined the others. They had to get moving again. The sooner the better.

*****

Chapter TWENTY-THREE

Toby walked away from Junella feeling like if he never saw her again for the rest of his life he'd be fine with that.

When he returned to the car, he found Zinc up on the roof, repairing the windows by squeezing some kind of liquid glass out of a big toothpaste-type tube. "Ey, chief. What'd boss-lady wanna talk to you about?"

Toby opened his mouth, but nothing came out. There a million angry words he wanted to say about the skunk, but there was no point in throwing a tantrum at Zinc, who'd done nothing to deserve it. Toby shook his head and sulked past the canine.

On the other side of the skatecar, Piffle had a hand over her eyes to keep from accidentally observing Doll as she pulled the remaining bits of window glass from the hamsterfly's arm. Toby strode past both of them and climbed up into the backseat without a word. He remained silent while the others prepped the car for departure.

A few moments later, a black skull appeared outside his window. George looked rather chagrined. "I do apologize, Sire Toby, if I have inadvertently caused ill feelings by my actions. I was only doing as I believed just."

Toby looked at him for a moment, but then saw Junella nearby and looked away.

Junella saw him as well. His expression didn't change hers. For a moment she considered giving him a word or two of consolation, but knew better that he wouldn't listen. Instead she called out to her partner, "Good going, Zinc, but we can fix the rest of the windows in transit. Get George hooked back up and help him get this big stupid thing up on the roof. If we don't want anymore acid pies up our ass, we gotta move!"

***

The remainder of their journey through Polycoria was uneventful, save for the occasional beast bumping into the skatecar or being chased away from it by George's fearsome snorts.

This was good, because Toby wanted nothing more than to brood in silence for a while. When Piffle entered the back seat and saw the mood he was in, she'd tried to put her paw on his arm to console him. He flinched away. The hamsterfly silently whimpered at not being able to help. But she respected his desire for alone-time and went back to reading her pamphlets.

When one is bedridden during a long illness, one has time to think. When one's body is so ruled by ill health that one ends up spending close to 62% of their lifetime in a single sterile room, then one has lots of time to think. So Toby had gotten plenty of practice walking down the spiral staircase deep inside himself to see what he found there. When there were no playmates around, he'd hold imaginary dialogues with himself. And as he grew older, these sometimes became arguments.

It wasn't just what Junella had made him witness that had his guts tied up in knots. It was the utter frustration of not being able to deny her reasoning. He wanted to let himself get upset and say she was completely wrong. He wanted to dismiss all of it. She was just cruel, and a big jerk, and she didn't know what she was talking about. It would have been so easy to ignore all her words and just retreat into the comfort of moral certitude.

But because Toby had grown into such a self-reflective mouse, he couldn't.

Well, yes, technically he could. But he'd know it. And it would shame him.

So he forced himself to pick up her logic and examine it from every angle like a Rubik's cube. He couldn't dismiss it just because he wanted to; that was immature. So where was the flaw? His gut knew she was wrong. But where?

He couldn't find it in himself to blame George, that he was sure of. For one, even without knowing much about nightmare constructs, he'd seen how wild ones acted. George was the pinnacle of thoughtfulness and compassion compared to them. A bit of fierce behavior was forgivable sometimes. And too, he'd only done what Junella had asked of him. She was the one who came up with the idea to trample Rither's limbs and let him hobble away in agony.

What else could they have done with him? Assuming Junella was telling the truth about the cops in Ectopia Cordis, Toby had no other ideas. If they'd let Rither go, maybe he would have turned around and whipped out some other hidden sonic weapon that'd blow up all their heads. Or maybe he'd flee into the woods and go right back to killing and robbing innocent travelers by tomorrow. Maybe just leaving him there to be captured by the Bozos would have been enough. But Toby had seen those twisted creatures with his own eyes. Could he honestly say that having one's limbs broken would be a less desirable fate?

How many other people had Rither flung off the cliff, just like he would have done to Toby and his friends? They had to stop him somehow, right? The good guys stopped the bad guys from hurting innocents, that was how it worked. But they never did it so cruelly.

'And the bad guys keep coming back the next issue,' a voice inside him said.

Toby grimaced, not wanting to admit that was a fair point.

Junella had said this wasn't a storybook. Was that where he was getting all his ideas about 'good guys' and 'bad guys'? There was certainly truth to that. With all the time he'd spent in his bedroom, he'd barely interacted with the outside world except through fiction. In movies and books, good guys didn't torture their enemies. They didn't kick them when they were helpless. And only rarely would they kill the bad guys outright. Though yes, this was probably done more often so there could be reoccurring villains, rather than for any real moral principle.

If you have the chance to stop a bad furson from hurting innocents, then shouldn't you do that? Whatever it takes? Is it justifiable to be cruel to the cruel, to prevent greater cruelty?

Now that he thought about it, Toby realized that hero characters actually did kill their enemies rather a lot. But specifically, the waves and waves of disposable henchmen. Always dressed identically. Sometimes even in masks. So you cared less when the hero shot them or cracked their necks.

The more Toby thought about it, the more he began to realize some disturbing truths about the portrayals of 'good' and 'evil' he'd seen throughout his life. It wasn't that heroes never killed, they just didn't kill in certain ways. Bloodless kills were okay, because they could show that on TV. Getting shot just made you fall backwards, clutch at your chest and grunt. No messy red sprays everywhere. Heroes could kill henchmen by the score like stepping on ants, so long as it was a 'clean' death. But then, didn't those henchmen have lives of their own? And families?

Was it really being a 'good guy' to slaughter the employees but spare the boss?

The knot in Toby's gut was tightening. Thinking about all the avoidance of messy reality he'd seen in fiction made him realize that maybe he had no idea what the real world was like. And certainly not this nightmare world. But Junella did. She'd been surviving here for how long? Maybe she really did know better than Toby. Maybe he really did need to see what she had shown him. Maybe he did need to learn from it.

So why did he feel such an instinctive revulsion to it?

'Well, obviously, no one likes to see cruelty happen.'

Toby felt the blood drain out of his cheeks as he suddenly realized something incredibly damning about himself. 'Would I be feeling this disgusted if I hadn't stood there and watched it happen? If Junella had done exactly what she did, and just told me about it afterward instead of showing me... Would I have cared less?'

The answer was a painfully unavoidable, 'Yes'.

It hurt to admit that. His cheeks burned and his chest felt tight. But no one can run away from a truth that's inside them. At most, you can put up walls to keep it away temporarily.

What if everything he was feeling had less to do with Junella, or Rither, and was more about himself?

What if... What if he wasn't mad at Junella for what she'd done, but for making him witness it? For forcing him to acknowledge it? For involving him?

Oh hell, that was an ugly thought. He searched his heart, trying desperately to disprove it. It made him feel so shallow and self-centered. Did he really not care about the rabbit at all? The more he asked himself, and the more he tried to force himself to, the more he realized that all he was receiving back was a void. He didn't care.

And why? Because that heartless, cold-blooded thief had tried to murder him and all his friends, that's why. Rither had done the same to countless others. Toby could imagine himself inside the car, falling over the cliff, time slowing to a crawl as he watched the ground speed towards him. He remembered the paralyzing terror of going over the waterfall, so intense his brain had blacked him out rather than feel the crush of impact. And what if he survived? What would it feel like to stare out the broken window at the sideways ground, his limbs a tangled mess, feeling the weight of his friends' dead bodies on top of him?

Toby was reminded of the golden rule: Treat Others As You Would Like To Be Treated Yourself.

Well, didn't that apply both ways?

Why didn't it also mean to treat others in the way you see them treating others? 

Toby was not by nature a vengeful furson, and likely never would be. But he could feel a candle flame of fury inside of him as he thought about what that rabbit had put unknowable other people through. He still couldn't bring himself to call what Junella had done "good", but he could acknowledge that, compared to the cumulative terror and pain Rither's victims had gone through, it was probably nowhere close.

So what then made Junella wrong for doing it?

Was it... Toby squeezed his eyes shut, chasing elusive thoughts... Was it that he believed she had no right? That it was wrong to declare yourself judge, jury and executioner?

But then, who else?

She'd ruled out handing the rabbit over to authorities ('And why is letting a cop punish someone less wrong than doing it yourself?' Toby thought, but that was perhaps getting too heavy.) If Junella was right that no one else in this world was around to put a stop to people who preyed on others, then why not her?

Why did it feel wrong for a furson to decide for themselves to take another's fate into their hands?

And again, did he actually think what she'd done was wrong? Or did he just not want to have to think about it? Didn't he eat meat sometimes, without thinking of the nonevs dying at the slaughterhouse? Hadn't he already known she'd killed people before? Hadn't she flat-out admitted it? Hadn't she killed HIM a few times!?

Well, yes, but that was different. That was in a state of panic, and to heal him. But he couldn't continue to push aside the fact that he was riding in a car with a very dangerous furson. Two of them actually. It was easier to not think such dark thoughts about Zinc since he was so friendly.

'So what do you expect of them?' Toby asked himself. 'You hired them because they were tough enough to get you to Anasarca. What did you think that meant? Did you think you could just put off confronting it forever? Just turn your head and whistle every time they had to hurt someone to keep you safe?'

Junella had said that the rabbit wouldn't have gotten his limbs broken if he hadn't chosen to intrude upon her life. Yet Junella wouldn't have even been there to have her life intruded upon if Toby hadn't hired her.

The mouse clutched at his head and felt like it was about to crack in half like a smashed pumpkin.

Everyone else in the Fearsleigher was silent. Even George kept his eyes glued to the road ahead. Zinc avoided the tension around him by falling back into his magazine. Piffle did the same by brushing Doll's hair over and over and over.

Junella sat in the front and looked up in the mirror at Toby's tormented expression.

'What have you done, you stupid skunk?' she thought.

***

Several minutes later, Junella asked George to stop the car. They were passing another deep ravine, and Junella got out to unhitch the tuning fork from the roof and send it tumbling down out of sight with a kick. It fell hundreds of feet into darkness and vanished. After a moment's hesitation, in went the rabbit's handheld fork too. Junella had been planning to test it out to discover its properties. Maybe keep it, maybe sell it. Now she just wanted all traces of the incident gone from her sight.

She climbed back in the driver's seat and asked George to keep onwards.

***

Travelers approaching Ectopia Cordis will always have a good, clear view of the city. Not only due to the it's height and brightness, but because of what immediately surrounds it on all four sides:

Fifteen hundred square miles of parking lot.

This lot is so big, its dimensions actually exceed those of many terrestrial cities. But its size has a purpose. Not only is it impossible to drive anywhere within the city on anything larger than a moped, which means people gotta park their vehicles somewhere, but the massive open space gives EC's gunners a wide line of sight to spot and shoot the living hell out of any nightmares that creep close.

Realizing this (and remembering their approach to Coryza), Junella suggested that maybe George should make a pit stop as soon as they crossed the border. Polycoria's tundra ended abruptly at the beginning of the paved lot. All of it ended. The snow, the road, even some of the trees were sheared in half. It looked like someone had drawn a god-sized laser along the edge.

Even this far out there were a handful of cars around. Rusting hulks, so full of cobwebs they looked like they were born of the stuff. No one would be retrieving them any time soon. Their tires and electronics had been stripped long ago.

George stopped at the first spot he came to and let the Fearsleigher come to a bumpy rest.

Junella looked into the backseat. "I thought we might wanna stretch our legs a bit."

Toby was as still as a statue. Like he hadn't heard a word the skunk said.

Zinc caught his partner's drift, nodded to Piffle, and they both exited. Piffle brought Doll, hugging her.

Junella bit her lip. She moved an inch towards Toby, then an inch back, then forward again. Then she simply looked at him for a while.

"Still hate me?" she asked quietly.

The mouse had his arms crossed. His posture was as closed off as if he had police barricades surrounding him.

But his eyes met hers for a split second, then glanced towards the seat next to him.

She was glad to see this. She stepped carefully through the interior and plopped onto the faux-leather in the back. Mindful to keep a foot of space between her and her client.

Outside, Zinc, Doll, and Piffle took a walk amongst the derelict vehicles. Inside, Junella and Toby sat and stared at the carpeted floor for a minute or two without speaking.

Neither one wanted to be first to break the silence, but eventually Junella traced a finger across her grooves; a soft hiss of static.

Toby's ear twitched in her direction.

"I... I think I might actually be sorry," she sang in a whisper.

Toby looked up. That was the last thing he expected to hear out of her.

The skunk kept on staring into the floor, fingerneedles poking little holes in the seat. Her mouth did not move when she spoke. "At the time, I saw an opportunity to teach you something I thought you needed to know. But maybe you don't. I keep forgetting that you're not staying. You're going home. At least, if we succeed you are. So maybe I don't need to punch all the weakness outta you. Maybe I should just let you be."

Junella put her arms around herself as if she felt a chill. "Maybe I didn't think before I acted. Maybe I coulda just talked to you. Maybe forcing you to look at... that... was a rotten thing to do."

Toby took all of this in. Out of all the things he'd thought about, the possibility had not occurred to him that maybe the mighty Junella Brox might be feeling some doubts of her own. She always acted so sure of herself. Bordering on condescending.

He sighed. He leaned back against the seat and looked up at the grey ceiling fabric. "Maybe," he acknowledged. His voice felt raspy even though he hadn't used it in a while. "Or maybe I did need to see it."

She arched an eyebrow and looked sideways at him.

"Maybe, as much as it made me feel like throwing up, I needed to stop thinking that this is all just an adventure in one of my books. One where the hero goes on a magical quest and stays pure of heart the whole time. Maybe I needed to face the possibility that I've got a picture in my head of what this place is like, a storybook illustration, and you actually live here. Maybe you know more than me."

Junella nodded. "Thank you for saying so." She suddenly blushed. "-I don't mean, like, I know everything. Just..."

"I didn't think that."

She smiled sheepishly. "Right."

Toby put his arms behind his head, still not looking directly at her. Though he could see her in his peripheral vision. "I'm still angry at you, Junella. But I've really thought about it, and I can't help but admit, you are right. About everything you said. It feels awful and slimy and ugly to have to accept that I'm in a place where sometimes hurting someone who's helpless is the right thing to do. That feels SO wrong..." He grimaced. "But then again, I don't even know if it feels like that because it is wrong, or if it's something I'd rather let myself pretend doesn't happen." He had another thought and shot a narrow look at her. “Or maybe because your lesson didn’t exactly have much tact.”

She bit her lip. No denying that.

Toby’s look softened slightly. He was glad to see her showing some acknowledgment of his feelings. "I don't know if you were right to show me that. I honestly can't decide. And that makes me almost nauseous."

She closed her eyes, not wanting to see the conflict in his expression. "I'm sorry for that," she sang. Her voice was as unsteady as he'd ever heard it. "I'm not good with... subtle. I do what I know is right, because I know it's right. I do what keeps me alive. I'm not used to having to defend that. I mean, it's not like I hear a lot of disagreement outta Zinc." She winced at how that sounded. "...Not to imply he's a brown-noser! I couldn't stand him if he was! He's just the kind of guy who goes with the flow, y'know? And we think alike anyway. So he's apt to agree with me because he already sees where I'm thinking."

She looked out the window to where the canine was straining to lift a junked subcompact up over his head, to Piffle's wild applause.

"He puts up with more of my bullshit than he probably should," she added, nearly inaudibly.

"But you..." Junella rested her head in her hand. "I'm not used to this moral dilemma kinda shit. You're damn weird, Toby. My other clients... they either cringe in the back the whole time, or they wanna play cowboy and disobey me every chance they get. You... You make me reconsider things. Jerk." She chuckled.

Toby chuckled a tiny bit too.

Junella looked over and gave him a trace of a smile.

She sighed. "Look, I don't wanna sweep this under the rug. I don't want you to think I'm just trying to make it go away. But we're so close to EC we can see it. I want to settle down in a hotel room. Hell, I want a bubble bath." She leaned a little closer towards him. "So can we... I dunno... go back to normal for the moment? Again, I'm not saying we pretend nothin' ever happened. Just... I hate riding in a car where the atmosphere feels like I'm packed in ice."

He nodded. "I can understand that. And I think that's okay with me. For now, can we agree there's no good answer? There's no 'one of us is totally right and the other's totally wrong'? Can we agree we're different people? REALLY different! And accept that we're not gonna like some of the things the other one does?"

Junella sat up and gave him a genuinely warm smile. "Yeah. That sounds good to me."

She put out her paw for a shake.

He reached for it.

"Watch the needles."

"I will."

They shook.

Then Junella did something Toby didn't expect. She didn't exactly hug him, but for a brief moment she reached over and sort of touched her shoulder to his while reaching around him.

He blinked, not sure of what had just happened.

"I don't like having enemies, Toby," Junella crooned. "I don't like being in debt. I like things settled and smooth. I like to feel like I know where things stand. And I admit it, Toby, there's gonna be times when I'll do things that turn your stomach. And sometimes I'll need you to just trust me, no matter how ugly it feels, because I've been through something your mind doesn't even know where it should start being afraid of. But I can tell you this: I know I'm not a hero, but I do try not to be the bad guy. I try not to be worse than I have to be."

He nodded. "Allright."

She looked past him out the other window, to the glittering, whirling city they were about to enter. "Something else just occurred to me. I think maybe I felt an urgency to make you face reality 'cause I knew we were heading here. EC is not like Coryza," she warned. "Coryza's like a welcoming fireplace. This town is like a big fat middle finger. It's even shaped like one. A great big tower of rotating 'Fuck You'."

"So why're we going there?" Toby asked reasonably.

She brightened. "Because it's the best place there is. There's no better stop in Phobiopolis to shop, eat, take in a show, get rich, or get killed. But there's a reason I don't live there." She tried to think of a way to describe it that wouldn't sound like she was afraid of the place. "Think of, like... like a golden treadmill, all covered in diamonds and emeralds 'n shit. Looks pretty, right? But do you wanna have to keep running on it all the time?"

Toby thought maybe he could follow the metaphor.

"I like to do my jobs, then have a place where I can go and relax for a while, get me?" Junella continued. "EC's always spinning. You stop moving, your ass falls off."

The sparkle of confidence came back to her eyes. She swatted the mouse on the arm. "How 'bout we go get a good meal and a good rest? Clear out all this bad air, okay?"

"Allright," Toby said. He thought that sounded pretty good too.

Junella had already popped the door open, but Toby put a paw on her arm. "Hey..."

She looked back.

"Thanks for talking about this with me. I'm sorry if I was too sulky back there. I'm glad we worked things out instead of just being stubborn."

Junella paused with her foot on the outside ladder. "Me too," she trilled. Her voice was actually quite pretty when her song was gentle. "So we're good for right now? We're forgiven and sorry and all that happy horseshit?"

Toby snorted a laugh. "Yeah, I think so."

Together they hopped down to the pavement. George had been standing by, still harnessed up, trying to appear as though he hadn't been eavesdropping.

Toby walked over and patted his side. "I'm sorry I didn't accept your apology earlier. I'll accept it now if that's allright," he said.

Toby would not have thought it possible for an undead charred skeleton's smile to be so full of warmth. "Certainly, Sire Toby. Very good. And thank you."

Zinc and Piffle were meanwhile rooting through the rusty, dusty old cars, chatting up a storm and laughing their tails off. Doll was enjoying a piggyback ride on Zinc's shoulders. Junella stormed over and barked out with a grin, "What the hell kinda shenanigans are goin' on over here!?"

Zinc stifled a chortle (he'd just been telling Piffle the story about him, four cop cars, a grocery cart, and a really big hill), and turned to see his employer and their client looking surprisingly cheerful. "Just the normal kind, Juney. Nothin' fancy. What's up with you? You were both so grim the last few miles, I half-expected to see you walk outta the car holding a stack of raw mouseburgers."

Toby puffed out his chest and seemed very offended by that. "Hey! Why'd you assume if we got into a fight, she'd be the one to kill me and turn me into food? Why not the other way around?"

Zinc stared at the mouse like he literally could not believe his ears. "Are you serious...?"

But then he saw the glint of a grin on Toby's lips.

He slapped his knee. "HA! That was a joke! Not bad, rodent! That's a gasser!"

Piffle giggled too. "Besides, we all know if anyone's gonna be food it'll be me," she said sweetly.

"C'mon ya pack of weirdos." Junella swung her arm towards the car. "We're only a few miles away from civilization. I'm hungry enough to eat George."

He happened to overhear. "Goodness, that would not be advisable! I can only imagine I would taste like biting into a fireplace."

*****

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Ectopia Cordis.

Ectopia Cordis!

It's... It's... It's freakin' ECTOPIA CORDIS for crying out loud!!!

How does one even begin to describe such a place? The biggest city and the tallest structure in all of Phobiopolis. Home to approximately one-fifth of all Phobiopolans. Most other citizens have visited, and all the rest want to. It could be easily named world capital if there were any governing body to make decisions about such things.

For starters, let's begin with the most obvious fact: it is a city made of ferris wheels.

Hundreds upon hundreds of forever-turning steel wheels, piled up into the sky like a stack of brilliant hotcakes. Every section of the city is in constant motion. The whine of metal on metal is omnipresent (most residents successfully tune it out after a month or so). The first hundred feet of the city is structural supports and giant motors. From this foundation rises a vertical mile of metal rings. Each one teeming with life. The top stretching up almost high enough to pierce the heavens.

Ectopia Cordis is sometimes called The Light In The Wasteland, and for good reason. From a distance, it appears as a pulsing, dazzling rainbow popsicle defying the surrounding region's eternal night. Every spare inch of its architecture (not used for real estate) explodes with colored light. The carnival bulbs number in the billions. Neon flows through the city in a million miles of glass veins. Imagine all the brightness of Las Vegas rolled up into a tube, planted like a wizard's staff in the middle of a sea of asphalt.

As the Fearsleigher streaked towards this mother of all lighthouses, both Piffle and Toby stuck their heads out the window like eager puppies. The mouse's friction with Junella was whisked away from his thoughts. He was a forgiving furson anyway, and it is nigh-impossible to feel anything but giddy awe when getting one's first look at the city.

Even though they'd barely crossed a third of the parking lot, Toby could already see the astonishing intricacy of Ectopia's design. At first it had all looked chaotic. A house of illuminated cards that might topple at any second. But no: looking closer, everything was all balanced and interconnected perfectly. There were vertical ferris wheels and horizontal ones. Everything meshed together like the gears of a clock tower. Every ninety feet, a massive horizontal monsterwheel spanned the full diameter of the city. From within them, more wheels of decreasing size arose and descended. Wheels within wheels within wheels. As Toby watched, he realized that, where a normal ride would have small dangling cars for passengers, some of EC's were so unimaginably enormous, they instead had city blocks. It was hard to make out clear detail from this distance, but some of the sections looked like they had apartment buildings and malls and even parks. Tiny rotating forests! And all of it was designed to facilitate residents getting around. Since trying to drive in the city would be suicide, the wheels kept people and cargo in constant motion to wherever their destination might be.

It was boggling Toby's mind. He tried to imagine living in a place where, if you wanted to go down to the supermarket, you'd just stand at the edge of your sidewalk and wait for the store to rotate into place in front of you!

He wondered if there were faster ways to get places. Races to the top. There had to be. It was just the sort of thing people would naturally challenge themselves to.

Zinc was bouncing in his seat, practically wetting his pants from excitement. He tore himself away from the sight of the gleaming tower-city to ask in the back seat, "This your first? I mean, I know it's yours, Toby. How 'bout you, Piffle? Ever feast your peeps on anything like this before?"

She pulled her head back in and shook it. "Nuh-uh! I don't think I could even dream a place this nifty!"

"I'm..." Toby sputtered. "I can't even think of words..."

Junella had seen it all before though, and was less than impressed. She was more concerned about how the city's defensemen would feel about George. She had no idea what kind of upgraded weaponry they'd have compared to Coryza's flaming arrows.

The parking lot they were traveling through was packed full of every kind of transportation imaginable. But only those with a gambling problem, or a stupidity problem, parked too close to the city's base. This was due to the mountainous ring of garbage that encircled it. Just try to imagine how much junk, stuff, debris, odds, ends, and people might fall off the edges of a skyscraper-sized tower of spinning discs. Here's a hint: you can't. Crews work around the clock trying to keep it from piling up too high. They are both helped and hindered by the giant nightmare hogs that come to feast on this smorgasbord of trash. Scabby-skin, curved-tusks, and mullet haircuts. These beasts would be welcome if all they did was eat up the city's detritus. The problem was, they also liked eating parked cars. And tourists.

As Junella watched one of the snorting, oozing porkers galloping towards a cluster of pedestrians, a streak of light and smoke was launched towards it. The pig-like creature had about half a second to oink in terror before it exploded in orange and green flames. What parts of it that didn't burn up were corroded away into nothing by the rocket's antibiotic chemicals.

George saw this too. "Madam Brox, I would not like that to happen to me. Perhaps we should let them know I pose no threat?"

"My thoughts exactly," she acknowledged. She was racking her brain for a way to signal the tower guards ('A flare maybe? A white flag?'), when the guards themselves surprised her by making first contact. A mailmouse squirmed its way out of the cigarette lighter in the dashboard with a handwritten note.

Junella read:

	DEAR OCCUPANTS,

	IS THAT NIGHTMARE KIDNAPPING YOU OR TOWING YOU?
	BECAUSE WE'VE GOT A SHITLOAD OF MISSILES POINTED STRAIGHT AT IT.

	-SGT. CANKER

"Nice of them to ask first," she sang. She fished a pencil out of the glove compartment and circled 'towing' several times. Then added a smiley face and "THANKS". She handed the note to the mouse, who folded it up between its paws and dove out of sight into the nearest hole. Zinc's ear.

"Yow!!" he said.

A moment later the mouse reappeared and handed the note back. This time, on the opposite side was written:

	THIS NEEDS TO BE DISCUSSED.
	MEET ME @ BASE OF CITY, SUB-QUADRANT 13

	ALSO: DESIGNATION "FEERSLEYR"???

	-SGT. CANKER

Junella wrote an acknowledgment, then added a P.S.:

	It's Fearsleigher. My co-pilot cannot spell

and sent the note back. This time, Zinc covered his ears, so the mailmouse dove into a cupholder instead.

Closer now, Toby could hear music in the air. Hard, sharp, dirty, grease-soaked sounds. Like harnessed snarls. He looked out across the chromed fields of parked cars. Some factory-shiny, some old junkers. Some, he couldn't tell how the heck they moved. (Had he really seen an ice cream truck with octopus tentacles?) Up in the sky he saw dancing movements. He thought at first it was giant mosquitoes, but it was actually several citizens hang-gliding down from the upper levels to look for their cars. 'Makes more sense than walking,' he had to admit.

Looking upwards, he could also see a few orange construction cranes with insectlike legs. They scuttled up and down the city, repairing broken sections or hauling additions into place. Toby guessed that, just by the fact he could see them so clearly from this distance, they were probably immense. 'Like domesticated rustbeasts.' In fact, one of them seemed to be carrying an entire restaurant. It looked like a toy playset compared to the massive orange arm it dangled from.

Toby also saw the vast ring of garbage around the city. It reminded him of wintertime when all the snow in a big parking lot would get shoveled up into a huge, sooty mountain. But this was even taller, and uglier. Fursons with big electrified sticks were herding the pig-nightmares towards the pile, letting them eat their fill, then giving them sparking slaps to make them move on. More junk was always raining down, so it was a never-ending race to clear away lanes for people to pass through. Toby even saw clusters of trash-pickers rooting through the piles, searching for free treasures.

The lights of the city made the moon look dull in comparison. The stars weren't even visible. But below the glare was the city's guts. As Toby's gaze slowly descended its length, he noted that each section seemed subtly distinct from the ones above and below. Hard to put a finger on it with everything moving, but sometimes a shift in brightness, colors, or architecture. Toby wondered if the residents in each one defined a unique culture for themselves, making the levels like boroughs in a city.

At the bottom of the stack, impossibly massive diagonal beams criss-crossed to form the base of the structure, which had to be as wide across as all of Coryza. Between the beams, Toby could see ancient machinery turning. Huge gears and screws and chains and pulleys. Toby didn't see any smoke. He wondered if maybe there was a huge exhaust pipe that emerged at the very top. Or maybe it all just ran on magic.

Closer still, Toby could see ant-like swarms of people lining up at big gateways spaced evenly around the base. Scanning over them, he gained some insight into the city's personality. Most of these people looked tough. Sometimes physically, sometimes technologically, sometimes just by the way they carried themselves. But aside from the obvious gawping tourists who stuck out like sore thumbs, these were people who all looked like they could take care of themselves in a nasty situation. Toby was rather glad he was traveling with others who could fill that role for him.

The gates were all numbered, and beneath an ornate, wrought-iron 13, a little guy in a glaring green vest was waving at the Fearsleigher with those light-up popsicles they use on airport runways. Junella shouted for George to head towards him.

There was rather a lot of screaming as George and the Fearsleigher made the scene in front of so many Ectopians. Some stared, some fainted, others threw soda cans and whatever else was handy. George once again tried to appear nonthreatening. The crowd wasn't buying it though. Flinching from all the projectiles and dirty looks, the spectral stallion halted in front of the man with the cones.

The guy's cigar fell out of his mouth and he turned tail in the opposite direction as fast as he could.

Junella swiveled in her seat. "Disembarking time! Someone called Canker wants to talk to us about George. I figured as much." As her passengers piled out, Junella swung herself around to the front bumper so she could retrieve something important from storage. Seeing the stares George was getting, Toby walked right up to pat his ribcage. The others picked up on his intent and flanked their transportation too.

Seeing souls emerge from the sleigh-thing and cluster protectively around the undead nightmare horse made some of the Ectopians relent. Not all, but at least George had to duck less junk. "A thousand thanks for your loyalty," he told his friends with much relief.

"You're welcome!" Piffle said. She hopped up to kiss George's nose, then held up Doll so she could too.

Sergeant Canker emerged shortly. This was doubly accurate, since he was a full-grown man who stood barely taller than Toby. Even stranger, ferrets are known for being long and slender, not squat and bulky. He was dressed in a spangly, impressive uniform with lots of medals and a hat as big as his head. He was surprisingly quick on his feet as he ran up to George.

"What in the fuckety flyin' hell is goin' on around here!? This thing can't exist! My eyes can't be seeing this! Are you trying to give me a heart attack, asking me to take it seriously that you wanna park a goddam nightmare construct outside my fair city? I got property damage to consider!!"

Junella nudged Zinc. "Play tour guide for a bit while I deal with the asshole, kay?" Zinc nodded heartily and the skunk went off to attempt schmoozing the sergeant.

Toby and Piffle were both staring up at the bright lights of the ever-rotating metropolis. Zinc plopped his wrenches around their shoulders. "It's the most, ain't it? Nothing else like it in this world or any other. Questions?"

"Yeah!" Toby blurted. He thought back to the hall of Coryzan history. "How in the heck did this get built!?"

"Good first question," Zinc said. "See, a few hunnert years ago, there was this big-time bad news evil sorceress called Scaphis Tarrare. A real cocksucker, and not in the good way. Dunno all the details, but 'ssentially she was powerful enough to magic up this big clockwork tower. She'd sit at the top and cast an eyeball down at all the poor shnooks she wanted to put the hurt on. Anyway, that's where Luxy comes in."

"I think I heard that name before," Toby and Piffle muttered simultaneously. "Jinx!" said Piffle.

"You probably did," Zinc said. "Luxy Bleeder is more famous than Aldridge. He's like... He's..." As the canine searched for words, the mouse and hamster could see an almost fanatical admiration in his eyes. "He's the Einstein of murder! Even that doesn't do him justice. He's the most brilliant homicidal maniac to ever live. And he ended up here! Holy cow, are we lucky to have him or what?"

Toby blinked. "Lucky to have a homicidal maniac!?"

Zinc winced. "You don't understand, man! With Luxy, killing is art! His brain's got illuminations like no one else. Nobody knows what he was like back on Earth. But here? Where there's no permanent death? He's a rock star. He's Zeus. If they had an election for president of the planet, he'd be the only candidate anyone would vote for."

"I still don't understand," Toby said.

Zinc snarled in frustration, trying to think of a way to convey the man's supreme coolness. "Okay, the sorceress I mentioned? Think about how powerful you'd hafta be to create somethin' this size. AND LUXY KILLED HER!!! That's how souped-up his brain is. He outsmarted magic! I don't even know how! No one does. But not only did Luxy kick the bitch's ass, he somehow caused a... Like, a reality-quake. Like when you smack the set to change the channel. Except somehow, he did it to the tower. Changed the whole thing on the spot to ferris wheels instead of clockwork. 'I thought that'd be more fun,' he said."

"He was right," Piffle said. "By the way, is that him over there?"

"WHERE!?" Zinc hopped a foot in the air as he whirled around. But it wasn't the man himself, just a billboard. Zinc rolled his eyes at himself. It was admittedly unlikely that the mayor of Ectopia Cordis would be hanging around in the parking lot. Instead, several feet away there was a big purple banner with a cartoon raccoon on it, smiling brightly. Above the raccoon's head was "Luxy sez". And in his word balloon: 

	ACROPHOBIC? YOU MIGHT HAVE A BETTER TIME SOMEWHERE ELSE.

Toby had an intuition he'd be seeing a lot more of these billboards inside the city.

Zinc said, "Yeah, that's him. There ain't a snowball's chance we'll meet him, but his face is everywhere. People line up for miles to be his victims. He could beat Junella in a knife fight with a blindfold on; no contest. Hell, with just one knife he could beat both of us! He's an artist. He's a maestro. To be killed by Luxy Bleeder is an honor people would do anything for."

"I'll take your word for it," Toby said, looking uneasy.

Seeing that the mouse was still unconvinced, Zinc continued. "Well, he doesn't just kill people. He runs the city too. And does a damn good job. Infrastructure, development, police stuff, holidays. You name it, he does it. He's basically dictator-for-life, but he's fair about it. If anyone thinks they can do things better than him, he usually gives them a job so they can prove it. His whole deal is: whatever's best for EC, whether it comes from him or not."

"Huh," Toby said. "Reminds me of this superhero show I saw once where the bad guy mastermind actually did take over the world. And the heroes were kinda stunned that he was pretty good at it. They still kicked his butt though."

Zinc laughed. "Sore losers."

He rhapsodized about Luxy's many legends and accomplishments for a while longer until Junella came striding back over, looking pleasantly surprised. "I take back what I said. Canker ain't an asshole after all," she chirped.

George, unharnessed, followed behind her. "A blustery fellow, but quite willing to listen to reason!" he added.

"So what's the scoop on Fido?" Zinc asked. (George gave him a slightly-offended look at that.)

"The scoop is, our pony pal can't come in-" The others made sounds of disappointment. Junella held her hands up. "He can't come in like this," she clarified. "Canker said folks'd crap their pants and be jumping off the edges wherever we took him. Plus he's too damn tall. They typically don't allow in anything bigger than a bike, except in zoos."

Piffle gasped happily. "Oh, so we can just shrink him again!"

"Or..." Junella held up the corked bottle she'd retrieved from the Fearsleigher, "...we can use this."

George leaned in to sniff it.

"Transformation potion I bought at the hospital. Thought it'd be useful."

"Will it work on George?" Toby asked.

"It's made for nightmares," she sang, grinning at her cleverness. "People use 'em as weapons. Nightmare's chasing you? Splash 'em with this and they'll turn into something harmless for a while so you can make a getaway. Usually only works for a few minutes or so. But George, if you don't resist it, it oughtta hold for as long as we need it to."

The stallion backed up a few steps, looking very reluctant. "Could we not use the resizing window instead? I actually enjoyed the novelty of being diminuitive."

Junella arched an eyebrow. "It's safe, don't worry."

"That is not the source of my reluctance, Madam Brox..." He whined like a dog being given a bath. "It's just that... I rather like my outward appearance. I am averse to its alteration."

Junella growled. "Look, I bought this before I knew the otter was gonna sell me a shrinky-thing. I spent money on this juice! Just try it!"

George sighed in resignation.

Piffle gave him a pat on the forelock. "It'll be fine. Getting turned into new things is fun!"

"I appreciate your help, Madam McPerricone," he said sincerely. Then he straightened up and snorted, banishing his hesitance. "If in taking this action I am doing what is best for my compatriots, then so be it! Apply the potion, Madam Brox!" He kept a stiff upper lip, despite not having one.

Junella popped the cork (the stuff smelled like grape jam, surprisingly), and hurled the bottle's contents.

The liquid made sparks when it touched George's bones. He barely had time to let out a shout of surprise before he started whirling around in a tornado of lightning bolts. Everyone covered their ears at the sound, which was like seven bottle rockets firing off at once.

In less than three seconds it was over. George the illuminated horse skeleton was gone. In his place was George the multicolored mechanical parrot.

Junella whistled. "Didn't expect THAT!"

The others gathered around George as he peeked his head out from under his wing and got a glimpse of his new self. Immediately, he recoiled in protest. "You have made me into a clockwork toy! An automaton! How insufferably degrading!" He clanked and clinked as he ran around in circles, flapping his wings and gnashing his beak. He looked like he'd been assembled by an unusually bright child with an Erector set. His eyes were camera shutters. His wings were jointed with rivets. His feathers were made of tin and wire.

"This is absolutely unacceptable!" George shrieked, continuing his tantrum. "I will not stand for this! I will not tolerate... Oh. Oh my goodness!" It was at this point that George had flapped hard enough to get off the ground several inches. He tried it again. Soon he was hovering a few feet above the asphalt. "This is unexpectedly enjoyable. I may have to reconsider this form. Hm."

Junella grinned smugly. "See? Ain't I always right?" She tapped her shoulder and George flew in to perch on it.

"I like it," Zinc appraised. "With the scarf and the cutlass, Juney, you already look pirateish. He completes yer ensemble."

The others all complimented George on his new looks too, which did make him feel somewhat better about having his noble species swapped for a squawking feather-duster.

Piffle meanwhile picked up the empty bottle of potion. She licked a remaining drop off the lip. It gave her an alligator tail. She squeaked with delight at this new addition and was already thinking of things she could do with it and how she might have to sit differently in chairs, when it vanished away, turning back into her normal stubby fluffball. "Aw blueberries!" she swore.

Junella marched back to where Sergeant Canker was standing with a few other Ectopian guards. "Everything's all cleared up now!" she called out. "I let my horse run off to, uh, graze or something. So he's not a problem anymore."

The sergeant chuckled at her transparent ruse. "And where did this fine specimen of parrotdom happen to come from?"

"He was in the trunk," Junella immediately lied. "He likes it in there. It's dark."

"Cheep. Cheep," George said in monotone.

Canker very nearly broke his facade to guffaw. "Allright you shifty minx. So long as that 'parrot' doesn't suddenly get a lot bigger and bonier, there'll be no problems. You may continue to the elevators with your posse once you get that crazy wagon parked."

"Thank yuh kindly," she twanged as she moseyed past. Her grin when she rejoined the others was nearly wider than her head.

"See, this is why I like EC so much," Zinc said. "You can get away with anything so long as you keep the chaos to a minimum."

Junella slapped the side of the Fearsleigher. "Everybody listen! Assuming our client will want to do a bit of sightseeing again, we'll probably be here until late tomorrow. Might even wanna spend two nights, since God knows we won't find better accommodations on the road to Dysphoria. So if there's anything you want outta the car, best get it now before I shrink it."

Zinc dove for his current hot rod magazine. Toby was about to look around for his paperback when he realized it was still safe in his pocket. Junella retrieved a travel satchel from the front compartment, already pre-loaded with essentials: maps, cash, mace, grenades, etc..

Piffle felt a very urgent tugging at her leg. "What is it, Doll?" She looked down. Then she looked back up once she realized Doll couldn't reply until she did.

A little plastic finger wrote on her skirt fabric: P-A-P-E-R-?

Piffle nodded to her. "Does anybody have something to write with? I think Doll needs to say something!" Zinc tossed her the pencil from the front seat and was about to start looking for some paper when Piffle winced. "Oh I am such a big goof! Sorry, everyone!" She quickly dumbfounded a tiny notepad for Doll. "Here you are. Sorry I didn't think of that right away." She looked around for a place where Doll could write unobserved, then sat her on the ground in the shadow of the skate blades and stood guard in front. "No one look at her!"

"Try not to anyway," Junella quipped.

Meanwhile, Toby tried to decide whether he'd need the throwing weapons and bracers he'd got from Dorster's place. He cast an asking look at Zinc, who nodded in a 'Couldn't hurt' kinda way.

A few moments later, a hand patted Piffle's ankle.

The hamsterfly swiveled around and scooped Doll up in a hug. "Let's see what you wrote."

Since she didn't have to rely on her fingertip this time, Doll's handwriting was actually quite pretty: 

	'This city looks too bright and noisy. I'm tired.
	And I feel like a burden, needing to be carried around.
	May I please stay with the car?'

"Oh of course you can. I understand." Piffle said, patting her wrist. "Hey guys! Doll wants to stay with the car and have a nap! Izzat okay with everyone?"

"I could not possibly agree more to this," Junella deadpanned.

Piffle blew a raspberry at the skunk. "How come you're so mean to her?"

"Because I'm mean, that's why," she replied. Fetched the resizing window, she stood in front of the Fearsleigher. "Everybody got all they want?"

The hamsterfly fluttered up to the door to set Doll down on the backseat. "You have a good rest, okay?" she said, and gave her plastic friend a kiss. "Sweet dreams. I'll miss you."

Piffle barely got out of the way in time when Junella began reducing the car. Their mighty fortified carriage became a miniature for action figures. And then it was sitting in Junella's palm, the size of a cranberry. She opened her mouth and dropped it inside.

Piffle winced. "Oh my! Won't the blades hurt your throat?"

"Nah. Thanks for the concern, but my insides are mostly liquid. They'll coat the car in a little vinyl pill. Safest place for it."

Piffle lightly touched Junella's tummy. "It's weird to think Doll's in there now."

The skunk's eyes shot wide open.

She hadn't realized the implications of what she'd just done.

That creepy-ass doll was inside of her. Microscopic. Just the right size to crawl into her bloodstream and swim up to her brain to cause an aneurysm.

She bent over to heave. After a couple of cacks, up came a black wax pill. She immediately fished it out of her spit and shoved it in Piffle's mouth. "YOU take care of it!!"

***

The wait for the elevators wasn't too bad. Toby and the others crowded in between a duck family and a very fat viking. Guards passed by and waved literal magic wands around everyone: little wooden sticks with sparkles at the tips. Toby thought they might have been checking for weapons, but Zinc said with a grin that weapons were encouraged here. The wands were to sniff out spores and residues that might be clinging to clothing, ready to do some infesting.

Zinc anticipated the Toby's worry at hearing about the weapons. Ectopia Cordis had a police force, he began explaining. A fleet of wheeled robots with gold stars and nightsticks. But the general rule was that you should at least try to solve your own problems before calling in the fuzz. Luxy believed that a citizen who expects a government to act as their parents needs to start acting like an adult themselves. So Ectopians were expected to settle minor quarrels with fisticuffs or duels (or in some rare cases, actual communication! Gasp!). The cops would intervene in clear abuses of power or sustained harassment, but if they thought you were just being a wimp, they were likely to throw you over the edge by the seat of your pants. Toby did not think this sounded like an ideal form of government. Zinc said that it worked out a lot better than most people figured. After all, if someone was peeved enough to murder you, five minutes later you could murder them right back.

Soon enough, Toby was being squeezed between everyone else as the guards herded them onto an already-crammed elevator car. People's butts and shoulders were bulging through the bars. When it was as full as spatial tolerances would allow, the guard rapped it twice, signaling the operator to send it skyward. Toby had been a little worried the metal crate would creak and shake, but instead the ride was surprisingly smooth.

The nausea of watching the ground fall away, however...

The elevator pulled its occupants through a fascinating tour of Ectopia's grand inner machinery. Cogs as big as windmills rotated with the lethargic power of an elephant herd. It all looked like the interior of a very old grandfather clock, gone green with tarnish. Workmen looked like termites in comparison.

Toby's attention was diverted from the gargantuan contraptions by a red laser grid that suddenly passed over him and the other passengers. He thought for a second it was about to sear him into cubes, but instead it just scanned him. Then, four TV screens in the top of the car suddenly sprang to life.

There was a fanfare of menacing guitars, then a raccoon with a Cheshire grin filled each screen. He had great big yellow-lensed sunglasses, a rocker's mop of hair, a burgundy jacket, and a silver shirt. He was tall, scruffy, and wiry. Like a wrung out dishrag. He gave off an appearance of the kind of guy you would go to for illegal substances.

"I smell newbies," he purred.

Toby cowered.

"Some familiar faces too, I hope? Coming back from holiday to my sexy city? Goodtahaveyaback, goodtahaveyaback. But you, you newcomers... Isn't it exciting? Your first time! Oh, I wish I could trade places with you kids for just this moment!" He put a hand to his forehead, overcome with emotion.

Then he turned back to the viewers, his eyes indicating it was seriousness time. "Allright. You're probably wondering, what kind of a place is this? This oasis in the sky? Well I'll tell you. It's a magical land where I want you to fun yourself to death. Perhaps literally, if that's your kick. It sure is mine." He ran his tailtip through his teeth.

"What is the law!?" offscreen voices suddenly bellowed.

"There are two rules!" he answered.

And on the screen it flashed: TWO RULES.

Luxy held up a white-gloved finger. "Rule number one: everything's legal so long as everyone's having a good time."

With a blast of brass, this rule flashed on the screen in big yellow letters.

Now the raccoon got very, very close to the camera. So close you could see the veins in his eyes behind his sunglasses. He spoke each word like he was forcing it against a grindstone.

"Rule number two: Do Not Fuck With Anyone Else's Good Time."

And here he held up two of his very favorite toys: a matched pair of chromium-plated nine millimeter pistols. On one was engraved 'GOOD', the other, 'TIME'.

Luxy stuck his muzzle between them like parting swinging doors. "Capisce?" he husked.

Spinning both guns on his fingers, he tossed them over his shoulder into the background somewhere. One went off, which made him startle comically, then titter.

"Aside from that, chaps, do as ye wilt shall be the whole of the law. You are my guests, and I am your gracious host. You are here to have the time of your life. My job is to provide that for you. Please, if anything fails to live up to your highest expectations, drop a note in one of our many municipal suggestion boxes." He held a hand up to his mouth and stage whispered, "No more dick drawings though. They've gotten boring."

He hopped back away from the camera to spread his arms wide, embracing all his viewers and giving them a dazzling gold-capped smile. "That's all from my deranged cranium! Go forth and frolic! Buy lots of stupid souvenirs! Get drunk! Fornicate in the streets! Wear condoms on your fingers and tickle little boys, I don't care!"

The elevator rumbled and finally came to a stop.

"And with that, my dear little friends. I bid you welcome to my livingroom and playground. Enjoy."

He giggled.

"Enjoy!"

He cackled.

"Enjoy!! Enjoy!!! ENJOY!!!"

Luxy Bleeder descended into mad whoops of uncontrollable laughter, bending double and spitting up drops of blood, and all the elevator's passengers stared at him for as long as they could until the doors opened and the screens turned black again.

*****

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Toby staggered out of the elevator, feeling a mix of terror and almost magnetic fascination. He'd seen news programs before about cult leaders. People with that rare, serpentine charisma that other people will do literally anything to be near. Luxy had it in spades. Toby felt like he'd just escaped from mind control. And that was just the man's image on TV! What in the world would it feel like to be in his presence?

Zinc clapped the mouse's shoulder. "He's somethin', ain't he?"

"He's... interesting," Toby admitted.

Piffle swayed back and forth. "I think he's swellegant!"

Junella sneered. "Him? Lousy chatterbox punk..."

That seemed an odd reaction. Toby wondered if she'd had bad dealings with Luxy before.

He was considering whether or not he dared ask about it when his attention was completely ripped away by the neighborhood he now found himself in.

This was Bigwheel One.

Easily-enough guessed, since there were big signs proclaiming it everywhere. Toby wondered if it looked like this because it was the first stop for tourists, or if every level was this fucking insane.

If Coryza was colorful and bright in an Old World style, Bigwheel One was a gaudy psychedelic vision of a future that had never come to pass. Everything was unnatural angles, aggressively strange architecture, and colors not found in nature. It reminded Toby of a theme park he'd once seen pictures of. And NEON! Good Lord, you couldn't throw a baseball in any direction and not shatter some eye-searing sign advertising everything under the sun. 'OPEN', 'LO-PRICES', 'TANNING', 'HARD LIQUOR', 'AMMO', 'HOT DOGS', 'BIG SALE', 'AIR-CONDITIONED', 'FREE SHOWS NIGHTLY.' Toby was unsurprised to be able to count four- no, five souvenir shops just from where he was standing. He supposed he probably wasn't gonna get out of this place without buying a t-shirt or something.

He would have thought that there'd be precious little solid ground in a city made of ferris wheels. Not so. He hadn't realized just how BIG the wheels were. He and the others who had just exited the elevator were standing at the edge of a horizontal disc the diameter of a small village. Even with the spaces between its spokes, there was more than enough room for avenues full of shops and eateries. Columns extended up from the Bigwheel to its twin high above. Sandwiched in between were more ferris wheels than the mind could comfortably comprehend. Every imaginable shape and size. Vertical ones and horizontal ones, all moving in sync to keep the landscape in constant motion. Even the wheel they were standing on was moving. Toby wondered if they had to angle the elevator tubes a certain way to send people up through them. That thought led to wondering how often people got horribly crushed between two intersecting wheels. 'They must have some way to compensate for that, right?'

Zinc had the slack-jawed grin of a yokel seeing indoor plumbing for the first time. "Isn't this GREAT!? Excitement's everywhere! Speed! Thrills! Laffs! I actually used to live here for a titch. A month or three, before I met Junella." He turned and noticed the skunk was in a rather bad mood. "Heyyy, cheer up, toots! Think about it: you were exciting enough by yourself to lure me away from all this!"

She gave him a 'You are so full of shit' look, but did smile a tiny bit.

"Cheep. Cheep," said George. "Actually, am I allowed to speak or will that spoil the illusion?"

"Sure you can talk," Junella said. "Lookit all the freaks here. Who's gonna notice a talking parrot?"

And boy was she right. This was just the periphery of the city, and already the group was witness to a plethora of eccentricity. Clothing styles ranged from centuries past to centuries yet to come. Body modifications seemed to be a big thing too. Toby saw enough earrings, nose rings, lip rings and tail rings to fill a shoebox. Not to mention prosthetic legs, hands, eyes, and everything else. Some looked like weapons, others decoration. A busker a few yards away was playing his leg like a saxophone. A feline femme at a cafe had a seemingly-living snakeskin for a dress. A couple walked past with a matched set of monogrammed shoulder-mounted grenade launchers. A walrus with every inch of her skin tattooed with skulls was arguing over the price of a hotdog with a vendor who was telekinetically controlling a robot duplicate of himself.

"Where to first?" Piffle asked.

Zinc clinked his claws together. "Well, after Fugax and Tuning Fork Guy, I'm actually in the mood to go to sleep on a full belly. That sound good to anyone else? Or you guys wanna explore the nightlife?"

Everyone said an early bedtime sounded fine.

Zinc's ears drooped (he'd been hoping someone would talk him out of it). "Fine. I know a great place to nod off, and there's a decent greasy spoon a block from it. It's on Bigwheel 30 though, so we might as well burn rubber." He held a wrench over his eyes and scanned the horizon. "Looks like the closest slapstation's over there. C'mon!"

No sidewalks here, just glitter-dusted purple carpet. No roads either: there was no room for them. But people got around nonetheless. All the carpetwalks were conveyor belts. Some slow, some medium-speed, some so fast people were having to hold onto their hats and glasses.

With a wave of his wrench, Zinc directed the others to one of the superspeed carpetwalks that went all around Bigwheel One's circumference. He and Junella hopped on like old pros. George took off from Junella's shoulder to practice flying. Toby eyed the rapidly-moving carpet uneasily, then hesitantly took a step. He was very nearly swept off his feet, but managed to wave his arms enough to keep his balance. A second later he heard a 'wumph' and turned to see Piffle having the same trouble. She was flat on her tush, giggling. Toby extended a paw to help her up.

Now that he was on it, it wasn't too bad. Though he could definitely feel the wind whipping at his fur. This had to be fast biking speed at least. Toby ran to catch up with Junella and Zinc who were walking up ahead. He and Piffle fell into step behind them. Zinc once again began rattling off descriptions of people and places of interest, but Toby's attention drifted to the interesting sights which were actually in front of him.

There were definitely way too many things to look at here. A bowling alley with a complex neon animated sign. An ice cream store shaped like a giant cone. An actual Aztec-style pyramid (probably a casino). And did that lioness have three heads? Yes she did. Wow. Oh look, here's a guy wiping the brains of a would-be mugger off the knuckles of his bionic third arm. There's a very drunk man taking a shit by the side of a movie theater while singing at the top of his lungs, and about five tittering schoolgirls taking photos of him. 

Toby was also amazed at all the interactions between ferris wheels. He saw people lined up at what must have been a mall district. Several wheels stood side by side along a boardwalk: each spoke on each wheel held a different store, and people would hop on as the different bistros and boutiques passed by. Lots of people were doing that all around him, moving from platform to platform, most of them looking like they'd had plenty of practice. They'd step from one to the next without missing a stride, sometimes while holding a conversation. One even did so while reading a tablet. Toby was surprised to only see one furson fall. He landed in gears below and was mashed to pulp. From the casual way onlookers laughed, it must have been just a daily inconvenience here.

Also, there were lots more of those bright "Luxy Sez" posters everywhere:

	FUN IS RISK, RISK IS FUN

	FREEDOM IS MORE PRECIOUS THAN WEALTH

	IS YOUR SAFETY OFF?

And one that just said, in gargantuan letters,

	SMILE!!!

Toby also noticed that there were four guys in fencing masks and hoodies approaching. They didn't seem too threatening. Younger than Toby himself, by the looks of them. He wasn't sure if they were heading towards him specifically or just going in the same direction. 'Probably I'm being paranoid again.'

There was actually a drive-in movie theater here. Well, sort of. No one had cars, but there were quite a lot of bikes, scooters and other compact means of personal transportation. There was even a section for mechanized exoskeletons! 'Cool!' Nearby was a literal beer garden. Alcohols of many colors flowed endlessly from a variety of fountains and waterfalls while Ectopians splashed about in them. People were spraying each other with hoses, cannonballing into pools, or just lying beneath the sprays with their mouths open. Toby even saw an enormous pair of fiberglass breasts with rum blasting out of both nipples. He averted his gaze from that.

"Hey pinkeye!"

Toby turned. It was the fencing mask guys. He wasn't being paranoid after all. He gulped as he realized they were all holding weapons. Two baseball bats. A balisong. One of them had a bunch of nails poking out of his fist! Through the actual skin!

The one in front moved like a leader. "Pajamas, brah? You show up in our city, walkin' around in your faggyjammies? Seriously?"

Toby felt his cheeks get hot. He should have realized, looking as he did, that he might as well just hang a sign on himself saying, 'I Am A Tourist. Please Roll Me.'

The hoodies clustered closer at seeing the mouse show weakness. One yelled out, "Are ya naturally white or did we scare ya that color?" The others snickered.

"He looks like Casper The Friendly Bedwetter!" another said, getting even bigger laughs.

Toby saw Piffle in his peripheral vision looking like she was about to take on all four of the goons. He gave her a 'Not now' look and, keeping his eyes on the leader, walked backwards until he bumped into Junella.

"Watch it!"

"Sorry. Look, there's some gang-type people over here making fun of me. You're my bodyguard, right? Do bodyguard things. Please."

Junella reached over to grab one of Zinc's wrenches to check out the hoodlums in its reflection. She tapped her foot. "Y'know, I could do that. And I will if you want me to. But they look like a pack of pushovers. I'd like to see you stand up to them. Hell, I dare you. It'll be good for you."

Toby was rather petrified by the idea.

But then he recalled Zinc talking about how Ectopians were expected to take responsibility for their own affairs. They weren't supposed to rely on authority for everything. And wasn't that what he'd just done by asking Junella to protect him?

He noticed the four minigangsters didn't look so confident now. Apparently they hadn't realized Toby was part of a group. And four against four was probably too fair a fight for them. They weren't backing down though. All of them still had their eyes on Toby. (Or at least he assumed they did. Those masks were creepy.)

Zinc was still preaching the gospel of Ectopia Cordis, unaware they had company.

"I got your back if you need me," Junella whispered. "C'mon. Assert yourself."

Toby's heart felt like a trapped, fluttering bird. But he chewed his lip a little and reached around his insides for a scrap of confidence he could hold on to.

He narrowed his eyes at the leader and walked towards him.

"Heyyyy!" one said. "Not gonna have your big sister protect you after all?"

"No," Toby replied quietly. He flexed his fingers. "I'd like you to stop bothering me."

The leader pointed a finger in his face. "Us bothering YOU? I think you got it backwards, dickhole. We're just tryna walk here. Maybe you're in OUR way. Ever think of that?" He punctuated his sentence with a sharp poke at Toby's breastbone.

The mouse flinched. Inwardly, his nerves were tugging at his brain to turn and run. But he forced himself to stand still and keep his face calm. "Please don't touch me."

All four of them laughed at this. "Why shouldn't we?" the one with the nail-fist said, waving it at Toby.

The leader was about to deploy another insult, but he made the mistake of snatching up Toby's shirt collar first.

Toby reacted purely by reflex.

In the blink of an eye, his palm opened up. His hand flashed and he was already swinging as his fingers curled around the handle. With the strength of instinctive panic, Toby's hammer arced up and landed one hell of an uppercut on the leader's chin.

The kid landed hard on his back. His mask flew off and was carried away by another walkway. He was revealed to be a shorthair terrier, who stared up at Toby with a look of total shock. Until the pain snapped his focus away.

Toby had his hands over his mouth. "I didn't mean to!" he sputtered.

The terrier's mouth was split. Toby had definitely broken his jawbone in two. Blood trickled onto the dog's gloves.

The leader's friends helped him to his feet. He turned and pointed at Toby. "FUSH YOU! FUSH YOUR FUSHIN' HAMBER, YOU CHEATER!!" He jumped off onto another carpetwalk and his three friends followed. In seconds they were gone from sight, leaving only two round dots of terrier blood on the carpetwalk.

Toby was a little dazed by how easy it had been.

A second later, Piffle was hugging his arm. "Oh Toby, you were wonderful! So heroic!"

He winced at that. He tucked his hammer away, not able to bring himself to check if he'd gotten blood on it too. "That wasn't heroic. I hit him once and he ran off. I feel like a bully, actually."

"Not at all!" Piffle insisted, her ruby eyes shining with concern. "There were four of them! With weapons! And you stood up to all of them, Toby! That was the bravest thing I've ever seen you do."

"Well..." He looked away, really uncomfortable at the compliment. "I mean, I had you guys with me."

"I agree with Madam McPerricone," George said as he landed between Piffle's antennae. "You showed initiative, Sire Toby. You stood your ground in the face of aggression."

Toby felt a vinyl paw rest on his shoulder. "I told you," Junella lilted.

Zinc looked behind him. "...they've got the best pizza anywhere, and... Hey, did something happen?"

***

Zinc added his own congratulations to Toby for standing up to the punks, but Toby just felt woozy about the whole incident. He asked his friends to please drop it. Smashing a stove was one thing. Hitting another living furson was... It was different. Even when he'd gone into frenzy-mode against the Cold Coven, the fact that they were made of ice (and way bigger than him) helped him disassociate from what he was doing. But this time he'd felt the unequivocal impact of steel on bone. His hammer wasn't quite as much a body part as Zinc's wrenches, but Toby could still 'feel' with it to an extent. Remembering the soft goosh of gums splitting and calcium cracking made his skin crawl. He hoped they could get to their destination quickly so he could distract his mind away from all of this.

Distraction came quicker than anticipated. Only a minute or so later, Zinc was introducing their ticket topside. Piffle held Toby's hand this time as they disembarked the carpet, so no one fell over this time. Before them loomed one of Ectopia Cordis' many high speed lifts: what Zinc had called a slapstation. One look and all thoughts of hoodies and hammers was terrified right out of Toby's mind.

It was like a conga line of spatulas, all flipping a playing card higher and higher and higher and higher... People stood in line to jump onto a large rectangular platform that slid out of a slot. A series of ferris wheels with flipper paddles basically spanked the platform up into the air. At the top of its arc, another flipper kept it going. And another. And so on. Toby looked way up and saw that the platform which had just departed had been slapped all the way to Bigwheel One's ceiling, where it sailed through a hole that opened up with split-second timing, presumably into Bigwheel Two.

Toby came very close to crapping his pants. "We're supposed to get ON that!? And let it- There's not even any guardrails!!"

Zinc smiled serenely. "Luxy doesn't believe in guardrails. He says it's better to fall a few times and get used to it." "He cleared his throat and put on his quotation tone. "'The consequences of risk are usually lesser than the consequences of forever avoiding risk."

Toby whimpered.

Piffle patted his paw. "Think of it like a fun scary carnival ride."

"I've never been to a carnival," he whined.

"Oh. Hm. At least I'll be right next to you. If you fall off, I betcha I can catcha before you hit the ground!"

He considered that. At least if Zinc was gonna drag him onto this deadly-looking thingamajig, he had a flying friend by his side in case of emergency. 'Two, actually,' he realized as he looked at George.

Guessing what his master was thinking, George took Piffle's collar gently in his footclaws and flapped his wings. To her whooping delight, he actually got her a few inches off the ground.

"Impressive, Georgie!" she complimented.

George admired his aluminum wings. "Extraordinary! I didn't expect such results. I doubt I could fly you to safety in luxurious comfort, Sire Toby, but I could very likely slow your fall."

"Platform's here!!" Zinc yelled.

An incredibly dour bulldog attendant (who looked like he'd ridden this thing ten thousand times just since his shift started) called out, "All aboard. You have twenty seconds." His voice was the drone of someone who'd said the same words so many times they'd ceased to be anything but meaningless noise.

Piffle had to give Toby a shove to get him onto the orange-carpeted platform. But she didn't get on herself. She waved to him and the others.

"Get over here, mush-head!" Junella shouted at her.

"Nuh-uh!" Piffle replied with a broad grin. "I wanna see if I can race you to the top!"

Zinc reached out for her. "Piff, these things go fast!"

"I do too!" she replied with a raspberry.

"C'mon, babycakes! You're underestima-"

SLAPPP!!!

The platform leapt up with such force that no one was left standing. Except one long-term Ectopian resident, plus the attendant, who casually reached down to grab someone's runaway hat before it tumbled over the edge.

"Great Caesar's ghost!!" Piffle exclaimed. "That thing IS fast! C'mon, George! Let's catch up!" The plucky hamsterfly spread her wings and took off at top speed.

George hopped off her head to fly beside her. Not only to reduce her aerodynamic drag, but because he wanted to see what his new wings could really do. "Shall we make this a three-way race, Madam McPerricone?" he shouted.

"The more the merrier!"

Meanwhile, Toby was clutching Zinc's ankles while trying not to barf every time the platform got thwacked again. Zinc and Junella had both gotten themselves standing by now, and Toby couldn't fathom how that was possible. The city was shooting past in a colorful, sickening blur. He wasn't actually screaming, but that was mostly due to being too frozen with fear to make a sound.

"You'd get used to it if you lived here!" Zinc yelled over the roar of air whooshing past.

There was a brief moment of blackness as they passed through the underside of Bigwheel Two, and again into Three, Four and Five. As Toby had suspected, each mega-slab had specially-angled slots molded into the metal so the platforms could pass through without even scraping the sides. Even despite the fact that each wheel rotated counter to the one below! Toby's mind was not in the mood to appreciate this miracle of timing and engineering, because all he could think about was, 'Twenty-four more of these!!!'

Piffle was giggling so hard she was almost falling behind. Her wings were a glistening blur, pushing her upwards like a speedboat's churning propeller. The lights swirled around her like the biggest kaleidoscope of all time. Piffle had always dearly loved flight, but the Blackdamp's sky was patrolled by many nasty creatures of tooth and claw. There had never been an opportunity to climb so high before.

George was humming a happy tune. Something he'd heard from one of the travelers passing above him during his underground internment. He honestly did not care much for the look of this body, especially the beak, but the wings were magnificent. He was easily keeping up with both Piffle and the platform. His normal bones felt a tiny bit of fatigue on occasion, but this metal didn't seem to. Fantastic! Absolutely marvelous! 

THWACK! THWACK! THWACK! It never seemed to end! Toby had managed to let go of Zinc's legs, but was clinging to his own for dear life. He was lying on his side on the platform, watching the steel beams and wild colors smear past him. As long as he kept his eyes unfocused, the nausea wasn't too bad. He could actually hear Zinc and Junella talking nonchalantly! Though, a few other people were curled up in the fetal position like he was, and some were even crying hysterically. So he didn't feel too ashamed. The attendant, on the other hand, looked like he was about ready to yawn. "Bigwheel Sixteen. Get ready to depart," he called out tiredly.

At every level, twenty seconds was all people had to get on or off, so they tended to move like lightning when they did. Surprisingly, Toby only saw one furson fall on the entire journey to 30. He'd expected people to go flying at every stop. But at Bigwheel Twelve, someone had been chatting with their friend a little too long and only had one foot on the platform when it achieved lift-off. Toby saw the poor schmuck cartwheel through the air a few times before landing with a splat. He regenerated a new body in a second though, and his old one went zooming away on one of the moving carpetwalks. He was even smiling! Like, 'Gosh, I'm so clumsy! Ha ha!'

Toby had no idea if he could possibly get used to having so little fear of death. He knew he'd already croaked a few times and was still in one piece. But it had been scary and painful and horrible! He remembered tearing himself to pieces back in Amaurosis Fugax... Ugh. He'd almost succeeded in putting that out of his mind.

Maybe everyone started out like him. Maybe everyone struggled with the instinctive fear of termination until it happened so many times it just became boring.

That was actually a really horrible idea the more he thought about it. How many times would one have to die to become desensitized?

On the other hand, he felt a bit better now about the masked guy he'd hit with his hammer. He was probably healed already, or his friends had given him a coup de grâce. So Toby knew he hadn't inflicted any permanent damage. Still, one thing he hoped he'd never become desensitized to was causing pain. He hoped that would always fill him with sick revulsion. 'As it should for anyone,' he thought.

"Bigwheel Thirty. Get ready to depart," droned the bulldog. 

Toby blinked. Before he could react, wrench-jaws were clamped onto his shoulders.

"On your feet, comrade! We gotta step lively!" Seeing that his client was too shellshocked to move, when the platform stopped, Zinc yanked him off like luggage.

Toby had seen people in cartoons kiss the ground after an acrophobic experience. He didn't actually do that, but he considered it.

Junella stepped daintily off and tipped the attendant a Luxybuck from her satchel just because he looked so miserable. He seemed genuinely surprised by this.

Toby stood on wobbly legs, bracing himself against Zinc's shoulder. "I never want to go on another one of those ever again," he gurgled.

Zinc was highly amused by how green the mouse was turning. "Sure, pal. Now let's go eat a great big meal! How's pancakes sound? Or fettuccine alfredo?"

"Do you WANT me to puke on your feet!?" Toby gasped.

A flapping of wings caught their attention. "I do hope you feel better soon, Sire Toby."

"George!" Toby hadn't even recognized the little shiny parrot at first. "You got here quick. Nicely done."

"Thank you! I am learning to enjoy this form. And Madam McPerricone should be arriving shortly as well."

Zinc nudged Toby off onto Junella so he could run over to the edge of the wheel. He clamped on for safety and looked over, trying to spot her.

Almost immediately, a little pink nose touched his. "Hiya!"

She was visibly exhausted but also beaming with triumph. Zinc took Piffle's hand and guided her in for a landing. "Crazy, cat! I didn't expect you for another few minutes!"

The panting hamsterfly gulped air until she could respond. "Thanks! I (huff) tried my best! (puff) I was worried I'd pop my (huff) wings off!"

The others gathered around their aeronautic amiga. "Where'd you get the ruby tiara?" Toby asked.

Piffle squeaked happily. "I don't know! I was flying and flying and waving at people, and some of them waved back, and there was this big party, it looked like a wedding, and someone tossed it down to me and waved, and I yelled out THANK YOU!! Isn't it pretty?"

Toby nodded. "It is. It matches your eyes."

She beamed.

Junella poked Zinc. "Are we gonna need to check in at the hotel before it fills up, or can we go straight on to the restaurant?"

"Easy street, Juney. There'll be rooms. Trust me. It's one of my favorite places to flop."

"I'm not entirely sure I can eat. Ever," Toby said, holding his stomach.

Zinc chuckled. "The Gastroworks ain't far from here. We could skip the fast track and walk over. Maybe that'll settle your plumbing?"

Toby burped. "I hope so."

Junella flinched at Zinc. “The Gastroworks? Really? Isn’t that place a little…” She mimed a potbelly with her hands.

He looked right at her. “Clown wrecking ball,” he said firmly. "You promised me a burger."

She immediately conceded. “Right, right, I forgot. Good boys get treats.”

He ‘arf’ed.

As Zinc predicted, spending time on something stationary did help Toby mellow. (Plus they kept the pace slow so Piffle could cool down.) Of course, the carpets weren't actually stationary. Bigwheel Thirty was in constant motion just like everything else in EC. But with only the night sky to compare its slow rotation to, their section felt as much like solid ground as Toby could have hoped for.

This neighborhood was also easier on the eyes. The colors were less loud, for starters. They were currently on one of the Bigwheel's spokes, heading inwards towards the center. Dozens of businesses lined the way. There were seven lanes of carpetwalks too: fastest in the middle, slower on the sides. This area was less... tourist-y than Bigwheel One. It had a kind of retrofuturistic nostalgia feel. The carpetwalks were sky-blue here, with white stars and comets. There were lots of aerodynamic curves to the architecture, with unnecessary-but-cool-looking details like fins and chrome. (Toby briefly shuddered, remembering the rocketship diner back in Stoma. But the fact that he saw people actually exiting these establishments helped a lot.)

A theater marquee was headlining 'BLOODSUCKING GYPSIES'. Toby did not know if this was a movie or a band. 'Or actual bloodsucking gypsies. Why not?' he considered. A nearby laundromat was shaped like a giant front-end washing machine. There was a geodesic dome fried chicken restaurant. Also an indoor shooting range with a big transparent bubble over it that wobbled slightly whenever anyone took a shot. 'Completely soundproofed!' a sign advertised.

Plenty of interesting people to look at too. A wolf with a t-shirt that was somehow made of mirror-cloth. A weasel shooting up with a syringe of liquid electricity. Someone who was just a head stuck on a giant nonev spider body. Two male rabbits, one walking the other on a leash. There was also someone who looked like nothing but bones and gelatinized skin, walking around looking lost and repeating to himself, "I am Skeleton Jelly... I am Skeleton Jelly... I am Skeleton Jelly..."

Toby and the others had to detour around two teenagers having a knife fight while an encircling crowd cheered them on. The combatants didn't seem enraged. In fact, from the way they were chatting back and forth, this seemed like just a friendly competition. Toby heard the fight end behind him, but was too far away by then to see who won.

Up ahead The Gastroworks pounded, belching equal parts noise and smoke into the air. The restaurant was themed like an art-deco chemical refinery. Great big pipes jutted out everywhere. Lots of black, rusty metal. Lots of valves. There was a dance floor up on the roof and Toby could hear the hard rock from a block away.

"Could we, um, eat someplace quieter?" he asked, and wasn't sure if Zinc heard him over the din.

Junella shook her head, telling Toby, "It's no use. He's like a kid in a toy store whenever we come here. If you argue with him, he'll whine and plead and give you the big puppy eyes 'til you just wanna smack him. Better to give in. 'Sides, we'll get some rest afterwards. And if you need to upchuck, they got restrooms."

Zinc was feeling the groove of the place before they'd even reached the doors. "The food here's tip-top," he told the others. "Imaginite's great, but sometimes you want a change, y'know? Taste somethin' beyond your imagination? Something a real chef dug their fingers into?"

Toby stuck his tongue out. Junella made a similar face as they walked through the main entrance and got a look at the wall menu. "Forgot how expensive this place is..."

Inside, it was exactly as head-poundingly loud as Toby had feared. Though at least the atmosphere was welcoming. The tables, chairs, and wall decor all followed the same motif of industrial decay, but everyone seemed to be having a good time.

Zinc was not completely unaware of his client's nausea. He scanned the restaurant for the quietest-looking spot and directed them all to a little table back near the kitchen. It seemed to be the only place not directly under a subwoofer.

George fluttered over to the table and perched on the edge. He swayed in time with the rock music. He sort of liked it. It was pleasingly menacing.

The chairs were made of old copper pipe, upholstered in gasmask-type black rubber. Toby sat down and picked up one of the menus that were already on the table. 'Lots and lots of meat,' he noticed.

As he was guesstimating what he'd most likely be able to keep down, their waiter appeared. He was a very tall bull, and he was extraordinarily naked.

Toby's pink eyes bulged. He gaped for a tenth of a second at the unholy sausage an arm's length away from him, then snapped his attention back to the menu.

"Hello!" the bull hollered, staring straight ahead. "My name is Pancake Food! And I will be your waiter! This evening! Our specials tonight are! Roast dumptruck on fire! Ten pounds of beer! My ass! A pitchfork in your eye! Some soup!!"

Toby was starting to think this was a little insane, even for Phobiopolis. He saw that his companions all had similar looks of, 'What the heck!?'

"Corn dogs on a tractor! On fire! More beer!" the bull continued.

Mr. Pancake Food was suddenly tackled by a female deer half his size. "No, no, no!  I thought I threw you out hours ago! Get away from the customers!" She called over her shoulder, "Roscoe!! He got back in again!"

"MORRRE BEEEEEEEER!!!" the bull bellowed as he was hustled out of the restaurant by several bouncers, then bodily thrown into the street. The carpetwalks dragged him slowly away.

The doe, looking both relieved and apologetic, returned to their table. "Ugh! Sorry folks. I'm Ambient and I'll be your REAL waitress. Thank you for not getting up and leaving after that little performance."

"That? I've seen nuttier things in my livingroom," Zinc said casually as he leaned back in his chair.

Toby whispered to Piffle, "I am really glad that guy turned out to be a loony."

"Yes. He was being unsanitary," she agreed. Though she also looked a bit sad to see that foot-long conversation piece go away.

The doe's outfit consisted of a normal server's blouse and skirt, plus a leather apron and thick black glossy gloves. Her hands squeaked when she got out her pen and pad. "Drinks?"

"Lots of ice cold ginger ale," Toby immediately requested. It had calmed his nausea many times before.

"I'd like to try a blueberry daiquiri if you have one," said Piffle.

"More beer!!" Zinc and Junella said simultaneously, then cracked up.

The doe rolled her eyes. "What kind? We got plenty." She waved her hand towards a shelf full of display bottles.

"Any good local brews?" Junella asked Zinc, figuring he'd know.

"Ron's Motor Oil," he recommended immediately. "Just a name, by the way. Not real oil. 'Sgood stuff. It'll pop your ears."

"Sounds good. Four of 'em," she ordered.

"Your friend's been here before, huh?" the doe said as she scribbled it down.

"Used to live here," Zinc said. "Down on Twenty-Six. Water Street and Darroch. Ever been there?"

"Izzat near Luxyland?"

"Yeah! I could see the lights from my window at night!"

She shook her head. "I never go down there. Too noisy."

Considering this doe's place of employment, Zinc tried to figure out the logic of that statement. "Four Oils for me too."

"Allright. You guys know what you wanna eat too or should I give you a minute?"

Zinc gestured at Toby. "My paleface kemosabe's not feeling so good. What've you got that ain't too heavy?"

She smiled consolingly at the mouse. "The venison caesar salad's fabulous. I'd go with that."

Toby blinked. "Venison? That's... deer meat. You're a deer."

"Exactly," she replied. "It's me, in fact."

Toby started to wonder if tonight was just going to be a series of insane waiters. "What!?"

"Oh, don't worry! That's how we make sure most of our meat is ethically butchered: we just shoot the staff when they come in in the morning. Painless, quick, and there you go."

This thing with the eating people again...

Noticing his discomfort, she added, "Or, we have plenty of entrees made from nightmares. So you know you're eating something that deserved it."

"Can I just have some french toast?"

She shrugged. "If that's what you want." She decided not to tell him where the eggs came from.

Junella was eyeing the waitress up and down. "Got any venison steak?"

"Sure do, darlin'. Or did you mean the restaurant? Ha!"

The skunk grinned. "I'll take the biggest cut you got. Medium rare."

Ambient pointed her pen at Piffle. "And you? Nice tiara, by the way."

"Thanks!" She looked over the menu one more time. Everything looked too good to choose! "Ummm... If I get a basket of cactusyote ears, will anyone else eat them?" Zinc and Junella both nodded. "Okay, that. Plus, um..." She vacillated a bit more between the czernoburger or the fried biteranodon before going with the latter.

"Okeydoke. How 'bout you, Mr. Mechanic?" the doe asked Zinc.

He chuckled bashfully. "You guys... ah... you take special orders, right?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Depends how special."

Zinc pointed across the table at Piffle. "Her."

The hamsterfly 'eep'ed.

"You did offer," Zinc reminded. "And I can't get that cookout outta my mind. You were delicious!"

Piffle bounced in her seat at the compliment. "Thanks! If you wanna eat me some more, that's peachy!"

"What'd you have in mind?" the waitress asked Zinc, casually enough to imply that customers requesting other customers was a regular occurrence.

What Zinc really wanted was something like a pulled-Piffle sandwich. But he knew the restaurant wouldn't have time to slow-cook her. "Bacon cheeseburger?"

"You want her to be the bacon too?"

"If you can do that, yeah!" His grinning mouth was already watering.

The doe jotted it down. "It'll be an extra five bux surcharge, plus the house keeps the rest of her meat. Is that okay with everyone?"

Both Piffle and Zinc nodded.

Ambient repeated all their orders to make sure she'd got them right, then reached out to take Piffle's hand and lead her to the kitchen. The blushing hamsterfly looked like she'd been picked to be on a game show. "See you soon!" she called back as she was led away.

Toby mumbled to himself, "I am never gonna eat a normal meal again for the rest of my life, am I?"

"Afterlife," Junella corrected with a smirk.

He gave her a look, then turned to Zinc. "By the way, I just want you to know, the whole idea that they're gonna kill her, and you're gonna eat her... it boggles my mind. But I know that for you, and her, and here, it's normal. So I won't say anything else about it."

Zinc nodded appreciatively. "That's cool of you, Toby. Thanks. And hey, I know I probably should keep you in mind more, being an out-of-towner. It's just..."

"...It's just you really like this city," Toby said understandingly.

"Yeah..." He sighed happily. "I get all juiced up. Fuel-injected!" He got a wistful look in his eyes. "I think about moving back here a lot. But then again, maybe staying away's better, y'know? Like how Christmas comes but once a year 'n all that? Absence makes the heart grow fonder?"

"That makes sense," Toby nodded. "Certain things feel more special if you don't-"

All their heads turned at the sudden POW that came from the kitchen. Muffled with a silencer, but still louder than the background music.

"Was that...?" Toby asked.

A few moments later, Piffle came bounding through the double doors. "Back again!" she sang out.

She pranced over to the table and gave Toby a smooch between his ears to let him know she was okay. "That was fun! They had me stand on one of these rubber mats with a bullseye behind it. Then I just closed my eyes and, kablammo! They dragged my other body off to get foodificated and told me I could sit back down." George pulled her chair out for her with his beak. "Thank you, kind sir."

"Quite welcome, Madam McPerricone."

"They even gave me a ten-percent-off coupon if we wanna buy anything more of me!"

***

The ginger ale helped a lot. Once he'd gotten off some heavyweight-class burps, Toby's stomach felt a lot better. He even eventually got used to the loud music. And the toast was fantastic. Just the kind of simple-yet-comforting fare he needed. The others' meals all looked a tad strange, but he had to admit they smelled incredible. Smoky, sizzling hot slabs of deer, hamsterfly, and nightmare meat.

Toby realized that in the last few days, he'd probably had more menu options, and been surrounded by better food smells, than in his whole past year of life on Earth. He thought about his usual meals of weak soup and bland sandwiches. How could he have gotten so used to eating that day after day?

Toby asked Piffle what exactly biteranodons were and she said all she knew was that they sounded tasty on the menu. When the cactusyote ears arrived, Toby hesitantly tried one. Followed immediately by another. They were kinda like if avocado and ham came from the same lifeform. And they went great with salsa.

This led to an interesting discussion with George about what the waitress had said regarding nightmares. Toby remarked that it seemed kind of unfair to say they "deserved" to be killed for food. Though to his surprise, George actually agreed with her. He replied that, while he admired Toby's consideration, he held no illusions about his kind. In all his years, he'd never come across another construct like himself that was capable of rational thought or selflessness. He acknowledged that he might be the only one. All the rest were literally less than animals, since even the most vicious of beasts are primarily concerned with survival and reproduction. Nightmare constructs existed only to create fear. So in George's opinion, if anyone deserved to be temporarily irritated by being shot and served, they did. 

Meanwhile, Junella and Zinc both bulldozed through their beers until they got quite tiddly indeed. Junella was even singing along with the rock music, and, amazingly, looked like she was enjoying herself. Zinc wolfed down his Piffleburger, complimenting her vociferously the whole time. She was tickled pink. She even tried a bite of herself as bacon. Thinking about this too hard made Toby nearly have to go visit the bathroom for a while.

Zinc took off the instant he finished his burger, not saying where he was going, and was back in about four minutes. He refused to say a word more about it. Junella was too busy serenading herself to notice his impish grin.

When the meal ended, Toby was amazed to find that he was still hungry. He asked if anyone minded him getting dessert. Junella said she was paying and had plenty. So Toby made the unprecedented decision to willingly try something he'd never eaten before. He'd always wondered what flan was, and was happy to discover it was nothing scarier than really good caramel custard.

When the bill came, a tipsy Junella rustled around in her satchel and pulled out a literal fistful of cash. Toby noticed the way some of the other diners were staring and hoped his group wasn't due for a mugging in the parking lot. The money itself was interesting. Bills of bright yellow, pink, purple and orange, each one with Luxy Bleeder's leering face on it. Toby remembered wondering about this earlier, and asked Junella how they kept people from just whipping up as many bux as they wanted from imaginite or dumbfounding. Zinc burst in with a yeast-scented bark of laughter, saying that, allegedly, Luxy could always tell the real thing by the smell. Rumor had it he rubbed each bill in his armpits before they went into circulation. (Toby hoped this was not true.) And as far as counterfeiters, Zinc said they'd had exactly one case so far. Luxy'd caught the guy and put him in an endless loop; forever regenerating into a new body every five seconds. Eternally copied. Then he was put on display as an art installation and Luxy said that anyone who wanted to take his place was welcome to try committing the same crime. The expression on the unfortunate criminal's face had so far proven a perfect deterrent.

Junella and Zinc debated getting even more sloshed, but decided against it since their teetotaling client looked like he wanted to sleep sometime soon. She laid down a generous tip for Ambient and headed for the front register. Zinc, meanwhile, sauntered over to a bristly fellow he'd overheard talking with his mates a little too eagerly about Junella's satchel. When the 'roo turned around, Zinc literally clamped his muzzle shut with a crunch and a muffled scream. "I'm drunk, not deaf, ya nosebleed," Zinc said before letting go. The others around the table had looks of, 'We weren't planning a robbery! Us? Oh no siree!!'

Back outside on the starry walks of Bigwheel Thirty, Toby appreciated the decrease in background noise. He was suddenly feeling drowsy and asked how far away the hotel was. Zinc said it was close enough they didn't even need to walk. When they all stepped onto a medium-speed carpetwalk, it wasn't two minutes later that they found themselves in front of Sawbuck's Sleepeteria.

It was a very large brick windowless box that looked more like a meat packing plant than a hotel. But Zinc swore by the place. "You can't get any cozier! You'll sleep like a baby lamb soaked in chloroform!"

Before they walked in, Toby saw another of those Luxy Sez signs:

	AGAINST THE NIGHT WE ARE UNITED

He kinda liked that one.

They walked up the steps into a lobby that looked sleazy precisely because of how hard it was trying not to. Everything was faux. The wall art was poster prints in gold-painted plastic frames. The aquarium had more decorations than fish. In one corner stood the tiniest concrete waterfall money could buy.

Toby furrowed his brow as he noticed the large unknown structure to his left. It looked like the kind of tubular tracks you'd slide torpedoes into. But these were pointed up into the ceiling. Was there some kind of artillery cannon on the roof?

Zinc skipped to the front desk and bopped the bell. "Roosman, chief, ya in there!?" he yelled. Turning to the others he said, "This is a real high quality joint. Part of a franchise, actually. Not many businesses get that big in Phobiopolis, you can imagine."

The door behind the desk opened onto a typical little manager's office. Toby heard a TV making soccer match sounds and the skreek of a chair moving. He was not expecting a sentient cloud of ash to emerge, but it did. 

Like what might puff out of a volcano but tinier, it was about six feet in diameter and a swirling salt-and-pepper grey. Somewhere deep in the center mass, two smoky orbs glowed like headlights. The cloud floated towards Zinc and peered at him. "...Zinc, was it? I know your face, young man, but my memory... Not so hot."

"Foggy?" Zinc supplied.

"Eyyyy, watch it with the puns, you."

Toby was sort of proud of himself for only being mildly startled when something that would have ordinarily sent him screaming in the opposite direction appeared in front of him. He was starting to get used to the idea that in Phobiopolis, appearance alone did not determine character. This cloudy fellow's voice was as mild-mannered as plain cream cheese. 

Mr. Roosman reached out a pseudopod of ash to pick up a pair of eyeglasses from the counter, then arranged them into himself approximately in the area of his eyes. No one knew how they stayed there. "Party of four?"

Junella pointed to her "parrot".

"Pets stay free. Especially mechanical ones that the maids won't have to clean up after," he replied with a chortle. Then he looked over the computerized hotel layout. "Pairs or separate?"

Everyone looked at each other. They were all about to speak ot once when Zinc butted in and put his wrencharm around Junella. "We'll take two pair, garçon."

Junella gave him a questioning look.

"Hey, it'll save money!"

She considered that.

Piffle looked over at Toby. "I don't mind bunking up together."

The mouse turned a bit pink.

"That's just fine," Mr. Roosman said. "I got two doubles right beside each other, with a door between if you need it. S'allright?"

"Perfecto," Zinc grinned.

"Just the one night?"

"Uh... that's up in the air. We'll see."

Roosman made a note of that. "Understoodo. I'll put you down for one day, but if you sleep in past eleven the charge'll be for two. Each of our suites has an automat for meals. Champagne is available, as well as premium film entertainment."

The general cheap atmosphere of the place, plus what the manager had just said, finally added up in Junella's somewhat-inebriated mind. She whapped her partner's arm. "Zinc, dammit, did you take us to a love hotel!?"

He snickered. "Hey, I wasn't bullshittin' about the beds. You can't get comfier anywhere!"

She hooked a finger into his collar. "You brought our client to a make out pit! And that doesn't seem the teeniest bit unprofessional to you!?"

Zinc bit his lip to keep from giggling harder.

Junella sighed.

Roosman kept diplomatically silent.

"To be honest, I really don't mind," Toby piped up. "I'm full and dozy and I just want a place to lie down."

Zinc gave Junella a 'See? Everything's fine!' look.

She reached up and gave his nose a pinch. Then she rustled around in her bag for some Luxybux.

Roosman rang them up and 'stepped' out from behind the counter. "Right this way, folks!" He gestured towards the tube-booth Toby had noticed before.

"Are we gonna get vacuumed to our rooms?" Piffle realized, sounding delighted by the novelty of it.

"A cigar for the lady!" Roosman said. He sounded like he was smiling but it was impossible to tell. "Mr. Sawbuck was inspired by old-fashioned mailing tubes and Japanese capsule hotels, and had the vision to combine the efficiency of both. You shall be whisked to your luxurious accommodations on a cushion of air. Carried aloft upon the breath of the gods!" He stood by the controls and beckoned the quintet to enter.

Junella leaned forward as far as she could without actually stepping inside, trying to see up the tube. "This thing ain't gonna bounce me around like a tennis ball, izzit?"

"Nah, nah," Zinc said. "You're thinkin' of those cheap ripoff places that don't got the pneumatics worked out right. Some of them, you can see bloodstains all up 'n down the insides of the tubes. But here? They invented and perfected it. Nothin' to worry about!"

"You fill me to the brim with confidence," she deadpanned.

"Well I'm not scared!" Piffle announced, leaping into the tube-area. "Fire away!"

"Bon soir, miss!" Roosman said as his pseudopod sent her on her way.

FOOMP! A transparent shield came down and Piffle was sucked out of sight; all in less than a second. 

"If you're staying with her, you're next, young man," Roosman said to Toby.

The clear shield rose like an opening mouth. Toby held his tail in his hands and gave a sickly little nod to the ash cloud. 'I've been through worse,' he told himself. He managed to keep himself from saying anything as he turned around, closed his eyes, and hoped he was positioned correctly.

FOOMP!

It was over so quick Toby didn't have time to appreciate the fact that he'd actually kind of enjoyed that.

It was as if a huge magnet had locked onto him and pulled him through a twisting, brain-shaped maze of transparent tubes. He hadn't seen more than a blur, but it looked like there was miles of the stuff. Toby was pulled this way and that, but the curves were gentle enough not to give him whiplash. And only a few seconds later, he was popping out of a hatch onto a vinyl gym mat.

"Hiya, Toby!" Piffle said. "Have a nice trip?"

"I think I actually did. My head's a little spinny and my stomach didn't like it, but otherwise, yeah, I'd do that again."

"Glad to hear it!" She started pulling off her blouse and Toby looked quickly away.

The room they were in was so small it really should have been called a carton. The whole thing was only about the width of a queen bed, with a ceiling so low Toby's ears brushed against it while kneeling. There was the squashy, creaky landing pad area and then the bed itself. Or rather, the part of the room that was a bed. It looked like someone had upholstered the inside of a refrigerator box entirely in hot pink fur. Like being at a flamingo convention. There was an abundance of pillows in various shapes, and dim, warm lights in each corner. No windows, but the 'door' to the next room was a sliding panel just big enough for someone to crawl through on all fours. In the landing pad area there was a glass door set in the wall with a light inside and a touchscreen showing various snacks and drinks. 'Sent by tube too, probably,' Toby guessed. By the hatch were buttons for 'restrooms', 'lobby', 'pool', or you could select someone else's room number with a password.

Piffle had changed into a petite sea-green nightie by the time they heard a soft thump from next door and some musical curse words.

"Sounds like Zinc finally convinced Junella," Piffle chuckled. She crawled over to the 'door' and gave it a knock. "You settling in okay over there?"

The panel opened up and a skunk muzzle poked through. "I don't know. I think I just got swallowed by Valentines Day."

A moment later a rising whoop signaled the approach of Zinc. He tumbled through the hatch with a lot of clanging. "Wooo-wee! That's half the reason I love coming here! They should build a really big one and put it in Luxyland and charge tickets!"

A smaller foomp heralded George's arrival as well. There was a metallic-sounding flap of wings as he got himself on his feet. "Gadzooks! That was somewhat delightful!"

"It wasn't too bad," was as close as Junella came to admitting she'd enjoyed it too.

Piffle was running her paws over the expanse of pink faux fur, loving every inch of it. She bunched up a double handful to rub her muzzle in. "Mmmmm!"

Toby crawled over too. He pushed against the mattress first though, just in case it was a waterbed. Nope: solid footing. And the pink stuff really was incredibly soft.

"What time do you wanna get up tomorrow, Junella?" Piffle asked through the hole.

"Whenever," she replied. She uncoiled her scarf and made a pillow from it. "We've got this one chance to sleep in, might as well take it. Though Toby, if you wake up first, don't feel bad about getting us up too. You're the client after all."

"Allright, thanks."

Zinc had his wrenches, skullcap and clothes off in record time. In just his undies, he wriggled under the covers. "Well, goodnight everyone! See ya tomorrow! Sleep tight, Juney!" And with that, he abruptly switched off the lights with his nose.

"Hey!" she grumbled. She didn't see what the big rush was. "G'night you two," she sang quietly as she settled in. She left the panel open a crack, just in case of emergency.

There was a brief moment of quiet.

And then...

"What is that?" came from the next room. "What IS that!?"

Toby froze. Anything bad enough to make Junella's voice quiver with panic was not something he wanted to deal with.

"AAAAAAAAIIGHHH!!! JESUS CHRIST, ZINC! IT'S GOT ME, IT'S GOT ME!!" The skunk's screams probably woke up half the hotel.

"I shall save you, Madam Brox!!" George cried out.

Toby and Piffle exchanged glances of alarm and were just about to pull the panel open and see if they could help when Zinc began laughing his ass off.

"ZINC!! What th- Oh you MOTHERFUCKER!! I thought she'd stayed in the car!"

Zinc continued hooting. They could hear him gasping for air.

Piffle banged on the panel. "Are you two okay in there?"

It slid open. "This diabolical sonovabitch went out during dinner and bought this to put on my side of the bed!" Junella tossed something through.

Toby looked over Piffle's shoulder. It was a plastic baby doll.

"I take it there is no actual danger and I have been roused to action without reason," George huffed.

Zinc tried to stop laughing long enough to speak. "I just- hee hee! just wish the l-l-lights weren't off, so I could have s-s-seen your f-face!! HA!"

A black vinyl arm poked through the panel. "Gimme that back so I can beat him with it."

Grinning, Piffle did. A moment later came the sounds of bonking.

"Yowch! Tee hee! Ease up, Junebug!"

To Toby's surprise, he heard Junella chuckle too. "Allright, yeah. You got me. You got me good. Fair enough, ya bastard. Now do you have any more of those or can I actually get to sleep?"

"That's it, I'm done. Honest injun. Goodnight everyone! ...Again!"

"Actually," Junella realized, "I just remembered I wanted a bubble bath before bed. The hot tub downstairs oughtta be close enough." They heard her skootching her way across the pink fur. "I'll be back later. I'll try not to disturb you if you're sleepin', Zinc. Or maybe I will. Maybe I'll go out and buy me a rubber clown mask."

"I'd deserve it," he admitted.

She said her goodnights to everyone again, then they heard the foomp of her heading out.

Toby had been rather rattled by the sheer volume of Junella's scream, but was chuckling now. Especially knowing that the fearless Junella Brox did have at least one thing that made her jump. "I wonder what Doll would think of that? I don't know if she'd be insulted or amused."

"Prolly the second one, what with Junella being so mean to her all the time. I'll be sure to tell her when I let her out." Piffle rubbed her tummy, able to somehow sense her friend safe within her. It was interesting to think that Doll was inside of a sleigh, inside of a pill, inside of her.

The pink fur blanket enveloped the whole sleeping area, but Piffle located the edge of the blankets where she could slide in. She cooed happily at the cool, silky sheets. "Swanky! Hop on in, Toby. And don't forget your slippers!"

He puzzled at that, but then remembered Zinc warning him the other day about foot-drilling bugs ('Geez, was that only one day ago!?'). He noticed a pocket beside the bed with a complimentary pair. Basically hairnets for paws. He put them on. "You'd think with the rooms pneumatically sealed off it'd keep the bugs out."

"It prolly does, but most people would rather be safe than sorry. Me? I don't mind them. If dem bugziz get me in the night, it just means I'll have tickly dreams!" she giggled.

Toby found himself simultaneously befuddled by, and admiring of, her ability to not let this realm's constant threats get to her. He pulled himself into the pita-like bed and piled up pillows behind him. "Piffle... do you mind if I ask you something?"

She rolled over onto her elbow. "Go right ahead."

He stared up at the pink ceiling. "I've been thinking about this off-and-on for a while now. Maybe you don't have an answer, and that's okay, but..." He took a deep breath. "Piffle, is there any safe place in Phobiopolis? At all?"

She wasn't sure what he meant by that. Her antennae bobbed. "Coryza's pretty safe."

"Yeah, but only 'cause they keep it under lock and key at night. I mean like, is there any place without all the foot bugs and runbugs and guys in fencing masks and killer clowns and all that? Is there anyplace where you can just relax?"

She thought about that, and could empathize with why it was weighing on his mind. "Well, I haven't traveled everywhere, so there might be. But honestly I don't think there is. I don't think there's anyplace that's completely, totally, ab-so-lute-ly safe from everything."

He sighed.

"...On the other hand, I don't think there was anyplace like that on Earth either."

That gave him pause.

She laid back against her pillow, stretching her back, feeling the edges of her exoskeletal sections rub together. She put her arms behind her head. "Actually, I was thinkin' about Doll just now. I know she's inside me, and she's safe. And I don't have to worry about her floating around with my food and getting digested. I don't know how it works, 'specially since the restaurant took my other body away, but I know you can sometimes 'put things away' and it's not like regular eating. It's more like... Like when you don't have a pocket so you dumbfound something. Where does it go? As far as I know, into a kind of limbo. So it's safe there. That's about as close as you can get to what you're asking, Toby. But I don't think it's a place. I don't think you can be awake there."

He'd felt slightly hopeful for a bit, but then that feeling capsized. What good was being safe if you were unaware of it?

"Other than that, well... I think I know what you're feeling, Toby. I guess I got over that a long time ago and don't think about it anymore. But I remember what it was like, feeling scairt and confused all the time." She realized something. "...And there is one other place you can go to get away from that."

"Where?"

She blushed. "Your bellybutton."

"'Scuse me?"

She bit her lip to keep from giggling and scooted a little closer so she could whisper. "It's the kind of thing that's not discussed in polite company. But if you're ever too over-frazzled, you can curl up in a little ball, just like an armadillo. You'll dive right into your tummy-button and end up inside your mind. You can make it look like whatever you want. And while you're in there, nothing can hurt you. It's like when I was little and I'd pull the blankets over my head to keep out the nightmares."

"That actually works?" He marveled at the idea, and idly poked his own navel. "So what's the catch? Why doesn't everyone who ends up here just curl up and stay safe forever?"

"There's a lot of reasons!" Piffle immediately replied. "For one, you can't stay there forever. It's like holding your breath. Sort of. Or like how you can only sit cross-legged for so long before your feet fall asleep."

"Oh." That felt like it made sense.

"For two, it's considered rude. I'm not sure why. But if you ball up around other people, that's like picking your nose or scratching your tushie."

"Weird."

"And for three..." She reached across the pink fur to pat his paw. "Don't you think you'd get lonely if you just stayed inside all the time all by yourself?"

He hadn't even thought of that.

And while Piffle made some good points, this still sounded like something Toby definitely wanted to explore. "Do you mind if I try it now? Just to see if I can?" he asked.

She nodded. "I'll just become real interested in this wall over here," she said as she turned around. "La-de-dah, tum-te-tum..."

Toby pulled up his pajama top. He stuck his finger in his bellybutton. He leaned in closer. Nothing was happening. "Are you sure about this? You're not just telling me strange things to see if I'll believe in them, like Zinc did?"

"Nope! Promise! You hafta kinda think real hard about it and make like you're diving into a pool," she replied with her back turned. "Here I am, just staring at a wall..."

Toby wasn't sure how to do that from a sitting position. But he put his hands together, pointed them at his bellybutton, lunged forward-

And suddenly was in his bedroom.

"What the...!?"

Toby's head swiveled all around. The pink fur room was gone. Piffle was gone. Phobiopolis was gone. He was standing in the middle of his old room at home, on Earth. There was his bed and his bookshelves. She'd said he would go inside his own mind. And of course, what other place would his mind immediately think of?

Before he could take in the visual details, his nose wrinkled as the memory of this room's scent came back to him. Within a few seconds it was unbearable. That clinging, cloying, toxic odor of ten thousand layers of artificiality. Sprays and creams and cleaning chemicals. Antibacterial everything. And beneath it, like an alligator swimming just below the surface, was the stench of his own sickness. His sweat, his dried pus, his old vomit.

He turned and saw, on the wall beside his bed, the long stains from innumerable times where he'd wiped discharge off his fingers.

He had to get out of here.

And just like sitting up straight, he was.

Piffle had been a good girl and only peeked once at her friend all rolled up into a perfect furry sphere. But when she heard him jerk back to reality, she turned around and was confused by the horror on his face. "Toby? What happened!? Whenever I do that I automatically go to a happy place!"

The mouse stared off into space, breathing hard through his nose to get the smell out. This canned hotel air was lilacs and cherries in comparison.

"It was a place I thought was happy... But it wasn't. It wasn't..." he said vacantly. "I can't believe I ever got used to that..."

Piffle sat up to sit beside him. "I'm here now, Toby. Do you want to talk about it?"

"N-no... Not yet. Maybe. Sometime." He wasn't even looking at her. The very idea that he had once spent days in that miasma, surrounded by it... that noxious fog permeating his skin and clothing... How?

She intuited that this was something too personal for him to let her help with, much as she hated seeing his pained expression. She wished she could just hug him all better. Instead, she patted his leg and crawled back to her side of the bed. "Do you want to just go to sleep now, Toby?"

Slowly, he nodded. "Yeah, I think I do. Sorry I spaced out there, I just..." He couldn't even begin to describe it. Instead he pulled the covers over him and turned towards the wall.

The room was dead silent now, except for the faint whisper of  Zinc's breathing next door. Piffle reached up to turn off the light. Then she pulled the blanket up to her face.

From behind her came a faint mumble. "Thank you for being helpful, Piffle."

"You're welcome, Toby," she said back. "I'll be here in the morning if you need me."

"Thank you," he said again.

Piffle got comfortable and found a small smile to fall asleep on. Even if Toby wasn't ready now, she felt good knowing she'd be there when he would be.

*****

CHAPTER THIRTTYTHHREE

"MOM!!!"

Toby was suddenly wide awake, not knowing whether he'd actually screamed or just dreamt it.

It was so dark in the tiny room his eyes needed a moment to adjust. The automat panel glowed just enough to make out the indistinct, fuzzy shapes in the room.

Piffle was still beside him, and still asleep. So he must have cried out in his mind only. If he'd done it for real she would have been startled out of her skin.

Careful so as not to wake her, Toby peeled the covers back and slowly crawled, inch by inch, towards the padded landing area. After a dream like that, he just wanted to move. To know he wasn't trapped in one spot anymore.

At the automat, he moved around the little food icons with his finger until a bottle of water came up. He poked the image urgently. Seven seconds later there was a small 'thud' as it whooshed through the tubes and arrived. Toby winced, hoping the noise hadn't disturbed anyone. Hands shaking, he unscrewed the cap and drank so fast it spilled all down his pajamas.

Good god, that dream...

Toby had wondered what the nightmares here must be like. And now he knew. They were just as bad as when he was alive.

He had been sitting in bed at home, watching one of his favorite cartoons. But the screen was too close, like the TV was hovering an inch or so off his lap. And then he was inside the TV show, observing it omnipresently. The Keen Team were once again on the trail of Dr. Bigfoot's latest evil plot. But the normally light and wacky program had a more intense edge to it somehow. The animation was far too detailed. The camera angles swung in drunken arcs. No one was smiling. And when a cage fell from above and trapped the heroes, there was real fear in their eyes. It wasn't their buffoonish nemesis this time. It was a tall, thin presence in a featureless mask. He laughed an unearthly, glass-breaking laugh and the screen went black. But instead of cutting to a commercial, it returned to the show. The heroes were all tied up, back to back. Tears were pouring down their faces as they struggled against barbed wire bonds. The man in the mask was looming over them, drawing on their faces. No... No, he wasn't drawing. He had some kind of knife shaped like a pen. And he was carving their facial features off. Slowly. Piece by piece. They were trapped and couldn't escape, and had to listen to the anguish of their teammates, their friends, suffering this meaningless, cruel torture. And it wouldn't end. The scene just kept going and going and going. Toby was uncomfortable to the point of nausea, but his body was paralyzed and he couldn't tear his eyes away. He had to watch while his beloved cartoon stars wept in agony. He started screaming hoarsely for his mother to come take the TV away, to shove him away from it, anything! He screamed louder and louder, but had a deep, sick knowledge in his gut that something was very wrong and she wasn't coming to help him. She wasn't ever coming back to him ever again. Because she-

That's when he woke up.

Toby suckled on the plastic bottle till he'd crushed every last drop out of it. He sat there, back to the hatch, just trying to keep his heart from banging its way through his ribs.

He reached up to feel his cheeks. They were wet. But not from water. He'd cried his eyes raw during the dream.

Part of him hated his mind for putting him through such a horrorshow.

But another part wondered if this had been inevitable.

At least when he'd spent all that time in the cave weeks ago, he hadn't been holding anything back. He'd been constantly terrified out of his wits, screaming, crying, and wishing like crazy for help. But over the last few days he'd still been surrounded constantly by pain and danger and surreality. He wasn't any safer. He was just learning to deal with it better. But a lot of that was simply shutting the fear off and tucking it away for the moment. Caching it for later. He was among other people, after all. Societal rules decreed that descending into fits of blubbering hysteria was unsightly. So he held it in.

No wonder it had all come back out when it had the chance. Maybe his brain was even doing him a favor. Uncorking the bottle before it burst.

After all, he had been enduring what should have been impossible levels of stress. Losing Piffle. Nearly having his brain erased by that pink gas. Tinder Fingers' burning touch. The rancid swamp. The waterfall. Trapforest Path. The ice angels. The parade of psychotic terrors in Amaurosis Fugax. Tearing his own flesh to shreds. Letting Junella skewer him. Nearly being killed by Rither. The sound of Rither's limbs being crushed. The masked kid's jawbone...

There was so much he'd been through already. By all logic, it should have driven him insane by now. He should have been a gibbering mental case, biting his nails down to the skin and sitting in a puddle of his own piss.

He had no idea why he wasn't.

A small voice inside him timidly offered that maybe there was more resilience at his core than he'd ever had reason to believe in. Or maybe being with people who were kind to him, and forgave his cowardice, helped to make him stronger.

Toby felt new tears from his eyes. He remembered then what had happened just before he fell asleep. And that made him realize why now was when he'd finally snapped, not earlier. It was seeing his room again. The room he'd remembered fondly. The room he would have given up his own skin to return to during those long nights in the cave.

He'd already discussed with Piffle his realization of what going back home meant going back to. But that had been a vague worry. Something easy to forget. It hadn't become concrete until he'd felt that room again. When he'd entered himself, his mind had taken him, not to the place he wanted to remember, but to what it had actually been.

A plastic tomb. His sickbed full of mottled vinyl sheets and stomach-churning odors. His toys splayed all over the floor, since he increasingly lacked the energy to put them away. His beloved books lying open, their pages spotted with phlegm and other substances. The unbreathable poison cloud of artificial flowers. The haphazard spots and patches of his mother's unhinged, compulsive "cleaning".

He had called out her name in panic within the dream. But in his waking state, he realized now that he hardly ever mentioned her. How often had he even thought about her in the past few days?

Why would a boy who has known nothing but his mother's love throughout his life, upon finding himself in a strange, faraway land, not be paralyzed from the grief of separation from her? Why was he not in mourning? Why did his thoughts seem to slide away from her, to subconsciously avoid her?

'What does your mother's face look like, Toby?' a ghoulish voice within him asked, grinning with crooked teeth at the knowledge that he could not answer the question.

He did not dare answer.

Because what Junella had said couldn't be true. It couldn't!

FUCK HER!!!

Toby gasped, stunned by that sudden gunshot of rage that had just overwhelmed him. It had felt like being lashed by a whip of fire.

'You're lying to yourself,' he said to his empty insides.

He wished this room had a window to look out of. He wanted to lean on the sill and stare out into the night at all those turning wheels and let them take his mind away. Somewhere far from these agonizing thoughts. He felt like his brain had been flayed. He just wanted it all to go away. To go home.

But that was why the nightmare had come. Because, at some deep level, he knew it was no longer that simple. He wanted to escape from this nightmareland and return to a place where life was simple and safe. Except it wasn't. That was only how it had seemed while he was trapped inside. That was the hazy, hypnotic dream he'd had while he was caught in the pitcher plant.

His subconsciousness knew better: he had no home to go to.

So what now? Call off the journey to Anasarca? Tell Junella and Zinc he'd wasted their time for nothing? And where would he go even if he did back out? Did he just expect them to babysit him and keep him safe forever? Toby realized that he had no idea how to survive without a Mommy taking care of all the details of his life.

He hadn't been trying to get "home", he realized. He'd been trying to get back to a place of no responsibilities, no accountability, and no thought for tomorrow. A place where every today would be exactly like the yesterday before. Dull, colorless, plastic-coated. Safe.

Toby wondered if he'd ever stop feeling nauseous.

He thought about ordering another water.

Then he thought about going out for a walk.

That was ridiculous. Of course it was. He'd never been to this city before. And he had no idea how long he'd slept. It was probably the deep part of night out there now. The time of night Coryzans had built the walls for. Even assuming Ectopia Cordis had its own defenses, what about its citizens? Toby couldn't fend off a punk with his hammer and not feel sick about it. What would he do if a couple dozen surrounded him this time?

Or what if that didn't happen? What if he just went out and got some fresh air for a few minutes, never lost sight of the hotel, and came right back? He didn't have to go poking around in any dark alleys. He knew this city was probably lit up like a Christmas tree 24/7.

He'd be safe, just going out and coming right back, right?

"I'll do it," he whispered to himself. 'I'm going to get up and push that button that says 'lobby', then just climb into the tube. If Mr. Roosman is downstairs, I'll say hi to him and tell him I'm going out for a little while to clear my head. Who knows? Maybe I'll see some late-night party store and go in and have a look around. Maybe I'll buy an Ectopia Cordis souvenir. Maybe I'll get a baseball cap or a postcard.'

Toby let his mind wander to all the possibilities his little nighttime excursion might take.

He didn't notice that his eyelids were drooping, or that his thoughts were rapidly dissolving into slush.

Minutes later, he was fast asleep on the floor of the gym mat, his back to the hatch.

*****