Ch. 2: Journey to the Monster Swamps
Star and Marco take Katie to their home that evening and tell her about their adventures.
"So you two fight monsters who wish to use the wand and go to different dimensions to have adventures?" Katie said.
"That sums it up," Marco said, "Though it was a challenge fighting Toffee."
"Who's Toffee?" Katie asked.
"A weird lizard monster dressed like a lawyer," Star said, "He wanted me to destroy the wand when he kidnapped Marco. That's why the star in my wand is missing the other half."
"That's weird," Katie said, "Why would he go through the trouble to make you destroy your wand when he could have the power for himself?"
"That's why we have all these books," Marco said, "We want to get inside Toffee's head and figure out his plan. I have a feeling we haven't seen the last of him."
Katie noticed two pairs of scissors, one black and the other red.
"What's with the scissors?" Katie asked.
"Those are dimensional scissors," Star said, "The red one can take you to any dimension, but the black can take you straight to monster realm."
"My mom is making tacos tonight," Marco said, "Why don't you join us, Katie?"
"Sure," Katie said, "I have to call my mom and ask her."
"Okay," Marco said, "C'ya down stairs."
Marco and Star went downstairs. Katie closed the door and got out her box-cutting scissors. Then, she switches the monster scissors with them.
"Once I get the star half, I'll finally have friends," Katie looked at the scissors.
Katie gets on her cell phone and calls her mom.
That night, while her mom is asleep, Katie sneaks past her room and out of the house. She gets out the monster scissors, cuts a dimensional rift, and steps through. She steps in on the other side and sees the ruins of Lido's castle.
"This must be the place," Katie said, "Now to find the star half."
Katie suddenly sees the rack that carried Toffee's coat and tie.
"Must be Toffee's garments," Katie said, "Marco's right about him dressing like a lawyer. Weird that they didn't get burned in the explosion."
Katie walks away from the rack, not noticing something moving in the coat pocket. Crawling out is a small claw that is slowly transforming into something.
Katie rolled and pushed every rock and piece of debris she could find. She kept on and on to find the star half but to no avail.
"No sign of it," Katie despaired, "I don't know where else to look."
Katie suddenly sees a golden light under pieces of wood. She runs to it, pushes and pulls off the wood, and sees the star half.
"The missing star half," Katie said with glee, "Now I can take it back to Star!"
"You won't be taking it to anyone, Child," a voice said.
"Who said that?" Katie said.
Katie turned around and sees a big blob taking form of a humanoid liars in a polyester shirt and black pants. The lizard puts on the tie and coat and turned toward Katie, revealing himself to be Toffee, much to Katie's horror.