Chapter Ten

"The end battle between good and evil should be impressive."

God

Aahz

What I couldn't tell anyone there, was that I was wondering if I should just keep being powerless. What Barry said was true. How many times had Skeeve almost died because of me? Even here is a perfect example. If I had been nosier and asked what Skeeve was doing, he might not be almost dying now. Maybe I did deserve what the powers that be did to me.

"Aahz, don't do this," Tanda said in a soft voice next to my ear. "None of it was your fault."

"Maybe it all was," I muttered back. "I didn't save Skeeve here; Pookie did. All I did was—"

"Find him and get us here. Aahz, don't play the pity party. Skeeve wasted all this time, risked his life, so he could restore your powers. Do you really want this situation to be repeated because you are stubborn and feeling sorry for yourself?"

That's what I had found so attractive in Tanda once. She never pulled any punches, and she was right. I didn't want Skeeve to feel sorry for me and do what he did again. After all, this whole thing started because Skeeve had felt guilty about me, just like I'm doing now about him. Guilt! What a useless emotion. It was time I squashed it. "Alright, what's my cure?"

"This, right here," Massha exclaimed and brought out a brown bar. I was dubious, at best, and didn't take it right away.

"It works," Pookie said. "I lost my powers because of what the people here call healthy food. We think it's where Garkin obtained the stuff used on you in the first place, not where you thought he did."

I was about to take it, and just put my faith in this small thing, when Massha couldn't hand it to me anymore, as it was stone—she was, too. I don't know what had happened, but all massive flesh of hers had turned into just bulbous white stone. I looked towards Pookie for help, but, she, too, had turned into art, along with Bunny and Tanda. Oh, crap.

Garkin was here.

No, he wasn't here in the flesh. Rather, he had become what I'm guessing Skeeve had seen, and he did look like a ghost. I cursed Guido and Nunzio out mentally. Of course! They were bodyguards of the mob, never expecting that when a magician was asleep, they weren't really, and had a lot more power at their disposal—like turning people into stone.

"Hey, old buddy," I said casually, lounging a bit. There was no real reason to panic yet, as he hadn't turned me to stone, and that meant he couldn't, as I should have been the first on his list. "Keeping high spirits?"

"I guess my abilities don't work on a Pervert that has lost all his ties to the magical world."

"That's Pervect!" I corrected, promising myself mentally that I'd make him pay for that. "And, you also are aware of, I'm guessing, that you can't attack me physically in your ghostly state."

"No, you're right, but I can turn Skeeve into a statue as well. First, I'm going to make him one more offer of friendship, and I want you to stay out of it, or else I'll seal the deal now. Got me, old friend?"

I gritted my teeth, and did the only thing I could, which was to grab the hospital bed and wheel the comatose Skeeve out of range, running as fast as I could. Garkin was startled: he hadn't expected me to run, but he rallied quickly, and he could go through walls, after all. Life's not fair, I thought, and picked up my speed, ignoring the people doing their best to get out of my way. I was trying to save Skeeve, so I wasn't too concerned about overly slow pedestrians. I saw what they called elevators here, and I broke the doors open, hoping there would be a car there. I was in luck, and I pushed the button for first floor after getting Skeeve inside.

Garkin rushed past, and hadn't seen where I went, but it was only a matter of time. Face it, self, I thought with grim anger, you can do nothing without powers. If only I had taken that bar from Massha. But, oh well, would have, should have, could have—didn't! What to do?

I looked up to see Garkin floating down through the floors, scanning the area for me, and then he saw me. An extra burst of speed wasn't enough. It was too late—Garkin had Skeeve again. My old buddy seemed to have gotten tired of running, so he was going to go right to turning Skeeve into stone. Desperate, I scanned the area for anything that could help, but physical stuff was the only thing that met my gaze. Maybe I could throw that glass covered thing with all those chocolate bars at him . . . wait, bars?

Sure enough, the bar that Massha had offered me, before it and she got stoned, was inside. No more time for thinking, I smashed my entire hand through the glass and pulled out three bars, eating them all with wrapper in tact.

It was incredible! Within seconds, I felt all those force lines, like I was seeing again after years of being blind. I also saw what Garkin was utilizing to start the process of turning Skeeve into a statue. Not being gentle at all, I yanked what he had gathered away, sending him sprawling. Oh, at the same time I had put . . . let's just call it a tractor beam on his physical form and reunited the two, spirit and body. So, that's why he was now in a very undignified position on the floor, blinking in shock. Out of body experiences can do that to a man.

"Hello, Garkin," I said, smiling with all my teeth. It was time to show my old friend what it was like to mess with a Pervect—or me in general. To punish him, I first did an old blocking spell, that would keep him from doing any kind of magic, whether in astral form or not (Pookie didn't know how, or I would have had her do that in the first place), but it wasn't enough. That slime monger had taken away everything I had and left me stranded in an unkind dimension—then he kidnapped Skeeve! That was way worse, so I wanted him to suffer, without Skeeve as his slave, and without powers, in a dimension that would hunt him for his face.

So, I disguised him as Skeeve. I'm sure Barry would make sure Garkin never left his new prison, and he wouldn't be able to do anything without powers. My friends appeared in the elevator, Garkin's spells gone now, and I explained to Barry that the one in the bed was Skeeve, and Garkin, his new prisoner, was on the floor, looking stunned.

That was that, but there was one more thing that I was waiting for.

"Where am I?" Skeeve said from the bed, color back in his face, and he was sitting up, looking at his look alike with shock.

Skeeve was fine again!