The band sat around the card table under the unwavering fluorescent light of the garage. They had closed the garage door now that the evening chill had crept into the air, and they were laughing as they sat around pizza boxes and rapidly draining cans of pop.
"See, I'll do most of the song writing," Tandy said. "I figure the way this will work is I write the song, then come up with some guitar tabs for you two and keyboarding for me, and then you just… you just do what you do," she said to Peter. He grinned a bit sheepishly.
"Go easy on me," Mary Jane said. "I'm still kind of sucking at the guitar playing. I'm gonna hafta practice a lot to get up to speed."
"Do your parents mind that we're making a ruckus in their garage?" Peter asked.
Tandy rolled her eyes. "Dad is pretty much permanently on business trips, and Mom isn't back from downtown yet. She has an appointment at the spa, followed by an art show she's directing. I'm kind of curious to know how long it will be before one of them figures out I've got a band."
"Ah," Peter said with a sage nod, sorry he asked.
"W-will w-w-we d-do covers?" Tyrone asked Tandy.
She shrugged. "I don't know. I formed the band because I've got some ideas for songs, some of them written. I wanted people to help me out who, you know, don't mind going out on a limb and doing some experimental stuff."
"I think we're all mental enough," Mary Jane said with a nod.
"G-gotta p-pick a n-name," Tyrone said.
"I like those weird kinky band names, like Crash Test Dummies and Goo Goo Dolls and Red Hot Chili Peppers," Mary Jane grinned.
"Those are all things. You're a material girl," Peter observed.
"How about," Mary Jane said thoughtfully, squinting at the ceiling, "Mad Mannikins, spelled with a 'k' to make it more artsy? Like a protest of wooden performance or something."
"I th-th-think we c-could be B-B-Busted C-Coffin!" Tyrone said.
"Whatever we pick, we all have to agree on it," Tandy said. "We're in this together. I was thinking a possibility might be Muse Unbound or something."
"Hang on," Peter said, getting up. He returned with a spiral notebook and a pen. Opening the book, he leaned over it and started scratching in the names.
"Or Three Eyed Fish," Mary Jane said. "That's kinda cool."
"Ch-Ch-ainsaw R-review!" Tyrone grinned.
"Leaf Dance," Tandy said dreamily. "I had this cool idea for a song watching leaves fall onto the lake."
"CGM!" Tyrone contributed, "for C-comput-ter G-generated Music!"
"But it isn't," Mary Jane said. "Dude! How about this. Lawn Ornament."
"Lawn Ornament?" Peter said skeptically.
"Well it's better than Butthole Surfers," Mary Jane said primly. "We're brainstorming. Write it down."
"We haven't really even talked about what kind of music we're going to do," Peter said. "Should we let that help us decide what kind of band name to use?"
"D-deathtongue!" Tyrone added.
Tandy smiled at them. "The name is the buy-in," she said. "Once you feel the band is yours then we can move on. So we must pick something everyone likes."
"No snide comments out of you," Mary Jane said, pointing sternly at Peter. "Where were we?"
"G-goreblade!" Tyrone said. "Spattercash!"
"Not to be rude or anything, but I was wondering," Mary Jane said to Tyrone. "Are you into death metal?" He grinned at her and nodded. "I see," she mused.
"Peter, you haven't suggested anything," Tandy said to him directly.
"Ah," Peter said. He shrugged, a bit uncomfortable. "I, uh, don't really listen to a lot of music. This is kind of new for me." Peter stopped, stiffened, peered around the garage.
Mary Jane noticed at once and got very nervous. Tyrone blinked at him, and Tandy raised an eyebrow.
Something out of place, something out of place; the shadows!
Peter sprang at Mary Jane and knocked her to the side as the shadows in the back corner of the garage erupted and whooshed out at the table, the edges of the shroud defying the laws of physics as they rigidly plunged ahead and swept the entire table into their folds. Peter looked back, but the shroud was already gone, and so was the table, and the chairs, and—
Tandy and Tyrone had vanished without a trace.
"Oh. My. God," Mary Jane breathed.
"Go home," Peter said, bounding to his feet. He rushed to the cordless phone and picked it up, punching in a number.
"No," Mary Jane said, standing. "I'm with you."
"This is going to get ugly," Peter said. "Please."
She wavered, then nodded. "Come by my place when you're done," she said. He nodded, and she left.
xXx
Illyana sat at the table, munching on a pickle and peanut butter and frito sandwich. The phone rang. She put her sandwich down and answered it. "Strange residence, Illyana attending."
"This is Peter, Peter Parker," came the agitated voice on the other end. "Is Strange in?"
The front door opened, and Strange walked in looking slightly haunted. Xavier was on his heels; he turned to close the door then saw Illyana and smiled. His smile was tense.
"Just walked in," Illyana said. "Strange, it's that Parker guy. And welcome back."
"Thank you," Strange said distractedly. He took the phone. "This isn't a good time, Peter, can I call you back?"
"Fifteen seconds," Peter said. "That's all I need. I was here at Tandy Bowen's place, we were talking, and this shadow swept out of the corner and took her and Tyrone. I barely got MJ and me out of the way. I wanted to tell you that, and to see if you have any ideas as to how I can get them back."
Strange was silent for a moment. "Peter," he said, "you do good work. We'll be right there."
"Uh, thanks," Peter said, a bit confused. Strange hung up and turned to Xavier and Illyana.
"My associate, Peter Parker, is a bit of a trouble magnet," Strange said. "If something odd is going on in the area, it tends to find its way to him. And so has our cloak. Peter just witnessed an attack."
"Wait, the cloak?" Illyana said. "The vampiric herald? The Shroud?"
"Yes," Strange replied. "It's out, it has a new host, and we need to rescue him before the Eye does its work and implodes the Shroud for good. So we have until he actually tries to feed, that's the trigger. Montessi's nephew is its host."
"Oh man," Illyana breathed.
"Let's go," Strange said. "Scry for Peter, then come with us if you like."
"Right, Chief," Illyana said, and she thrust her hand out with her fingers spread as a disk ringed with dark eldritch flame swept up from the floor, carrying Xavier and Strange and Illyana to Limbo.
Peter leaped to the side as the stepping disk flared, and he blinked to see Xavier and Strange.
"Xavier?" he said uncertainly. "You're walking?"
"With mechanical assistance," Xavier said. "I have a machine that lets my psionics power my movement."
"Glad you found another way," Peter said with a small smile.
Strange had his eyes closed, a thin line of concentration on his forehead. "It came from there," he said with a gesture, "and swept through here, then disappeared."
"Right," Peter said. "People come and go in the strangest ways here." He looked at Xavier. "If I don't understand, I figure it's magic and I go to Strange."
"Seems a wise course," Xavier said, looking sideways at Strange. The Sorcerer Supreme sat on the floor.
"I am going to search for the Shroud," Strange said. "Xavier, you are welcome to do the same."
"What should I do?" Peter asked.
"Protect our bodies while we're defenseless," Strange nodded.
"I can do that," Peter said. "Unless the Shroud comes back."
"I don't think it will, it's too soon," Strange said. "Illyana, scry for it." Then he closed his eyes. Peter looked around.
"What, is she invisible now? What a chilling thought," he muttered. He began to pace, casting glances at the two silent and motionless men from time to time, shaking his head.
Strange's astral form lifted from him, and he saw the world in a crispness that was impossible for mortal eyes as he saw the energies that resided in everything. Including the air. And the spirits of the earth. He sent out an inaudible keen, and spirits rushed to him as he drifted out of the garage.
He looked for an echo of the Shroud. None in the area knew more than the garage contact. So he began to flit across the earth, a driven ghost moving at the speed of thought.
Xavier expanded his consciousness again, looking for the print of terror on the minds around him. He began a methodical sweep of the neighborhood, then he cast his thoughts wider. Hundreds of thoughts prickled in his mind, the signatures of a range of emotions, punctuated by the occasional flare of anger or spike of passion. What he sought was terror. It would only be a matter of time before he found it.
Illyana crouched by her pool, studying it as images flickered and danced in the still surface. "This is stupid," she muttered. "I barely know what I'm looking for." Then her training returned to her; when she was a wizard, and no longer an apprentice, she would have more difficult searches than this. She applied herself, bending to the task, and the scry flickered faster.
"This sure would be easier if the damned thing would stay on Prime and not go jumping off where we can't follow," she muttered.
Peter started thinking fast as a car pulled into the driveway. He didn't have a car anymore, Mary Jane had brought him. And she had left to go home. Strange and Xavier had no car. Tyrone had gotten a ride from Tandy. Peter peeked outside. A red Miata was in the driveway. A classy middle aged woman strolled up to her house, and let herself in. Peter breathed a sigh of relief, then resumed his vigil over his two stiff and motionless charges.
xXx
The breathing dark in the corner of the musty basement shifted, and a darker fabric unfurled from depths unfathomable. With a hoarse scream, Manuel rode the Shroud out of the endless dark, back to Prime. He yanked the folds of the cloak open, only darkness beneath. From that darkness, two teens were disgorged.
Sputtering and gasping, Tandy and Tyrone thudded gracelessly down on the concrete of the floor, struggling for air.
"I can't do it!" Manuel shouted at Mordred. "The agony! I am barely sane! But this is too monstrous! I will not… provide… a hunting ground for the foul thing—" a rattling gasp of pain cut his words short.
Mordred stood motionless, staring at him coldly, decidedly unamused. "You could have done great things, Manuel de la Rocha. You still can. But first you must accept what you have become." He sniffed. "That horrible hunger that is gnawing at your guts and your bones is a hunger for light, for living light. You cannot slake it without drinking souls. After the starving predator that conceals itself in your folds has cooked them properly, seasoned them with despair. Manuel! Get a hold of yourself! Don't you see? Hope is gone!"
Quivering under the battering assault of starvation, Manuel looked at Tandy and Tyrone with eyes too sunken to be seen, his fleshless face pulling his toughened skin ever tighter over a dark skull.
"Once again I must choose," he whispered, "between hunger and pride."
Tyrone pushed himself to his feet, trembling with fear. "T-t-ttake m-m-mm-me," he stammered. "Let h-hher g-ggo!"
"Tyrone!" Tandy managed, rising. "You can't do this. I won't let you."
The gold amulet at the Shroud's throat glittered with a cold light as Manuel stared at him.
"Your mother loves you. You have brothers, sisters. You can't make this call," Tandy said, standing with her back to the Shroud, staring up into Tyrone's eyes.
"Tandy!" Tyrone shouted, grasping her shoulders. "For once! Let me d-do this!" Then he pushed past her and flung himself at the Shroud's inky depths.
He was knocked to the floor by a twitch of the sentient fabric. "No," Manuel said, a strange wonder in his voice. "If a sacrifice must be made… I can do no less than this unfortunate one. He would give his life to save yours." Manuel's teeth chattered. "I must… uphold… my family's… name…"
He let out a tremendous scream as he furled the Shroud around himself, ever tighter. And then, for their sake, he gave up all hope.
Mordred shook his head, a faint smile on his lips. "So passes Manuel de la Rocha," he murmured. He slipped out of the basement, locking the door behind himself.
"Run!" Tyrone said urgently to Tandy. "Run while you can!"
The Shroud had collapsed upon itself, Manuel had vanished within it. Once again, it was fabric. For a second, it did not stir. Then it restlessly twitched, and its broad, pointed shoulders whirled up from the ground, the cowl peaked and empty save for the darkness that echoed endlessly within its malice. The Shroud swirled, the amulet at its throat glittering. Traces of light whipped across the fabric from the amulet, swirling across the surface. The Shroud lunged as Tyrone cried out; it swept at Tandy, and Tyrone leaped into it, topping into its endless dark.
"No!" Tandy shouted, scrabbling for a grip on his ankle as he vanished into the inky emptiness. Then darkness covered them, and they were lost.
xXx
Xavier and Strange gasped in the same moment, and Peter whirled, ready to fight. Xavier opened his eyes and struggled to rise, Peter was at his side in a moment.
"What happened?" Peter asked urgently.
"It screamed," Xavier said shortly. "Loud enough to be felt from here. Strange went to alert his apprentice."
Strange's eyes opened, and he rolled easily to his feet. "Let's go," he said, and a disk of pale darkness swept up around them, ringed in eldritch flame.
xXx
Tandy blinked and looked around. Her mother, her father; they sat by a Christmas tree that was listlessly decorated. The gas log flickered in the fireplace, a Christmas special was on the television. In the next room, her aunt and uncles moved quietly, glancing in from time to time, walking on eggshells.
The doorbell rang, and her parents sprang up and rushed to the door.
"Somebody order a pizza?" the gangly youth said, brandishing his insulated sack full of pizza boxes.
Her father's jaw worked, his eyes bugging out slightly, and her mother turned away and concealed her sorrow behind her hand.
"I just keep hoping," the older woman whispered. She walked over to the mantle and looked at Tandy's senior picture as one of Tandy's uncles rushed to pay for the pizza.
Tandy realized that she was never going to go home. She realized that no one would ever know where she had gone, what had become of her.
As the cold rushed through her, a light kindled in her eyes, a spark of determination. "Mom, Dad," she said, knowing instinctively that they couldn't hear her. "There's always hope. Always. I never gave up." She smiled at them. "Merry Christmas," she whispered. "Don't give my room away." And she reached out to smooth her mother's hair, wondering if the gesture would bring any comfort at all, wondering whether she was a phantasm or they were. It was all so surreal; they looked a lot more real than she felt. She had to believe she could still do some good.
A star glittered with a cold, hard light in the night sky above.