Hey to y'all who are keeping up with this...thanks a ton! Again! Like I said ...the last chapter really was not my favorite ...but I didn't know what else to do with it and it meant a lot that you guys enjoyed it anyway. From here the story will kinda go up and down ...like any standard horror plot would ...leading up to what I'm hoping to bea bigger conclusion. So thanks to those who are sticking with me and I hope you continue to do so...:-)

Will started to cry out before he realized that what was connecting squarely with Karen's forehead was but a great stream of water.

"What--" Karen sputtered, trying to shield herself from the current and falling backward.

"Yay, the witch is dead!" Jack cheered.

"Jack, it's water," Will pointed out, exasperated, "at the very least, she's melting."

"Give it up, kids," Karen coughed feebly, "that Wizard of Oz bit is weak." She sat up, trying to assess the damage. "Oh my God…my hair…and…ohhhh!" she gasped out, then slowly brought her head upward, her livid eyes burning into Jack's. "This was silk!" she roared.

Jack shrugged. "I'll buy you a new one."

"No, you won't!"

Jack shrugged again. "No, I won't, but it sounded good."

Karen growled at them, slowly rising.

"Hey, Jack?" Will pulled on Jack's sleeve. "Now might be a good time to cut to next scene."

"Right."

Back downstairs, near the front door, Grace wasted no time covering them in kisses.

"No, Grace, ewwwwwwwwwwww," Jack whined. "I'll never get this off!"

"I thought you were dead!" Grace cried. "I thought--I thought--"

"No more thinking," Will told her, "we don't have time for that. She's still on her feet and hot on our trail. What was that Charlie's Angels deal, Jack, and where did you get that water gun?"

"Mason owes me for a box of hams I smuggled in for him last week," he said. "Karen's been monitoring."

"Well, nothing says 'thanks for the hams' than a water gun that could pass for the real thing," Will remarked.

"Hey, you know, we could be asking the wrong question," Grace said out of the blue.

"I don't know what made him say Charlie's Angels--" Jack began but Grace shushed him.

"Not that, Lucy Liu," she snapped. "We're trying to figure out how to get away from Karen, true? Well, maybe we should be asking what could possibly be possessing her to do this in the first place."

"She's possessed by a lot of things, namely Satan," Will said.

"I told you not to wear plaid last week, Grace," Jack said. "It's obvious you pissed her off and she went over the top."

"And anyway, we were trying to figure out how to get away from Karen before this happened," Will added.

"Okay." Grace made a slashing motion in mid air to indicate for them to stop talking. "We can either spend eternity running for our lives--"

"Which, when it comes to Karen, we'll end up doing anyway," Will cut in.

"Or we can figure out what the cause of this is," she continued, ignoring him, "and try to stop it."

"How do we do that?" Jack inquired.

Grace smiled sweetly at him. "Well, Jack, I was thinking we could sit Karen down over a nice mug of hot chocolate and talk to her about it." Her features hardened. "Why would I be asking if I knew!"

"Cool down, Lorena Bobbitt," Will told her. "I think you've got a point. Now…something happened between now and the time she went upstairs."

"Oh yeah," Grace said vaguely, "for a--" She made a quote gesture with her fingers "--breather."

"Breather," Will repeated. "And I'm sure Karen Walker's definition of a breather is planets apart from the rest of us."

"So it seems like the only logical thing to do…" Grace said thoughtfully.

"Yeah…" Jack's tone matched Grace's. "All we have to do is ask Karen what she took."

"That's great, Jack," Grace agreed, "I can only see one little flaw with that plan."

"What's that, G?"

"She's trying to kill us!"

"Whoa." Jack backed away, his expression baffled. "Okay, Grace, you really need to develop the will to chill."

"And you need to stop trying to bring back that expression," Will said. "Besides, all Karen cares about when it comes to uppers and downers and, well, basically everything in between is that they have long, unpronounceable names, God forbid that she'd know what they actually were."

"Which brings us back to my original proposal," Grace said impatiently, "that being, that we somehow get up to Karen's room and try to figure out what it is she took."

"Karen's room? Otherwise known as the Abyss?" Will exclaimed. "That's insane, Grace."

"Yeah, that tends to happen when someone's after me for blood," Grace retorted icily. "But if you have any better ideas, I'd love to hear them."

"Yeah, as a matter of fact, I have a way better idea."

"And that would be?"

"Get into Karen's room and try to figure out what she took!"

"Where is she?" Grace whispered, Will leading the way with her and Jack clutching the back of his shirt, as Jack had insisted; there was more mass to Will than himself or Grace, and this way, he thought, if Karen were to burst out from nowhere, it would take her longer to kill him, thus giving Jack and Grace more time to get away.

"Don't you know anything?" Jack demanded, exasperated. "She's biding her time, waiting to come out when we least expect it."

"And this is coming from the she man who came out and everyone expected it," Grace scoffed.

"At least I came out, Grace," Jack shot back witheringly. "I'm not living with a gay guy still trying to figure it out."

"At least I'm not living with fifty consecutive guys thinking I have it figured out when I really don't!"

"Lindsey! Hilary!" Will admonished in a loud whisper. "I'm going to tell you the same thing they should have been told at the premiere of Cheaper By the Dozen--work it out later."

"Sure, Will, you take the lead once and suddenly you know everything," Jack countered hotly.

"Jack, as many times as I've taken the lead, I think that grants me the privilege of knowing everything."

"And just for the sake of the situation, we'll pretend that you do," Grace said.

THUMP.

"Aggggggghhhhhhhhh!"

"Grace!" Will hissed at her. "Are you trying to get us all killed?"

Grace considered. "Sometimes. But not tonight. Karen beat me to it."

"What was that?" Jack asked shrilly.

Will was quiet for awhile before, "It came from over there."

They crept to the hallway closet believed to be the culprit of the sound, and Will grasped the doorknob.

"Are we all aware that nothing good could come from opening that door?" Jack moaned softly.

"Are we all aware that Jack has been watching too many renditions of Halloween?" Grace wanted to know.

"Might I remind you, Grace, that you're the last one who screamed?" Jack told her testily.

"Yeah, but…okay, can we think about this?" Grace laughed halfheartedly. "We know Karen came into this world missing a few imperative things…like a heart…a conscience…yeah. But do we really believe that she would--"

Will cut her off as he threw open the closet door.

Dead silence.

Then,

"NNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"