8~

A new-born wave of aggression moved through the town, as Thorn Soldiers and Herb Hounds ran and shambled quickly towards their collective target, in small grouped clusters.

That wave, however, was born on the actions of an spreading, irate mob of civically-motivated citizens, police, and reprogrammed Questoids, carrying bladed, makeshift weapons, bottles of herbicide and bleach, and naked blood-, or, in this case, saplust, in an effort to take back their town from the weirdness that beset them all.

It started as a pitched battle through the neighborhoods, with the creatures gradually gaining ground with every retreat they caused. Then, the sheriff with his deputy-gardeners, would cut them off at strategic points in the town to prevent them from taking over the residential zones, before the Soldiers used their Greenman-motivated pseudo-brains to regroup, probe for weaknesses in Stone's advances, and break through their lines to slaughter them.

That was when the Questoids began fanning out in the city in small squads, picking off peripheral patrols, like in Hanley's Hardwares, and coming up behind the bulk of the plant army and tearing into them, while the police pressed their assault from the front.

The plants would have stayed their ground against the Pincer Movement, and fought until there was nothing left to animate, but then, something incredible and impossible had happened: Greenman was finally laid low, and without his mind to help guide and focus their own on given tasks, they were, suddenly, left to their own primitive devices, which demanded one response to their dwindling numbers under the concentrated human onslaught - self-preservation.

And so, the surviving hordes of hacked and chemically-burned Thorn Soldiers and cowed packs of Herb Hounds beat a shambling, leafy retreat towards their collective target, the main road that lead past the town's city limits, and then, began to surge back into the green depths of the Pine Barrens, where they were grown.

The angry citizenry began cautiously falling back, when they realized that following them into the woods, where the creatures would have the terrain advantage, might not have been tactically prudent.

Sheriff Stone gave a guttural roar in triumph, accompanied by victory cries of from the rest, before they turned and began re-entering the town.

Bucky approached Stone, while the sheriff kept a suspicious watch of the forest, ahead, and asked him, worryingly, "Uh, Sheriff, I know we did good, and all, but did we just introduce some new and invasive species into our eco-system?"

The musing on the ecological ramifications of their group action lasted only a moment, before Sheriff Bronson Stone, finally shrugged, in the middle of the road.

"Eh, it'll be fine," he dismissed.

A bird sang.

At least, that was what Marcie's perception told her, once she found herself in the middle of a beautiful, bucolic clearing.

The light scent of flowers was carried on the breeze that she felt, and then, she noticed that the wind was the only thing she felt. Every trace of pain that wracked her body was gone from her.

She looked at herself. She was clad in her normal clothes, strangely, but her body was intact.

Absently, she thought about the hereafter, and wondered if this was what her double experienced after her fatal shooting, or perhaps, after she moved on. She always considered herself a good person, so if this setting was to be inferred, then it was the shape of good things to come.

A few yards from her, sat an indistinct figure on what looked like a throne, prompting her to approach, hoping for answers. When the figure, a comely man looking to be in his mid-thirties and dressed in a black, silk business suit, decided that she was close enough, he casually raised a hand to stop her from coming nearer.

"Are you..." Marcie started to ask from where she stood.

"No," the man said, in a strong Irish accent. "But answer me this, detective. What do you think is more tragic, blood spilt, knowingly, or unknowingly? What is the greater offense, a necessary murder, or an unnecessary killing?"

Marcie, confused, ignored the question and asked, "Who are you?"

"Esus, Teutates and Taranis."

"Ugh! I've been hearing those names so long, now, they sound like a law firm," she sighed. "Plus, I see only you, here, so unless you're suffering from split personalities…"

"If I am, it's better than you swallowing half a water park, but congratulations!" the man said to her. "You just cut the strings off the world's most dangerous puppet."

"Puppet?" That gave Marcie pause. "Greenman?"

The man nodded. "One and the same."

Marcie shook her head, trying to clear it of the mental cobwebs. "But wait, I thought three gods were responsible for all of this. Who are you?"

"I'm sorry, my dear. Where are my manners?" the man asked, standing from his seat. He waved his hand before her, and another chair appeared behind her for her to sit in. "I'm Fear Doirich and I'm a powerful, evil druid, not to put too fine a point on it."

Marcie took her seat. "Fear Doirich?"

"Call me Fear," he said, breezily. "I'm all about me. Personal power, self-gratification, the whole kit and caboodle."

"What does that have to do with Greenman?"

"Look at it from my side," Fear explained, leaning back in his chair. "The Celtic gods saw the writing on the wall with the Roman Empire, because their conquests spelled the end of the Druid way of life. Do you know what it's like, looking down the barrel of oblivion? No fun, especially for a guy who likes to spread a little mayhem around with a distinctly Celtic flair."

"Like you, obviously?"

Fear gave a smirk. "Guilty. So, when Greenman's father was killed by a Roman soldier, I had an idea. He prayed to whom he thought were his gods, for help, but instead, he got me. I'd give him whatever he wanted, which would give me, and a powerful benefactor I know, what we wanted."

Marcie, secretly, gave her host a cagey look. The knowledge of someone who just professed to be up to no good, and the existence of a so-called 'benefactor' sponsoring him was cause for concern.

"Which was?" she asked.

"The most justified self-interest there is. Survival. Continuation. Existence, the sole right of any being. Anyway, I, in no uncertain terms..." He took a deep breath and raised a hand to count down with. "...Told him that he'd be our defender of the faith, gave him the powers of The Green Man, hence his nome de guerre, and pretty much made him immortal through the power of the threefold death, kept an eye on that Roman soldier's bloodline throughout the years, told him the location of ley lines, so when he got his sacrifices off the ground, he could kick off the festivities, in grand style, and clued him in to time travel, so that, ultimately, our way of life would come back big! Whew!"

"I suppose it was a good thing he was smart enough to take that history book with him, so he had an edge," Marcie replied, wondering how to leave this strange, troubling figure.

Fear agreed. "Well, my boy was so happy with his successes, over the centuries, that he wanted to kill two birds with one Wicker Man, as it were. He would give "us" our due for helping him out, with his three sacrifices, and then, he'd snuff out the descendant of the Roman soldier, at the same time. Heck, he deserved it. Besides, my benefactor was already over the moon from all of the killing he had done in the past."

"Oh," he added. "Sorry that I had him screw you and your father over like that, but he really needed a win."

The callous mentioning of her father, whom she hoped was all right, and his downfall, hardened her. "Don't change the subject. You're telling me that you tricked Greenman? He was innocent, all along, and you played on his faith to use him?"

"Tricked?" Fear asked, lightly. "No, more like, I played him, like a cheap harp."

"That's pretty evil," she had to admit.

"Hello! Evil druid!"

"He should know what you did to him."

Fear shrugged, again. "Oh, he should, by now, and the misery he'll feel, knowing what he did to so many people, for so many years, will keep my benefactor strong for a very long time. You can pity or mourn him, if you like."

Marcie decided that in the quiet moments of her afterlife, which she guessed would be a lot, she probably would do that, but for now, the truth was desired more. "I'll put a pin in that, but thanks to you three, I-I mean...just you, the world will have to pick up the pieces, and try to make sense of this mess!"

"Well honestly, missy, there wouldn't be any mess, if your town had just changed like the rest of the world did, but nooooo!"Fear clucked, like a wet hen, with rolled eyes. "You talk about messes? Those Annunaki messed things up when they brought that Mystery Incorporated, here, pushing the native versions of themselves into the past, which created a space-time disruption, over your town, that was super-charged by the ambient energy of the ley lines under your dad's park. That shielded Crystal Cove from the changes to the timeline, when it happened!"

Marcie's eyes widened in realization, and an amazed chuckle slipped from her. "So that's why we didn't change."

"It won't last, though," he dismissed.

"Why's that?"

"In this new timeline, people used to think that Crystal Cove was a cursed town, so no one ever went here. Thanks to you and your buddies, this place is famous, now. The town where the Undying Pagan Emperor...died. People will come and go from there, all the time, now. Do you know what that means? That means that your precious Crystal Cove may had been protected from the new history, at first, but not from its culture, not now.

"Pagan culture is already all around you. It's coming in from the outside and will change you, over time, and then, Crystal Cove will catch up with the rest of the world. This is just prolonging the inevitable," Fear gloated.

Now, it was Marcie's turn to shrug at her host. "So what? Pagan culture was already around us, before the change. The foundation of our language? Latin, the language of pagan Italians, our government, democracy, created by pagan Greeks, our fiction, like fairy tales and folklore, again, pagans. Humanity's not as cut and dry as you'd like to believe. This is still America...I think. We embrace the different. It's a gift, not a curse, and we'll only get stronger with more of it. Oh, and don't count my town's culture out, either. We can change the world, and be just as influential, too."

Fear was slightly taken aback by that missed issue. She did have a strong point, based on the original history of the world, and he wondered, in the midst of his long machinations, how he didn't see that little detail, earlier.

"Well, thanks for the history lesson," he said, graciously. "And may I, also, say that you and your friends were nothing short of unpredictable. I like that. You getting involved, to begin with, and then, all of your friends helping you stop Greenman's sacrifices, and stealing his fortune to donate to the other religions of the world to give them a leg up."

"They did that, back at his house?" a stunned Marcie asked, not realizing the depth of the damage they were willing to risk dispensing on Greenman, or the repair they were willing to give to the world, from where they were. "Whoa!"

"I know! Right?" Fear exclaimed, admiringly. "I didn't want you around messing things up, but boy, did you! That's why "we" had to keep warning Greenman about little ol' you! Oh, and here's the ironic bit, no matter how loudly you might deny it, because of what you've done to Greenman, those wussy neo-pagans, out there, will always see you as one of their own, more druid than our pawn ever was, and he was dangerously devout!"

Marcie didn't immediately know how to deal with that. The last thing she thought about, when facing Greenman, was becoming some legend for a religion she didn't even follow. "I'm flattered, but you painted yourself into a corner, Mr. Fear. Even with the world being what it is, it's pretty Kumbaya, right now. With Greenman gone, there shouldn't be any serious conflicts, which means, no future for you, or your benefactor."

"Hmm, you'd think that," he thoughtfully pointed out. "But, I like to plan for the long haul. See, Greenman was old school, and he liked things just as they were. When he recruited his followers, in the past, and they fell in line, they became traditionalists, too.

"But, when he left to come back to the present, he wasn't around to enforce that point of view. As a result, Druidry changed over time, becoming more liberal and less bloody, creating a whole new camp of followers who were ideologically opposed to the more...stringent parts of our faith, as it were, and now, all they do is debate the issue. Yawn!

"But, what if we gave another traditionalist a helping hand, like we did with Greenman, a real firebrand who could set off a great war, one that could last for decades, maybe even centuries, keeping my friend hale and hearty, from all of that unnecessary hardship and strife, for a very long time?"

The calmness Fear displayed in relating the dire scope of such an event made Marcie shudder. Wars were complicated affairs, right down to their reasons, and a world war would get far worse for the people she left behind, before it ever got better.

She wished that whoever this man was, he would just leave the world alone. "You'd do that? Pit people against one another, just to keep you and this friend of yours on top?"

Again, Fear shrugged. "Well, I did say I was evil, didn't I? Think of it as a life-support system, for him, if you will. Create a world full of followers, have said followers endlessly fight and die under a tragically mistaken belief, which, in turn, makes my friend strong."

"Why are you telling me all of this?" Marcie asked, suspiciously.

"Think of it as a reward for bringing down Greenman. Besides, it's not like you could do anything to stop it. The only cog in the machine that was missing, for a while, was the conflict, but I think I can get that started."

That threat, combined with simple outrage and concern, drew Marcie, indignantly, from her seat, to stare Fear down, not caring, at the moment, that she was nothing more than some neophyte phantom to him.

"Look, I'm not all that thrilled about this new world you created, but you're not hurting millions of people, in this scheme of yours," she heard herself challenge him. "If you try to pull this off, I'll find a way to stop you, even if I have to come back as the Dead Justice of my world, to do it!"

That display of bravado brought a bemused smile on Fear's face. "Well, I like your spunk, girl," he said, honestly, and then, whispered, "But, who said you were dead?"

"Huh?"

The illusory span of time was only in the space of minutes. The forest clearing, the chairs, and the mysterious man had vanished, the song of birds was replaced by the mutters of concerned people, the calm lapping of water, and a vaguely familiar voice faintly calling her name from the veil of numb perception.

A crushing force was pressing against her breasts, and a shadow had fallen over Marcie's fuzzy sight, but the oddest feeling she could begin to perceive was the firm pressure she felt on her lips.

She spasmed and coughed up a cupful of warm water from her stinging lungs, and then, gasped in the welcoming air, again. The clouds of confusion started to lift from her fluttering vision, and the shadow backed away, letting daylight fall upon...

"V?" Marcie identified, weakly.

Kneeling from performing hasty CPR, a wet, grateful, and tearful Velma looked over a ragged Marcie, outside the water slide's pool, while behind her, wrapped in EMT-given blankets, Winslow and The Owenses, helplessly, looked on.

"I had the gang bring me here, in case you needed help against Greenman," she explained, not caring if Marcie understood, or even approved the seemingly futile gesture, but only talking to her to help keep Marcie conscious.

"V..." If there were words Marcie wanted to say to her dearest friend, exhaustion and physical weakness had taken their heavy toll on her, and she could say nothing more, and do nothing more than sleep.

It didn't matter to Velma.

"I told you I'll protect you," she whispered. Then she moved plastered strands of long hair from Marcie's face, gently, sat her up, and held her, as she heard the EMTs' approach and take over the rescue.