Evan can't help but wonder if vomiting is just a side effect of time travel, because the very minute he realizes he's back in the present day, he finds himself spewing green chunks on the lawn. He shudders. This too reminds him of Monster Blood. He hasn't puked this hard since Andy and Conan had him try his first beer. Just the memory of the drink's awful taste makes him feel like vomiting all over again.
"Jesus, dude!" a familiar voice cries out, "You feeling alright?"
Evan looks up from his temporary nausea and realizes he's looking at Ricky Beamer. The boy wears the same leather jacket as when Even had first met him that fateful day at Dark Falls High, sporting a Misfits t-shirt beneath. His fingernails are sharp and painted a striking purple hue. Evan feels the urge to kiss him. If he's dressed in the same attire, then it must not be too late, he thinks. Dark Falls can still be saved.
"Huh?" Evan asks.
"You just puked all over the lawn, ginger. You know, I was kind of expecting a hello. Hey, that reminds me. I just got done reading a book. It's about this guy who's hopelessly in love with his best friend. Surely you can relate?"
Evan glares at Ricky, feeling a brief but noticeable sting of pain pierce his heart like a wooden stake going through a vampire.
"What are you talking about, Ricky?" Evan asks, though he already knows where this is going.
Ricky scoffs. "Come on, ginger. I'm talking about you and Andy. Ever since she arrived in Dark Falls, you've all but forgotten about your little fling with Lucy Dark. This whole time it's been Andy this, Andy that. You guys are practically inseparable. If you ask me, you guys are practically symbiotic."
"Symbiotic?" Evan raises an eyebrow.
"You can't live without each other," Ricky replies. "I'd say you share one brain cell, but really, Andy has the one, and you just borrow it."
"Hey!" Evan protests "I think you're forgetting you made me leader."
I know," Ricky replies with a smirk, placing a hand on Evan's broad shoulder. "But sometimes it takes an idiot to save the world."
Evan is about to argue further, before he starts to think about Andy again. Maybe Ricky has a point. He wants to tell her everything. How he traveled back to their very first meeting, how he made a deal with a plant monster for his freedom, and especially, how, according to the Reality Police, he had witches' blood running through his veins. Evan still can't wrap his head around that. He wants to believe it's all one big lie, but something within him fears it's all too true. It would make sense, Evan thinks, given his Aunt Kathryn's background in magic. Still, he isn't sure what this means for him in particular. Can he control the Monster Blood, just as Sarabeth did before him? Evan shuts his eyes and imagines using the green slime as his own weapon for a change, using it to crush Mr. Dark and his cronies for good. But how in the hell was he supposed to do that? How could Evan control a substance that terrified him? No good can come of Monster Blood, Evan reminds himself. It was something he'd told Andy multiple times.
"Ricky, why are you here? I mean, like, why are you here at my house this very second?" Evan asks. He has to make sure he really has successfully made it back to the present, and hasn't, god forbid, broken the timeline somehow.
Now it's Ricky's turn to glare at Evan. The look is a mixture of confusion and frustration. "Um.. Earth to Evan Ross? We're about to go kick Mr. Dark's ass, remember?"
"Oh, thank God," Evan cries, though he doesn't mean to shout it aloud. This must be how Ebeneezer Scrooge felt, being given a second chance. "Then there's still time!"
By now, Evan has realized how nuts he sounds, and grabs Ricky by the collar, dragging him into the house. "Look, I'll explain everything, okay?"
Inside, Evan finds the same people he'd broken into Dead House with before everything went to shit. His band of survivors. Andy. Carly Beth. Jerry. Amy. Conan. Evan grimaces at the last one. Conan's inclusion in the group is still something he isn't exactly thrilled about. Counting himself and Ricky, that brought the total up to a small army of nine teens, not exactly the best odds against an army of monsters, but it was better than going at it alone. Wait. Evan pauses. Nine? Something about that number doesn't sound right. He counts again, making sure he remembers to count himself.
Evan. Andy. Conan. Carly Beth. Ricky. Jerry. Amy.
Evan stops as his finger lands on two teens he hasn't seen before, a boy and a girl. It isn't hard to see that they must be siblings, the way they have the same shade of long, curly brown hair and dark eyes. Their faces are nearly identical too, both solemn and grim, though the girl appears slightly older. Evan can tell they've been through a lot. He can't imagine what. Their clothing is unassuming, especially compared to Andy's dayglo top and Ricky's black leather. The girl sports a striped shirt and jeans, while the boy is wearing a faded red hoodie and black shorts. Evan looks around the room and then back at the siblings. Nobody else seems to think strangely of their presence but Evan.
"Um,not to sound rude or anything, but uh, who the hell are you two?" Evan asks.
The brother sister pair shoot him a look not unlike Ricky's confused glare.
"Evan, I know there's a lot of us here, but you really should try to remember people's names," Andy taunts.
"No, I'm serious," Evan replies. "You two weren't here before- before I-"
Evan stutters. Oh god, he really has broken the timeline. Now the Reality Police really had an excuse to execute him, if they weren't all dead themselves now, Evan shudders. He can still hear the screams of the agents in his head as they were torn apart by Dr. Brewer's monstrous plants.
"Before you what?" the girl asks.
"Before I went back in time," Evan answers. It comes out mumbled, but everyone can hear it. Now all of them are staring at him.
"Okay, that's a good one, man. Time travel. Haha." Jerry chuckles, "Don't think I would have thought have that one myself. But come on, we need to get serious. We are going to the Dead House, aren't we?"
Evan shakes his head. "No. Not anymore. There's been a change of plans. It's too risky."
At this, an audible discourse erupts in the room. Evan can't decipher most of it, but he can tell they aren't saying nice things about him.
"Too risky? Mr. Dark doesn't stand a chance against all of us. Besides, I'm not scared." Carly Beth says, "I'm done being scared."
"Yeah! I'm with CB!" Andy shouts. "You better start explaining or I think we'll have to unanimously demote you as our oh so esteemed leader. I'm sure Carly Beth is up to the task if you can't."
Evan sighs, "I know. I'm not doubting any of your bravery. In fact, I've seen it first hand. I know how crazy this might sound, but all of us, all seven, I mean, nine, of us, have already been to Dead House before. We thought we could steal back the Monster Blood from Mr. Dark but he was already there waiting for us. He wanted us to face our fears, all that trauma from our past."
At last, the room has quieted down, all of them staring intensely at Evan. He thinks back to how he had tried to convince his parents he wasn't in fact twelve years old, but a teenager who had already experienced four separate horrific experiences with Monster Blood. They hadn't believed him. How could they? Evan just hopes his friends won't be as skeptical.
Evan looks at Jerry, "Jerry, Mr. Dark forced you to play that haunted piano from your old house. The one Dr. Shreek taught you to play."
Jerry's eyes widen. "But wait, I haven't even told you guys my story yet. How could you possibly know that, Evan? About that stuff with Shreek?"
"I told you already," Evan replies, "I've lived through already. I know all of your stories. Carly Beth, how you were possessed by the haunted mask. Mr. Dark had that in his possession too. He made you put it on. And Amy, I know how Slappy turned your own family against you. He was there too."
Carly Beth glances at Amy. Both of them are visibly pale.
"All of this was part of Mr. Dark's revenge against us. He blames us, other kids, like us, for forcing monsters back in the shadows. He invited us all to this sick dinner party with his family."
"What did he serve?" Conan asks. "Hopefully cherry pie. Or at least some drinks. Fuck, I'm thirsty right now. Is it normal to be this thirsty all the time?"
"It doesn't matter what he served, Conan." Evan growls. "The point is we lost. We faced our fears, but that wasn't enough. Mr. Dark was three steps ahead the whole time. You want to know the truth? The Monster Blood isn't at Dead House. No, not like we're expecting it to be. But there is something else. It's this big.. blob thing, I don't know what it is exactly, but Mr. Dark told me it was called King Jellyjam, or used to be, at least. That's what he used to hypnotize our parents to come here to Dark Falls. He must have slipped samples of Jellyjam into their invitations."
"You're saying we lost," Amy says, "How?"
"By the time we got there, Mr. Dark was already ready to release the Monster Blood all over Dark Falls."
"So then how are we still alive, or at least not monsters?" Jerry asks.
"Some of us ARE monsters," Ricky reminds him.
Evan exhales. "During the dinner party, I snuck off to Mr. Dark's private collection, where he keeps all his artifacts. In there, there's a cuckoo clock. Dark told me it had the power to control all of time. So when the bird popped out, I twisted its head backwards and.. I actually went back in time. Back to when I first encountered Monster Blood. When I first met.. you, Andy."
Evan glances at her. On Andy's face is disbelief. It's a look Evan isn't used to seeing on her. The same expression is plastered onto all the others in the room. He can't blame them. He opens his mouth to explain the rest, how he was captured by the Reality Police, how he narrowly got away with his life.
"So basically, I broke reality, we only have one chance to beat Mr. Dark, and now somehow there's two people who weren't here before."
The room is silent before it explodes with questions.
"You went back in time with a cuckoo clock?" Ricky asks.
"There's a Reality Police? Is that, like, more or less awful than the normal police?" Andy asks
"You got sentenced to death by a toddler?" Jerry asks
Evan answers them in rapid fire, yes to all three.
"I guess some introductions are in order, or maybe I should say re-introductions," the unknown girl says. "I'm Amanda Benson. This is my brother, Josh. I can't say we've ever been aberrations to reality before. Kinda cool."
Evan stops to think. Amanda and Josh. Why do their names sound so familiar? Then he remembers why. It's that book Andy told him about, the same one Mrs. Maaargh had assigned them to read in her class, Welcome to Dead House.
"You mean you guys are-"
"Let's just say this isn't our first rendezvous in Dark Falls," Amanda says, and Evan realizes now she has a lip piercing. "Frankly, we hoped we'd never have to come back. But once we heard what Dark was up to, we realized we didn't have a choice, did we, Josh?"
Josh nods. "Yep. Believe it or not, we're here of our own free volition. Well, Amanda is. She kinda just dragged me along."
"When we met for the first time, we all shared our stories with each other. Before I had to reset everything. Maybe you can share yours with us?"
Amanda glances at Josh, exchanging some kind of mental conversation before they come to an agreement.
"First things first, if you're expecting our life to be like the book, then you can forget it. Life is rarely like fiction says it. In fact, it's a lot scarier," Amanda says. "Okay, I guess some things are true. My dad "inherited" Dead House for an uncle who didn't really exist. If you read his novel, you'd see him claim that from the beginning, he was suspicious, but that wasn't the case. Our parents didn't find out the truth until it was too late. But I knew from the moment I saw that shadow watching me that something was wrong. My family was lured to Dark Falls to die. They wanted our blood, our flesh.. to consume us. All of us. Just so those creatures could keep themselves alive. They would have succeeded too, had I not found their weakness to sunlight. God, I can still remember their screams. I've spent years trying to forget, but I don't think I ever can. How their faces melted off their skulls. Do you know what that's like? To be 12 years old and watch that? I was just a kid and I had to learn the hard way that death isn't the end for all of us. It should be reassuring, shouldn't it? But I'm terrified. I'm afraid that when I die.. I might become just like them. Just like Mr. Dawes."
Amanda shakes her head, and Josh comforts his sister as she tells her harrowing story. Evan's never heard anything quite so horrifying. Everyone else in the room seems just as disturbed as he is.
"We thought we killed them, but they can't be killed," Amanda says. "They'll just keep coming back. It's an endless cycle of bloodshed. And now Mr. Dark is starting it up all over again. You want to know how to end all of this, Evan? Dark Falls needs to be burned to the ground. That's the only way."
Evan feels a chill run down his back as Amanda speaks, her eyes so full of anger it's almost overwhelming. Evan can't help but recognize that fury from his own experiences. It's guilt, Evan realizes. Guilt for what he isn't sure.
"Since then, the two of us have been all over the country trying to kill any more undead sons of bitches," Josh says. "We had a particularly nasty encounter involving ghouls in Highgrave, but nothing like what happened to us in Dark Falls."
"You'll have to forgive us if we don't trust you guys completely," Amanda says. "I know you must have been through a lot, each of you, but well, our past has left us with some trust issues. If there's one thing we learned from our time in Dark Falls, it's that when it comes to making new friends, it helps to know who's dead and who's alive."
"Well, all of us are very much alive, Amanda. I hope." Evan tells her. " If I might ask, why did you decide to come back? If this place brings back so many bad memories?"
"I told you, we don't have a choice," Amanda replies. "This town destroyed our family. Those creatures killed our dog. Josh and I were never the same after what we went through. We tried making friends, tried socializing… but we just couldn't. I don't know if we were afraid or what. My dad thought he could tell the world what happened to us in that book it is, but all it earned him was ridicule. The whole world thought he was nuts, that our whole family were liars and grifters trying to make a quick buck out of a ridiculous story. It drove my dad to drink. He never sold another book again. Do you know what that's like, having the whole world call you a liar?"
Evan doesn't stop to think. "Yes, I do."
"All of us here understand, Amanda." Amy says. "You're not alone."
"Maybe not. But are you willing to do what must be done? And by you, I mean, you, Evan." Amanda asks.
Evan blinks. He isn't really sure what "must" be done. Kill Mr. Dark? Burn Dark Falls?
"Yes. I think so," Evan replies.
"You think so? You need to be absolutely certain, Evan."
"This is getting way too intense for me," Jerry says. "You're talking like the guy needs to sacrifice himself or something."
"That's exactly what I'm saying." Amanda replies.
