Part 6: Tidying the Ends
April 19th
Eddie arrives. Dr. Schreber starts to explain, in reverse. There was
this plane crash, see but Tommy doesn't get *into* plane crashes,
Eddie protests. The party, in bits and pieces, tells Eddie the whole
story. There's a lot of worrying that Peter's house isn't far enough
away from the Apcott house. Peter finds this somewhat disconcerting.
Eddie thinks they should get Alison and the priest for an exorcism.
Except that they don't actually have Alison, and Ezekial is kinda
scary to tangle with. Gerti is pretty sure she'll have to land, and
that she'll be noticed when she does.
Eddie consults his books on Satanists to try and figure out what to do
about them - in general, "kill them" appears to be the answer. They
aren't particularly vulnerable to silver bullets or stakes or holy
water (well, yes, they are vulnerable to silver bullets and stakes,
just not excessively so). Roderick thinks that the two plans in the
running are "go back to Boston" or "Stay here." Of course, Tommy is
still in the hospital, and leaving him behind in Greenfield would be
no good.
Dr. Schreber votes for Boston. "Being comfortable while waiting for
the demonic entity to destroy us is slightly preferable" but isn't
sure that the 30th is relevant any longer. Gerti thinks it depends on
whether Ezekial has any more stuff to do - if he does, then the 30th
is still relevant. Dr. Schreber thinks getting a body may have been
all he wanted for the moment.
More argument over where to stash the Apcotts. Esme finds a place in
Greenfield that she can rent and pretend that she's borrowing it from
a friend, since they can't really afford hotels in Greenfield until
the 30th. The place doesn't actually get used, though. Peter
searches the Apcott house once more, and gets Alison's bank passbook
(and finds some silver shavings on the bureau, though it's unclear
what they mean). He develops more pictures, including one of the
entire Apcott family. He also takes some picture of Esme and Mattie
playing together. Roderick finishes his book.
The police come by, asking about the plane. They get told it was
lightning. They aren't really convinced by this, having not noticed
any storms, but since they appear to have not found any Scotch in the
plane, and nobody was hurt, they go away again semi-satisfied (as
crashing your plane isn't really very criminal). Amelia files a
missing persons report on Alison.
The night passes - Peter spends it at the Apcott house, but nothing
happens there either. Mattie is beginning to get particularly upset.
April 20th.
Tommy wakes up in the hospital, and wants to see a mirror. He's not
as mummified as he used to be. The police report to Amelia that the
night before, Alison appears to have hitched a ride to Springfield,
claiming to be fleeing from her husband. The driver suffered a "heart
attack" at Springfield, and woke up without his wallet and a lot of
his clothes. Charlie, Peter, and Gerti head to Springfield to talk to
him.
The rest of the party comes to visit Tommy in the hospital - Mattie
has sent a get-well card with a picture of a crashing airplane on it.
Holy water does not appear to cure mummification. The Springfield
party continues on to Boston, after Charlie finds a guy at the train
station who thinks that Alison's brother was on the train to Boston,
but they lose the trail there.
On the way back from Boston, Dr. Schreber has a dream:
You watch through a pane of dark glass, with Ezekial. On the other
side of the glass, Mattie plays. Ezekial watches her hungrily,
pounding on the glass, but not breaking it. In the room with Mattie,
Alison begins to act more and more wild, stamping around and flinging
her arms about. She crashes into the glass, and breaks it, cutting
her arm and bleeding down the broken glass. Ezekial plucks her
through the broken glass, and she is gone. Then, the rest of the
scene fades and you see Ezekial walking away jauntily, Alison flung
over his shoulder like a coat. You follow. He keeps walking, and
time is flying by on either side, months and then years Alison is
discarded long ago by the wayside. Finally, Ezekial turns, with a
mocking grin...
April 21st
Mattie is getting pretty traumatized. Did Tommy hit her mother with
the plane? She goes back to the Apcott house to be in the closet,
causing a lot of consternation for Peter when she's discovered
missing. She talks to the Closet Guy about being a closet person
too, for her mother.
Peter writes a story for the Globe about a brave fighter ace crashing
after being struck by lightning. A valiant effort, walking away from
the crash unscathed, all that.
The 30th comes and goes with no extra supernatural events.
Roderick: "The only thing left is to bill Amelia."
Part 5
Index