“Yeah,” Half said, “I'd like to see you try that one.”

  “I'd like to see you move a thousand stone blocks with your mind and some frozen water.”

  “You guys, please!” said Miyoko. “Grow up.”

  Half hit me on the shoulder. “I'm just playing with you, my man. I'm here to help you.”

  “You must be on my side, or the Shield wouldn't let you do that.” I rubbed my shoulder. “So, what in the world does that mean—you can be in two places at once?”

  He shrugged his shoulders. “It's hard to explain. My body can be in two different locations at the same time, each half functioning independently of the other yet aware of what the other is doing at all times. Kind of like magical cloning with a centralized brain. It's probably too much for a boy of your lesser intellect.” His smile lessened the insult.

  “Wait a minute,” I said, baffled. “If you can do that, really be in two places at the same time, then shouldn't you be called Twice instead of Half?”

  A look of puzzlement crossed his face, but then his smile returned.

  “Oh. Yeah. Okay, so I'm not that good with nicknames. Cut me some slack, man. I was thinking along the lines of splitting myself into two, and one half of me being in each place.”

  “Whatever,” I said. “This could possibly be the weirdest conversation I've had in a long time. So let me see you do it.”

  “I already am.”

  “You are? Where's your other … half?”

  “Watching over your family. See? Maybe you should be nicer to me.”

  The proverbial light bulb went off in my head.

  “What? You mean … it was you? Were you peeking in our room a couple of nights ago?”

  “Yeah, I noticed you'd been up real late, and I saw your brother get up and act all scared, so I climbed up to see if you were okay.”

  I couldn't believe my ears. This was so bizarre, I thought.

  “So … how long have you been doing this?”

  “From the beginning, little man.” He hit me on the shoulder again. “Where do you think I got that Braves hat?”

  “What? You've gotta be kidding me.”

  “Rayna sent me after you—well, one of me—and the other me stayed behind to let her know what was going on. I was just about to interfere with Dontae the hairy gorilla when your dad showed up to save you. I went and got your hat just for the heck of it.”

  This was just way too weird. “How do you send … the other you places? Do you have something like the Bender Ring?”

  “No. I just go. I can't explain it, but I do it. And I can actually be in more than two places if I need to be. The most I've ever been able to replicate of myself is seven.”

  My head was getting dizzy trying to comprehend his ability. “So where have you been since then? Why haven't we met before?”

  For the first time, his eyes dropped and the smile vanished. “I was trying to gather the rest of the Alliance.”

  I looked over at Rayna, and saw the same expression on her face as the Half's. From what I heard back in the cavern, I knew something terrible had happened, and I was scared to ask. But I did.

  “Rayna? Miyoko? What happened?”

  “They're all dead, Jimmy,” Miyoko answered. “All of them, even the one you call Geezer. They're all …” She broke down and sobbed into her dad's shoulder. Tanaka was unusually silent, not having said much since I first helped them all down from the tree.

  “Tanaka,” I said, “what's wrong with you? I mean, besides the obvious crud that's going on.”

  “I just worry, Jimmy-san. I just worry. Still no sign of okisaru since they chase away Shadow Ka. My daughter's heart broken. Many friends dead. Don't really feel like talking.”

  Things had to be bad for him to be so sullen, I thought.

  “Last question, I promise. Rayna, how did you guys end up in the tree?”

  “Ask the Half.” She pointed at her badly nicknamed friend.

  He threw his arms up in the air. “It's not my fault. I didn't know I had Shadow Ka trailing me.”

  “After the okisaru chased away the Ka from the caves, Half showed up out of the blue. Before we knew it, several Ka jumped us, morphed into humans, tied us up with rope and hoisted us into the tree. They said something about it being a sign for you, to tell you that they'd gone back to join their brothers. Then they turned back into Ka, took flight, and disappeared.”

  “Why didn't they kill you?” I asked. It was a terrible question.

  “Sorry to disappoint you,” said Rayna. “I guess the message was more powerful that way. What did they mean, anyway?”

  I told them about the Ka that had supposedly abandoned their wicked ways and come back to being real humans. It hadn't lasted very long by the looks of it. I could only hope that at least one of them stayed true, and would go back to help their families like they had promised.

  “Something about that makes me very sick inside,” said Miyoko.

  “At least we know it's possible,” I said. “That gives us some hope. My dad did it, those people did it for a while. Maybe some of them did stay clean.” I breathed out a huge sigh. “You know, enough with the depressing talk. We've gotta find some food, and I need to sleep for about three days.”

  The others nodded in agreement, although we had no idea where we would go. We were just beginning to head for the road when a blur of movement behind some trees caught our attention. It was the Bender Ring appearing out of nowhere and falling to the ground, leaving Hood in its wake. He was back.

  “Hood,” I said, “why are you always running off when it gets dangerous?” I forced out a laugh to show I was joking, but no one else joined in. Miyoko even groaned.

  Hood grabbed his ring and ran over to me. There was an obvious sense of urgency in the way he was moving.

  “What's wrong, Hooded One?” asked Tanaka.

  Hood was looking around frantically for a place to paint some words. He saw a big rock and ran over to it, robe flopping back and forth with every step.

  “JIMMY, TIME IS UP. WE MUST GO NOW!”

  “Go now? What are you …” But I knew exactly what he was talking about, and it hit me way before he finished writing his next words.

  “THE LADY FROM YOUR DREAMS. WE HAVE TO GO RIGHT NOW.”

  What an idiot you are, Jimmy, I thought. How could that have slipped my mind so easily, when she'd made it clear how important it was that I be there? My spirits wilted knowing I couldn't rest for even an hour or two.

  But there was no choice. I just hoped she had some food.

  “Okay,” I said, thinking. The leather case with the Disk still hung by my side, and that was all I needed. “Look, Hood will take me there, and then come back and take all of you to my family in South Carolina. Man, I hope they're still okay.”

  “Don't worry,” said Half. “Right now they're sitting on the porch wondering about you. I'm looking at them with my other half.”

  I stared at him. Could this guy possibly be for real?

  “Are you serious?” I asked.

  “Yes, Jimmy, trust me. I think it's time I introduced myself to them. See ya.”

  He disappeared. No smoke, no noise, nothing. Just like that, he was gone. I looked at Rayna, the shock evident on my face.

  “Give me a break,” she said. “You've seen a lot weirder stuff than that. Now, I don't know what you're talking about or where you're going, but it looks like you better get on with it. Hood can fill us in when he gets back.”

  She was right. I walked over and gave her a hug and then did the same with Miyoko and Tanaka.

  “Don't worry, old boy,” I said to him. “They'll be back. Those okisaru are tough little cookies.”

  “I hope you're right, Jimmy-san. You'll need my army soon, neh?”

  I nodded and then patted him on the back. Hood grabbed me by the arm and dragged me over to an open spot, sick of my lollygagging. Without hesitating, he raised the Bender Ring over our heads and let it drop.

  Soon I was in New York City.

  Hood took us to the exact place he'd seen in a photograph: on the very top of the Empire State Building, on the west side, right next to the viewing window. The glass went up in a flat plane and then curved toward the center of the building, several feet over our heads. I guess the makers of the building frowned upon people jumping off of their investment.

  As Hood bent over to pick up the Bender Ring, I took in the remarkable surroundings. It was impossible to tell what time it was, although I thought it was early morning. But the sky was dark with the taint of the Shadow Ka—worse than I'd ever seen it. Never in my life had I even seen a storm that looked so black, and I had been through some doozies living in the tornado-plagued South my whole life.

  A mile or two from where we stood, the sky grew even blacker in a big swath across the sky. Where the taint above us looked like a dark, dark gray, the long rent in the sky was the complete absence of light—perfect blackness. A shudder of horror went through my skin, because I knew what it was. And something about it felt very permanent.

  It was a Ripping of the Black Curtain. We stared for several minutes, expecting, or at least hoping, that it would seal itself. But it stayed, floating over the earth like a mother spaceship.

  And things were coming out of it. Wispy, shapeless things, like ghosts.

  “Holy crud, Hood,” I said. “Things are worse than we thought.”

  He nodded his head, looking out into the distance with hooded eyes.

  “What is that?” I asked. “Are those things the Stompers?”

  Hood knelt down to write on the concrete roof of the building. The clouded darkness made it hard to see, but I could read his words just fine. And they gave me the heebie-jeebies.

  “YES, I THINK SO. THE CURTAIN IS BREACHED ONCE AND FOR ALL. TIME IS OUT.”

  “So those ghost-looking things just fly down and enter our brains? That's how it works?”

  “SOMETHING LIKE THAT. I WILL GO NOW.”

  So much for a long conversation.

  “Okay,” I said. “Come back for me in a couple of hours. If I'm not here, then come back every two hours after that. Does that work?”

  Hood nodded. “I WILL GO AND GATHER EVERYONE ELSE TO YOUR UNCLE'S HOME.”

  “Sounds good. I just hope that Floating Lady shows up. Is it time yet?”

  Hood nodded again and then readied himself to go. A few seconds later he dropped the Ring and was gone.

  I was alone, standing on the most famous skyscraper in the world, watching our mortal enemy enter my world just a couple of miles away.

  Man, my life was weird.

  I sat and stared for quite a while at the surreal scene of the Rip in the Black Curtain, almost hypnotized by it. It was so hard to imagine what the Stompers actually were, to visualize and conceptualize what we were dealing with.

  What could be more vague than describing them as nightmares?

  A tap on my shoulder interrupted my thoughts. Finally, I thought as I turned to face the newcomer.

  But it wasn't the Floating Lady.

  It was The Half standing there.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked.

  “Everyone's safe and happy back at the farm, so I thought I'd come and say howdy. In fact, I'm talking to you and to your mom at the same time. She says hi.”

  “Ya know, Half, you're really strange.”

  “Thank you.” He turned and jaunted over to the wall by the elevator and plopped down into a sitting position, with his elbows on his knees. “So, where's that lady chick you were supposed to meet?”

  “I don't know. She probably wouldn't like you calling her a ‘lady chick,’ though.”

  “No, I don't mind.”

  The woman's voice came from my right, and a quick look revealed the lady from my dream. She wore different clothes, but they were still nondescript and boring. Her hair was frumpy, and her face was lined with worry. Baffled at how she'd managed to sneak up on us, I couldn't think of anything to say.

  “But,” she continued, “I am sorry, He Who Is Known as The Half. But you must leave, and you must leave now.”

  “I was just starting to have fun,” he countered, but his face revealed that he knew he wouldn't win this argument.

  “Go, now,” the lady said. “The fate of this world is hanging in the balance. Don't mess it up.”

  “Man, that's some fancy talk. Fine, see ya.” He vanished without another word of complaint.

  I turned to the Floating Lady. “I still don't get how he does that.”

  “Don't worry, much will become clear before you leave me today. Did you bring the Red Disk?”

  I patted the leather pack hanging from my neck and shoulder in acknowledgement. “Why did we have to meet here?” I asked.

  “Something special waits inside. Also, I wanted you to see the main breach of the Black Curtain. I wanted you to realize that everything must end, for good or for bad, very soon.”

  “Those things flying out of the Blackness—are those the Stompers?”

  “Barely. But yes, that is what they look like before they gain their full power inside the minds of your people. They are worthless and weak until then, until you are prepared and ready in the Coma. That is why they need the Shadow Ka.”

  “It's all so hard to believe.”

  “Believe it, Jimmy. Within hours, you will be the last one awake.” She said it the same way I'd expect someone to tell me the time.

  “Come,” she said, motioning to a door. “We have much to discuss.”

  We walked down a few sets of stairs and through a long, dark hallway. We went through another nondescript door and entered a sparsely furnished apartment. It smelled of scented candles and recently burnt food. The walls were white, and only a picture or two adorned them. There was one lamp in sight, letting out a dull glow at the moment. She had me sit on a brown couch, and then disappeared for a minute. When she came back, she was holding two glasses of water.

  I took mine and drank the whole thing in one long gulp.

  “Do you have any food?” I felt stupid, but I was starving.

  “Yes.” She left again and returned with several sandwiches. “Can we finally begin?”

  I nodded as I wolfed down one of the PB and Js. It was the best thing I'd ever tasted.

  “We have you, we have me, and we have the Red Disk,” she said. “Let's begin.”

  She started talking, and in the next minutes and hours, my world was changed forever all over again.

  “Jimmy,” she said, “You have been through three of the Doors. Each time, you were sent to exotic locations, given great riddles to solve, dangerous tasks to achieve. Everything you have done to this day has been a test, everything. My dear boy, I'm proud to say that you have passed those tests, exceeding even the loftiest of our expectations.”

  “Our?” I asked. “You still haven't told me who you are. I don't even know your name for crying out loud.”

  “I told you, I am a messenger. That's all you need to know.”

  “Well, I'm sick of calling you the Floating Lady.”

  She smiled. “My name is Inori. Now let's move on.”

  “Okay, Inori.”

  “There is much to accomplish in a short period of time. First, we must get you through the Fourth Door, and to do that, we must have you solve the Riddle of the Red Disk. Once solved, you'll be able to find the Dream Warden, and get the Fourth Gift. It's all quite simple.”

  “Yeah, I wish it was more complicated, just for fun. Where is the Door anyway?”

  “It's right there, silly.” She pointed to the front door of her apartment.

  “Very funny.”

  “I'm not joking.”

  I rolled my eyes. “We just walked through that door. You're telling me the Fourth Gift is out in the hallway?”

  “Haven't you learned how this place works? Don't you remember the Door in the Tower of Air? They are not ordinary doors. My, my, my, we have so much to do. Now be quiet and listen to me, okay?”

  I nodded, already confused even though she hadn't told me anything yet.

  “Now,” she continued, clapping her hands together. “Take out the Red Disk.”

  I pulled the leather carrying case into my lap, unzipped it, and pulled out the disk. Its blood red color and heavy feel reminded me of the Storm World lady that had given it to me. Of all the places I'd been, that had probably been the strangest.

  I turned the disk over and over in my hands. It was the size of a normal dinner plate but two or three inches thick. And it was heavier than it looked, five or six pounds. The surface was smooth and shiny, like the hood of a brand new sports car.

  “Here it is,” I said. “Are you sure your name's not Erifani Tup?”

  “There you go again, thinking that's a person. No one ever said that.”

  “I was told that Erifani Tup would help me figure out how to use the Red Disk. Sure sounds like a person to me—especially considering all the weird names being thrown around since all of this started.”

  “Well, it is not a person. All you were told is that you needed Erifani Tup to reveal the Red Disk, and you needed the Red Disk to reveal Erifani Tup. That's why it's a riddle.”

  I threw the disk up in the air and then caught it. Inori gasped.

  “Be careful,” she said.

  “It all sounds like a vicious cycle to me,” I said. “I need one for the other, but I need the other for the one.”

  “Exactly!” she said, more excited than I'd ever seen her. “Now figure it out.”

  “But …”

  “No, Jimmy. You've come too far to play the denial game. Suck it up and do it. By the way, I can't help you. You have to do this, one last time.”

  She was right. I needed to quit dinking around and get to work. I leaned back on the couch and looked at the disk. I turned it over and over and over, trying to think about the riddle. Nothing was popping up in the old noggin.

  I closed my eyes, took a deep breath. I felt pretty good now that I'd eaten and had a chance to sit down. I pushed all other thoughts and worries as far away as possible, and turned every ounce of the Jimmy brain onto the problem at hand.