The world is a strange place. Your world is a strange place, for sure. People fly through the sky in the bellies of massive metal birds, the only thing standing between them and a fiery engine explosion being a properly stowed away tray table. The laws of physics simply stop existing for things that are very large and things that are very small. A human brain can cause its body to raise its body temperature and eject tears just because another body wiggled its tongue and produced airwaves that sounded a particular way. Crazy, crazy world.

And that’s just your world. My world, this world -- well, I don’t want to make this a competition, but I think it’s pretty safe to say that this world is an even stranger place. It has all the weird history and physics and emotions of your world, but it also has bug human zombie monsters running around. To be totally frank, there’s a whole lot more going on than just that, but you’ll find out about it all soon enough. One of the weirder things, even for the scope of this world, though, is that there have been cases of people coming back from the dead. Not as bugs, not as zombies, but just, bam, pop, woah, Steve’s alive.

Philip H. Frohman was an American architect born in the late 1800s in California. He lived a good, productive life. His crowning achievement, probably what you know him for (if you know him at all, and it’s okay if you don’t), was helping to design the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. Something you might not know about him was that he was one of the chief architects responsible for constructing the chapel at the town we now know as Camp Trin. His dream for the building was for it to be a hub for community, faith, and tidings of peace, and for many years it was exactly that.

What most of you don’t know is that Mr. Philip H. Frohman was granted a miraculous second chance at life by powers unknown. Despite the fact that he passed away in the ‘70s, he is now alive and well in the present day. I don’t know what cosmic power revived him from his eternal slumber (just kidding, I do, but you don’t), but whoever it was, they not only filled his lungs with the breath of life. So too did they fill his brain with the burden of knowledge. For all at once, Mr. Philip H. Frohman became viscerally and immediately aware that a pizza boy, a roaming bandit, a mysterious vagabond, a mob boss, a frumpy warden, and a second roaming bandit are all in the process of turning his beautiful chapel into a bloodbath. He rolls around a few times in his coffin and screams -- both because of the trauma of knowing what is becoming of his life’s work, and also because of the trauma of violently coming back to life only to be trapped in a small wooden box six feet underground. Because of these traumata, and probably largely because of the latter one and its accompanying lack of oxygen, he dies shortly after coming back to life.

Back in Mr. Frohman’s chapel, the bloodbath is getting under way. All over the place, lacrosse balls are being thrown, cards are being whipped, flails are being flung, punches and kicks are being punched and kicked, and meteor hammers are being meteored. Very quickly the chaotic and haphazard three on three fight becomes three separate one on ones. Up at the atrium of the chapel, closest to the front doors, we have Tay and May. In the middle of the chapel, where rows of pews face each other across a central walkway, we have Cannon and Daisy. In the back of the chapel, where Lex lies tied up in a lectern near a large stone altar, we have Hoodie and Warden Morgan. All across the chapel, the fight is on.

In the atrium, May swings her meteor hammer wildly at Tay. She’s abandoned her defensive position of slinging the hammer in a psuedo force field around herself. Instead, she’s taking the fight to her sister. The hammer rains down like its namesake all around Tay, leaving craters in the stonework of the floor with every strike. Tay dodges, ducks, dips, dives, and dodges out of the way, knowing full well that a single hit from that meteor hammer would mean the end of her. On more than one occasion she’s seen her sister turn a living person into a pile of calcareous rubble, and she rather enjoys having 206 regular sized bones instead of having ten trillion sand sized ones.

The safe thing to do in a fight where a close-range opponent can turn you into granulated sugar would be to stay out of close range. For Tay, this would make a lot of sense. As long as the plot allows for it, she has an endless amount of cards in her satchels, which means she could stand back and pepper May for days without ever coming into lethal range, so long as she has the energy to keep five-Ds-of-dodgeballing around the chapel. However, that isn’t Tay’s game plan. Instead, she opts to keep her cards lodged between her fingers, swiping at May with her cat claws. There is a voice of reason in the back of her head insisting that she’s doing things the wrong and stupid way, but that voice is currently being drowned out by another voice.

That second, louder voice is screaming. Freud would call this the subconscious battle between the id and the superego, but for those less psychoanalytically inclined, you can call it the subconscious battle between the rational part of the brain and the part of the brain that remembers every insult, every injury, and every injustice that May ever caused Tay. Tay spent a lifetime harboring hatred for her sister without any outlet for it. Now, she finally has that chance, and she’s not gonna waste the potential for catharsis on wimpy little ranged attacks. She wants to have the hands-on, up close and personal satisfaction of gutting May like the pig she is. As nimble as Tay is, however, May is every bit as agile. She’s quick enough to slip away from every one of Tay’s attacks. They’re deadlocked in a seemingly endless dance of narrow misses and close calls.

“Must be getting tired swinging that thing around,” Tay says, slightly out of breath but also excited that she’s the one to initiate the taunting for once.

“Must be getting tired living in your baby sister’s shadow,” May responds, seemingly less out of breath than Tay. She slings a horizontal strike that Tay hops over like a double dutch rope before it cleaves through the pipes of the organ. Tay tries to think of a witty response, but charismatic banter is decidedly not her forte. Instead, she’s forced to roll under another swing of the meteor hammer. “You know, you really should have just left us alone. Tried to build a life here, surrounded by people just as soft and as weak as you are. Too late now, though. I already gave you the luxury of living once, I won’t be giving it to you again. Especially not if you’re going to continue to disgrace the family. I’m sure mother will be happy to know that your death was as slow and as painful as possible.”

“You’re a psychopath.”

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“And you’re a worm. Fitting that you’ll die here surrounded by your kin.”

“They’re my friends.”

“You’ve known them for, what, a day?”

“In one hour they were more of a family than you ever were.”

“Oh, Tayna. It hurts to hear you say that. When you’re gone, who else is going to make us pick up after their messes and fix all of their pathetic little fuck ups?”

“Shut up!” Tay swipes madly in front of her, but May dodges back. May feints left, then quickly yanks the meteor hammer to the right. Tay falls for the feint, she’s caught off balance just long enough for May to land a hit on Tay’s chest. It’s a glancing blow, but it’s enough for Tay to hear and feel her own ribs crack in her chest. She howls in pain. She spits up a wad of blood, her mouth starting to look like a Kool-Aid faucet. She falls to her knees and hangs her head, coughing and hacking.

May stands over her, her eyes wide and her smile even wider. “Mother will be so delighted when I bring back your head as a trophy.” She heaves her meteor hammer into the air, then tugs it down hard, sending the bowling ball hurtling down. Tay bites her lip and rolls out of the way just in time. Her chest spikes with pain. She picks herself up and spits out another swig of blood, clutching the part of her rib cage that feels like it’s been turned into a pile of Legos.

“Mother’s going to have to hold her breath.”

Back in the center of the chapel, there’s a much less nimble fight going on. Daisy is far too huge to be in the business of dodging attacks, and Cannon is far too narrow minded to really even know that such a business exists. They’re trading blows, punches, and kicks. Daisy hoists Cannon up and slams him into the row of pews behind him. He responds by climbing up on top of the pews like they were ropes on a wrestling ring, then diving down on Daisy with an overhead strike from his lacrosse stick.

Daisy wipes beads of blood and sweat from her forehead, lightly tugging on her eye patch as she does. “You’re gonna pay what you did to me, brat.” She socks him across the face.

“You’ah gonna pay for bein’ a giganto piece of shit, ya giganto piece of shit. This whole goddamn thing woulda been avoided if you woulda just paid me my goddamn money for the pizzas that I made for you. I’d be back home kickin’ back a cold one and you wouldn’t be droolin’ blood gettin’ the daylights kicked outta you.” He jabs the butt of his stick into her gut, then swings at her chest with the net.

“You think you’re kicking the daylights out of me? You can barely walk straight. One more good hit and you’ll be out like a light.”

“Dream on, kid. I don’t like people who don’t pay me, I don’t like people who get whatevah they want because they’ah from big crime families, and I definitely don’t fuckin’ like people from Seven Cities, so if you think I’m gonna let a person who’s a combination of literally all the worst fuckin’ things I could possibly imagine beat me in a fight, you got anothah thing comin’.”

He slings a lacrosse ball at her. She winces, then delivers a solid punch to his sternum. He’s wearing his lacrosse armor, but it still hurts like a bitch. Nobody can argue that he can’t take a punch, but he’s starting to slow down. He’d never admit it, but fighting guards in the prison, fighting bugs in the tower, and fighting Marauders in the chapel have done a number on him. He’s on his last legs, and Daisy knows it. She sees him teeter back and forth a bit more with every hit. His strikes have less oomph behind them than they did when their fight started. Although he’s clinically, psychologically incapable of acknowledging it, this doesn’t feel like a fight that he’s going to win.

Down in the back of the chapel by the altar, the fight between Hoodie and Warden Morgan is surprisingly one-sided. That’s not to say that it’s a mismatch in power level, but rather to say that only one side is actually sending out attacks. Warden Morgan swings his keyring lanyard flail around to and fro, but Hoodie only plays defense. She blocks, parries, and dodges his attacks without retaliating with a single one of her own. No matter how many times Morgan swings at Hoodie, she doesn’t fight back.

“What’s the matter with you?” he bellows. “Hit me!”

“I’m not attacking a law enforcement official. Besides, we’re on the same side.”

“Didn’t you hear Daisy? Like it or not, I’m on her side, and she’s against the pizza boy, so I’m against you. Whoever you are.”

“But why?” comes a voice from off to the side. Morgan and Hoodie take a break from their fight to acknowledge Lex. He’s still tie up, but he’s managed to worm his way out of the lectern and towards the fight by the altar. “Just earlier this evening you actually were on our side.”

“Yeah, well, things changed when the Marauders showed up. After tonight, I’m gonna need Montego money more than ever. Hell, I’ll be lucky if I even have a town before the night’s over.”

“Listen, I’m not gonna pretend like I know all the ins and outs of the agreements you have with the Montego family. But, well, I said it before, but I happen to be a very good judge of character, and I can tell you don’t want to be doing this.”

“Of course I don’t want to be doing this. But I need Camp Trin to be safe. It’s my job. And I can’t do that without the Montego family. Even if I somehow didn’t need their money, ending our agreement would land me and all of Camp Trin on the wrong side of a very dangerous grudge. Believe me, there are a million things I’d rather be doing than fighting you all here in the chapel. Rebuilding our defenses against the bugs, putting out the fire, helping Rach deal with the Marauders.” He stops, then says almost to himself, “Gods I hope she’s okay.” He sighs and shakes his head. “But I have to think long term. If I don’t do what Daisy says, then there’s no way I can keep this place safe in the future.”

“You want to keep Camp Trin safe.”

“More than anything. And to do that, I need the Montego’s money and I need their good graces. Without that, I can’t uphold the law.”

“Morgan, I don’t mean to be harsh, but what part of this looks like law to you? You’re fighting someone who cares so much about what you do that she refuses to even attack you. That’s doing the right thing. That’s law.”

“What am I supposed to do, huh? Help you all to fight Daisy and the Marauders? When news gets back to Seven Cities, that’ll be the end of Camp Trin. The Montegos will come here and personally finish the job that the Marauders have started. If I let that happen, what kind of person am I?”

“I won’t let that happen.”

“Excuse me?”

“I need you to trust me, Morgan. You and I are on the same side. The whole reason I’m here is so I can go south to Atlantis and recruit allies who can help us end the war between New England and Seven Cities once and for all. I want to do what’s best for my people, and believe it or not, you are my people. Help me tonight, let me help you tomorrow. Please. All you want is for Camp Trin to be safe, and all I want is for Camp Trin to be free. We’re on the same page.”

Morgan scowls and clenches his jaw so tight that Lex things he might accidentally bite all the way up into his own brain. His nose twitches up and down a bit. Then, to Lex’s surprise, though, the stress in the warden’s face seems to fall away. For a second, Lex sees a frown. Genuine despair on Morgan’s face. As soon as it’s there, though, it disappears. “I don’t know if you really are the prince of New England, some kind of con man, or just a plain lunatic. But either way, I’m sold. Let’s go get my town back.”