Giles stood at the edge of the stage once more. His head ached but he was there.

This was the last night of the festival. In another hour, everything would over for better or worse. Jerry introduced him to the thick crowd. Some of the people carried candles. All those gleaming little lights out there, and all for him. Some of the glowing candles were GIFs on smart phones.

Jerry smiled and patted Giles on the back as he walked onstage to applause. Giles could barely remember another phase of existence when he’d resented Jerry for the “audition” which had capriciously skipped him. All that grievance seemed so petty now.

When the applause died down, Giles said tiredly and simply, “Here’s the last part of the story you’ve been so graciously following. I hope you enjoy it.”

For a long moment he stood with his eyes closed. So much depended on the story finishing. What if the magic skittered away from him like a doe at a rifle shot?

He felt for the thread of the story. He had lived through so much but where had he left the story for this audience?

Doree had fallen through the opening, had seen stars beneath her feet instead of Chaos and had screamed when she realized what she was falling in to. Yes, that was where he had stopped and everything which had happened since … somehow he had to weave that into the story for these people.

But how to start? The audience would want to know what had happened to Doree and he had no idea, no idea world what she fell into and how she became Tiffany.

He felt around for her. Where was she? Where was this boastful, vulnerable child who would grow up to be a powerful demon who he would love?

He stood before a crowd breathing with expectation, hanging on his silence, and nothing came to him.

Sweat beaded his forehead. He lived an agonized eternity, knowing that in a few more seconds uneasy whispering would begin, he’d hear “doesn’t he know what comes next?”

He would buy time by giving them a “story so far.” They didn’t need it, they all were eager to hear what came next. But at least he wouldn’t stand here silent.

He opened his eyes, ready to say, “You all remember where we left the story,” and then go on to remind them as if they didn’t.

His mother stood in front of him.

He stood as still as a statue, terrified. She was a ghost and she looked uncertain and unhappy, as if she were a character in a story where something terrible had just happened.

It was dangerous to think about someone being a character in a story. It was all too likely that she would become one.

He opened his mouth and quickly told the crowd about waking up in the laboratory and the mad scientist with the reeking breath running in triumph from the room now that he knew the “gilt edge” was to be found in Sedona, AZ.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

♦

Giles was alone with the woman with the long black hair. She ignored him but the set of her back, the careful way she moved, told him she had absorbed every word.

He took a step toward her – and winced with the sharp pain in Ed’s bad back. A groan escaped.

She turned enough for Giles to see her face.

She was not Tiffany. Robby instantly recognized her. She was his ex-wife, the one who worked for the government and who had warned him of the strange goings on in the desert near Sedona.

Cautiously, he said, “Honey?”

She turned all the way, her face wrinkling like she smelled horse turds. “I’m not your honey, you…” She shook her head in disgust.

There was a rich roundness to her words that made Giles’s heart ache. Robby longed to hold her but Giles only longed to hear her speak again.

But she saw Ed – and Ed tried to hit on her every time he saw her. He didn’t look like Robby … and even if he did, she’d left Robby three years before. The relationship was over for her, though not for him.

Her hand stroked his face!

Giles felt his heart would burst, as did Robby. But her face was grim and determined.

“Ed. Sweetie,” she said with an effort, “I’m sorry I was that rude, after what you must have gone through.”

Robby took her hand, his heart jumping. Giles nearly wept. Carefully, he said, “Yeah, it was rough. That gilt edge…” After all, he was a journalist. She was a Source.

Her eyes darted left and right. She leaned in close. “Tell me about it. Tell me all about it. It gets me … all wriggly. You so brave and all.”

Ed would have grinned a trickly grin and put his arm around her. And told her everything. Robby was proud of his wife putting up with that to gain information but Giles… he was sick.

The big boss had just this moment figured out “Sedona, Arizona” and Robby’s ex hoped to learn the secret. And she would then go have lunch with her ex and tell him. That hadn’t happened yet.

Robby was telling her everything he remembered, longing to feel her body against his once more. He mentioned Doree and her blue-black hair. Robby’s wife’s eyes widened as if she saw a ghost. It was only for an instant, like an actor shocked out of a role by a noise in the auditorium, and Robby missed it.

Was she Tiffany after all? Why did Giles want to please her more than anything he could imagine?

When he said nothing about the gilt edge, she thought he was hiding it. She said, “Well, good job, Ed,” and steeled herself to put up with nauseating pawing.

Robby forced himself to simply say, “Well, been a long day. Better go get some rest. See ya.” And drop his arms to his side.

She nodded, relieved, though her green eyes stayed cautious.

Giles decided it was time to get out of the building before Robby threw himself at her feet. Robby’s wife had enough information that she could have that lunch with the Robby of a few days ago and pass the information along. If he got out before he was caught, he could … do something about the madman who had not yet ripped open the sky.

He turned sternly, pushed open the lab door and walked with aching feet down the aging yellow hallway. How he longed for a last look at the woman in the lab!

Leaving the building proved comically easy. He followed the green exit signs to the glass doors where a security guard reading a magazine said, “See y’t’morrow, Ed.” A simple yank on a pneumatic door and he was outside in the dry heat.

What a dreary town confronted him on the other side of a parking lot. A small roundabout held a flagpole with peeling white paint. Houses and businesses to the left and right were closed, boarded up, or dilapidated. Trees which had been planted in front yards were dead or dying. It looked like a town which had been struck by plague. But a busy main road went through the heart of it and lots of cars whooshed past without stopping – why should they stop? Except for a 7-Eleven there was nothing to stop for. Between buildings he could see dry grass plains stretching away.

He was outside. He could leave. But where should he go?

He didn’t even know where on Earth or in time he was.