Everwild (Skinjacker 2)

Johnnie-O stopped walking and instantly began to sink, but he didn't seem to care. "You're crazy! You're crazier than Mary and the McGill put together!" "You're probably right."

"If Zach the Ripper is here, then this is the one place in Everlost I don't want to be!"

"So go back," Nick told him simply, and kept moving forward. Johnnie-O pulled his feet out of the ground and followed, grumbling all the way.

Like any other Everlost legend, Nick knew there was no telling how much, if anything, about Zach the Ripper was true, but he knew that dealing with a ripper was dangerous business. Isaiah wasn't the first one to speak of Zach the Ripper's ability to inflict permanent damage on an Afterlight. If you were decapitated by Zach the Ripper, you stayed decapitated, and you'd be stuck having to carry your head around in a backpack, or under your arm, or dangling from the end of your hand by your hair. Whether or not you'd feel the pain of it was unknown--for although Afterlights weren't supposed to feel physical pain, all bets were off when it came to an ecto-ripper.

For this reason, Nick was terrified as he approached the great spacecraft, but he didn't show his fear to Johnnie-O. Johnnie-O was scared enough already. Somewhere in the distance, a stray dog in the living world began to bark, but they both ignored it.

"Look at that thing!" Johnnie-O said, staring at the massive craft. "It's just standing there in midair!"

The orbiter and its rocket assembly were indeed floating about a hundred and fifty feet in the air. Nick knew there had once been a launchpad beneath it, but the shuttle launchpad was on tractor treads, and had long since been rolled away. "It's resting on the memory of a launchpad," Nick told him.

"Wonder what Mary would have to say about that."

Nick put on his best Mary voice. "In all things postmortem, the stubbornness of memory outweighs the so-called laws of physics. Best to report any antigravitational sightings to an authority."

Johnnie-O stared at him. "You're scary."

A closer inspection of the suspended spacecraft revealed that there was a rickety scaffold right beside it, just a few feet wide, and randomly pieced together. It looked more like a vertical beaver dam, stretching up to the engines, and clinging to the craft itself, all the way up to the orbiter's hatch. There was also something else on the huge deadspot beneath the suspended craft. Something that shouldn't be there at all.

"That's ... a dog... ." said Nick.

"Well, I can see that."

But Johnnie-O didn't quite get it. The dog had been barking nonstop for the past few minutes. Nick was used to tuning out barking dogs, just like most other sounds of the living world. But this dog wasn't part of that world. It was here in Everlost. It was barking at them.

The dog was some kind of unholy mismatched genetic mutt. Something like Rottweiler, crossed with Pomeranian. It was both huge and annoying at the same time.

"Wait a second!" said Johnnie-O, one beat behind. "That dog's in Everlost!"

The Pomerrott mutt was chained to a spike in the middle of the deadspot. Which meant someone had to put it there. Johnnie-O still couldn't wrap his mind around it. "But ... but, there are no dogs here. You know what they say, 'All dogs go to heaven,' right? Right?"

"Not this one. Maybe dog heaven took one look at it and sent it back."

Just then another sound cut between the Pomerrott's barks. It sounded like a loud snapping twig. Nick realized it was a gunshot the same instant the bullet caught him in the eye. It spun him around and knocked him to the ground. Chocolate splattered the underbrush and the Pomerrott barked like there was no tomorrow.

Johnnie-O screamed and ducked for cover. So much for him being a bodyguard. Not that Nick needed protection from bullets. He pushed himself up on all fours, blinked a few times, and the painless "wound" healed itself closed. In a few moments, his eye returned to normal. He had been caught off guard, that's all--in Everlost, a sniper is little more than a nuisance. Still there's nothing fun about being shot in the eye. He looked at the chocolate splattered around him, and wondered whether it had just splattered off of his face or come from inside when the bullet hit him? Were his insides turning to chocolate as well? He tried not to think about it, because thinking about it too much would make it so.

Johnnie-O, quickly remembering his own relative invulnerability, stood up and looked toward the spacecraft looming before them. "Whoever it is, he's going down!"

Nick stood up, hearing the crack of a second shot. This one caught him square in the chest, but since he was ready, he didn't let it throw him off balance. This time he could hear where the shot had come from. Up high. There was a rifle barrel poking out of the ship's hatch, taking aim for a third shot. Nick waited until the fabric of his tie healed closed before he spoke.

"If you're going to shoot at me," Nick shouted, "at least have the guts to come out where I can see you!"

No response but the barking of the dog. Nick strode forward with Johnnie-O right behind, clenching his fists, ready to pound their assailant into pork and beans. A third shot rang out, but missed both of them. Clearly the shooter was losing focus--maybe getting worried that they might reach the scaffold and climb up--which is exactly what Nick planned to do.

Finally a voice called down to them--the voice of a kid--their age, maybe younger.

"Get outta here! Go on! Nobody wants you here!"

"Nobody?" said Nick. "You mean you're not alone?"

"They's a whole buncha us up here. Yeah! A dozen at least. So go on, get lost a'fore we come down and make ya sorry y'got yerselfs kilt in the first place!"

"Prove it," said Nick. "If it's more than just you, let's hear from one of the others."

The kid was quiet for a moment, then said, "I don't gotta prove nuthin'! I gots the gun and you don't!"