"Tubs?" Elliot asked.
"Pretty mist," Tubs mumbled, reaching out his hand.
Elliot squinted. The kitchen was dark enough that he hadn't noticed it, but in a beam of moonlight through the window, he did see what appeared to be a silver mist. His first thought was of the Shadow Men, but theirs was a dense, black smoke. This was lighter, and it was pretty in a spooky sort of way.
But what was it?
Elliot flipped on the kitchen light, and the mist sparkled to life, as though it were made of thousands of mirrors. Its shape folded and curved like a fast-moving cloud.
Elliot ran his hand through the mist, then pulled it away when it stung him. "Okay, sorry," he muttered. The mist clearly had touch issues.
It moved toward the back door with Tubs following obediently behind. Elliot grabbed his arm, but he might as well have tried to slow down an elephant for all the good it did him. Tubs put a hand on Elliot's face and shoved him to the ground without breaking his stride.
"Tubs!" Elliot called. "What are you doing?"
"Pretty mist," Tubs said again.
Elliot thought Tubs was sleepwalking, but he couldn't be sure. Tubs said a lot of strange things while he was fully awake too.
Elliot leapt to his feet and tried to block Tubs from opening the door, but Tubs pushed past Elliot as if he were made of feathers. The mist expanded once it reached open air and continued to lure Tubs away.
"Wake up, Tubs!" Elliot cried. He considered running upstairs to get his dad's help, but Tubs would be gone before Elliot could get back. He grabbed a rock and threw it at Tubs's back. It hit with a klunk but bounced off without Tubs reacting.
Elliot was a little relieved about that. If Tubs had reacted, Elliot would have a bloody nose already.
He ran up to Tubs and began punching his arm, yelling at him to stop, and kicking at his legs. In any other situation, Elliot might have considered this a golden opportunity. But the mist was beginning to worry him. It was clearly something magical, but why did it want Tubs?
Elliot decided to appeal directly to the mist. "Hey!" he yelled. He swatted his hand through the mist, even though it felt like he was being bitten each time. "Where are you taking him?"
The mist didn't answer, which wasn't surprising considering that it had no mouth. It led Tubs across Elliot's backyard grass, all the while folding and dancing in the air. It was taking him into the woods behind Elliot's house. Elliot barely liked going there during the day. And as dark as it was out here in Elliot's yard, it was even darker in the woods.
"Wake up, Tubs!" Elliot called again. "Come back to my house. We have candy in there! Remember, you like candy!"
Tubs hesitated, just for a moment, and then continued to follow the mist.
Elliot ran back to his house and grabbed the hose that had been Kyle and Cole's favorite toy for the last several months. He turned it on full blast and shot a stream of water at Tubs, who kept walking as if unaware. So Elliot shot the water toward the mist. It created some sort of barrier that turned the water back on Elliot and soaked him with what felt like an entire lake of water splashing down on his head.
Elliot turned the hose off and sloshed back to Tubs, now at the edge of the woods. Obviously there was nothing he could do to wake Tubs up, but he could speak again to the mist.
"Whatever you are, you don't want him," Elliot yelled. "Trust me, you really don't! Just take me instead. I'll go with you, but leave him out of this!"
"Like, you're totally in the way, human," a girl's voice said.
It didn't come from the mist. Elliot swung around and saw a bright light a little deeper into the woods, like a small star had landed there.
"Who are you?" Elliot walked toward the light. Whoever had spoken was hidden behind a row of fallen trees. He climbed over the trees, now with Tubs only a few steps behind him. In front of him was a...a...a--he didn't know exactly what.
She was a foot high and didn't look any older than he was, but she sounded like one of those teenagers who thought she was cooler than everyone else. She had round wings; long, thin ears; and a bunch of curly, yellow hair. Her dress was bright red, purple, and yellow, and looked like something a little girl would dance around in, just to watch the skirt twirl. Around her neck were several loops of the grass chain that Cami had woven in his backyard earlier that day.
"Are you a Fairy?" he asked.
The girl shot a furious look at him and aimed her wand in his direction. Instantly a tree grabbed Elliot's right leg and yanked him upside down high into the air.
"I so totally don't need to be insulted right now," she said. "If I didn't have more important things to do, I'd just hurl you into space or something."
Okay, she wasn't a Fairy. But how was he supposed to know?
Elliot watched the mist approach her. It swirled in a wide circle and then settled at her feet. Slowly the particles of mist revealed themselves to be other similar creatures, each one bowing to her first. They all wore brightly colored dresses too, like a rainbow had exploded all over them.