Leave the Last Page

by Stephen Barnard

  ‘Fair enough,’ said Tom. ‘Dad’s going to blame you anyway.’ They both laughed.

  Ben pointed up ahead. ‘Well isn’t that a strange sight in this bizarre world?’

  A couple of hundred yards ahead was a building. It was strange because it brought back the familiar in this most unfamiliar of settings. It was a square brick building with a flat roof. It had a large front window that would allow them to see right in once they got a little closer. There were posters and stencilled writing on parts of the glass also. There was also a large banner heading above the window and the metallic door. This was a commercial property, and the name of the business was Greensphere Finances.

  As they got closer they saw the newly laid paving stone leading to the door and the decorative gravel that surrounded the building. They could also read a name painted on the window: Eric Kildare. Ben reached into his pocket. He had the business card that the man had given him earlier; sure enough, Greensphere Finances had premises on No Through Road. ‘He’s playing a game,’ said Ben.

  ‘Well then let’s go inside and play the game with him,’ said Patty. ‘Are we all ready?’ With a squeeze of a hand or a pat on the back they knew that they were.

  They pushed open the premises door. A little bell tinkled as they entered.

  *

  Alex and Charlotte Holliday pulled up in the primary school car park. As they stepped out they could hear a noise coming from within; a shout. Alex pointed to an open fire escape door and they both ran across the tarmac to get there.

  Inside they saw a scene of some devastation. There was smashed glass from a broken window, a melting and stinking projector on a wonky trolley and a huge crack running through the polished wood floor. And there was the head teacher tied to a chair with skipping ropes.

  ‘Get me out of here!’ she squealed.

  Alex quickly began to untie her as Charlotte tried to soothe her. ‘It’s okay, Mrs Aziram, you’re safe now.’

  ‘I can’t believe they left me tied to this chair! I told them I was sorry!’

  ‘Sorry for what?’ asked Charlotte.

  ‘Hitting your son across the face with a fire extinguisher.’

  Alex paused what he was doing. Then he pulled the ropes tighter. He ignored her yelp. ‘What did you say?’ he asked, stepping back to look at her.

  ‘Ah…that makes it sound bad. I don’t actually recall that happening, but they told me that’s what I did.’ She relayed to them everything she knew about what had happened, either from her memory, or from the explanation of her behaviour she had been given by Ben and Patty. ‘So it wasn’t me, you see? It was like I was hypnotised or something.’

  ‘Or something is right,’ said Alex. He nodded and went back to untying the ropes.

  Charlotte looked around her at the mess. ‘Was Tom okay? Other than you braining him, was he hurt?’

  Mrs Aziram smiled for the first time that day. ‘Your boy was very brave, and very sensible. I saw how warm and caring he is, and what an intelligent young man too. I’m just sorry, Mrs Holliday, that I never saw it sooner, when he was in my charge.’

  ‘That’s because you only saw his chair,’ Charlotte replied bitterly. ‘It took that to be missing for you to actually see a person and not just a quota for your school.’

  Mrs Aziram hung her head a little.

  Alex, having finished with the ropes, surveyed the ground for story pages. ‘Do you know if he left his book here, or parts of his story?’

  ‘I just know that they left, and left me tied to a chair – until September said the older woman. Your mother, Mr Holliday? I can see the resemblance.’ The head teacher stood and stretched her limbs.

  Charlotte took up the conversation. ‘We’ve had that part of the story, Alex, remember? He read it to us over the phone. That was about beating this old witch at a show – no offence.’

  ‘Some taken.’

  ‘And then when they left…’ Charlotte looked around. ‘Through back stage doors, the road to that man’s lair was just behind.’

  ‘Behind the school, you think?’ asked Alex. ‘It’s all houses and terraced streets isn’t it? No wait, there is something else, not quite barren and dusty, but open.’

  ‘What?’ asked Charlotte.

  ‘Come on!’ said Alex. He took off towards the fire door and Charlotte followed.

  Mrs Aziram, shaking her head, took hold of the wonky projector trolley and wheeled it towards the cleaners’ cupboard where it belonged.

  *

  Eric Kildare was sat at large pine desk. There was a telephone, a laptop, a coffee cup that said The Boss on it, and an ornate silver box on four taloned feet. ‘Good afternoon, folks. How can I help you?’

  ‘You could disappear,’ said Ben.

  Kildare frowned. ‘But I’ve only just opened for business. Do you like where my premises is situated? If you look outside you’ll see my little empire is growing.’

  ‘It stinks,’ said Tom, matter-of-factly.

  ‘How rude, but I guess that’s what you have to expect from little boys. What about you, Grandma? Have you got more sense about you?’

  Patty stood with her arms out in front of her, hands crossed on the top of her walking stick, like it was a cane and she was dancer about to give it a little kick and start a routine. She looked poised. ‘We’ve come for my mammy’s necklace. You took it by foul means. Now we want it back. If you just hand it over we can forget everything else.’

  Kildare rested his long fingers on the silver box. ‘Ah, well, you see, I’ve grown quite fond of the pretty trinket, and I’d be loathe to give it back unless I got something in return. I’m a business man after all – I can’t be out of pocket.’

  ‘What do you want?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s quite simple: the boy’s story. This thing is almost done, so it will soon be of little value. I would just like it as a souvenir of our adventure together.’

  ‘That’s not good business, if that’s really what concerns you,’ said Patty. ‘The necklace is valuable.’

  ‘Oh, I know it is. I wonder if Tom knows it though. You see, Tom, the necklace is very valuable, and when your great-grandmother died, it was passed on, but not to the stick-wielding maniac here-’

  ‘Oy!’

  ‘-Your great-grandmother left a will, and in it, it says that the necklace belongs to you once she dies. It is a very, very valuable necklace, that will take care of all your father’s financial worries and leave plenty left over for your promising future, Tom. So if I’m doing a deal, I’m doing it with you.’ He grinned toothily. ‘I want your story.’

  ‘I don’t have it any more,’ said Tom. ‘I’ve spent the last couple of days ripping pages out of it and leaving them for my dad. They’ll be all over the place.’

  ‘But you do have the cover, eh, Tom? And one last page in there. You always leave the last page blank when you write a good tale, don’t you? Just in case.’

  Tom gave an involuntary shiver and put his hand to his jacket, across his heart. ‘Just in case.’

  Ben noticed. ‘Just in case what, Tom?’

  Kildare stood up and they all took a step back. ‘Just in case he wants to write a different ending. Little boys like good twists and turns in stories, and they don’t like it when people who read them second guess what’s going to happen in the end. Tom here leaves the last page in his notebooks, because sometimes he crosses out the last scene in his stories if people work them out, and then he writes another, more grisly, ending.’

  Patty turned to her grandson. ‘Tom? Is he right? You said the story ended well for everybody.’

  Tom shrugged. ‘It does. They always do. Always. So then people start getting bored of reading my stories. Dad got bored. So when I could see that someone was going to guess what came next, I would sometimes change it.’ His shoulders slumped slightly as he tucked his hands in his pockets. ‘I changed a lot of my other stories, just in case dad went back to read them like he promised, only this time he’d be shocked and excited
by the endings. More like the books and films that he likes.’

  Ben put a hand on Tom’s shoulder. ‘Tom, what books and films does your dad like?’

  Tom’s voice was raspy when he spoke. ‘Horror.’

  Kildare extended his extremely long arms and his hands grew wider. He shot them out, piston-like, so that they rammed against the walls of the square office. With a huge crash the walls blew outwards and the ceiling flew off into the bruised sky.

  The three of them fell backwards, straight through the space where a wall used to be and onto the gravel. The grass nearby twisted and coiled and grew, reaching out to try and grab them. Ben yanked them both up before the sickly blades could take hold.

  The man in black stood before them, limbs elongated, face stretched out into an oval, his protruding jaw revealing oversized, sharp teeth. His blood-red eyes narrowed. This was Kildark.

  ‘Tom!’ Grandma Patty shouted. ‘Did you cross out the last bit of this story? Did you? What ending have we got coming to us, boy?!’

  *

  Alex knew where he wanted to get to but couldn’t seem to find the right entrance. He knew of the place but had never actually been there. ‘It has to be around here somewhere,’ he mumbled.

  ‘There!’ said Charlotte. Alex slammed on the brakes.

  They had stopped at the entrance to a narrow side street. A sign read: No Through Road. ‘This won’t be it,’ complained Alex.

  ‘I know, but look,’ said Charlotte. ‘Isn’t that Ben Fields’ car?’

  Parked half on the pavement was the dented Ford that belonged to the detective. ‘Has it been painted?’ enquired Alex.

  They got out to take a closer look. There were flames along each flank and a spear head painted on the bonnet; things that hadn’t been there when it had been parked outside of the Holliday’s home earlier. Only, as they looked, they could see the paint beginning to fade, the more sedate blue coming back to the fore. ‘It means it’s not part of the story anymore,’ said Charlotte. ‘Does that mean the story’s over?’

  ‘Or does it mean they’re just not coming back?’ Alex looked down the narrow road of Mort Lane. ‘What is that? There, at the end?’

  The couple could see two lines of terraced cottages, but at the end of the lane there was a wide open space where the sky was darker, turning purple. It looked like a festering wound. ‘I think we’ve found the way in,’ said Alex.

  They walked down the road to the very end where they found a gate that looked like it previously opened up to someone’s house, but now was the entrance to a dank and desolate landscape. There was the smell of rot in the air.

  It was Charlotte who saw the rock first. Her hand to her nose, she had just happened to look down. ‘Good boy, Tom!’ She knelt and picked up the story pages.

  Alex took a deep breath as he leaned over her shoulder. ‘Let’s see what comes next.’

  GREENSPHERE QUEST by TOM HOLLIDAY

  PART SEVEN

  Kildark smiled as he stepped back into his glass dome lair. The moment he had been waiting for was here. Standing before him, all armed but about to lose to the greatest powers he had harnessed in years, were the pathetic trio. He jumped up and floated two feet off the ground, the power poised at his fingertips.

  “Wow, how does he do that?” George asked.

  Helena gasped and said, “The Snuggerthang tooth!”

  George remembered. He saw it in the centre of Kildark’s lair, half planted into the poisoned ground. Black streaks of dark power were spreading from it across the floor. “Oh yeeeaaaahhh, that old thing.”

  Helena threw a caging potion at the hovering villain and Kildark was instantly encased in a gold cage. He started struggling like crazy.

  “Wow wow! WOW! That was almost too easy!” George yelled.

  “Mmm,” Helena murmured and looked up at the cage. “Huh?” Kildark wasn’t in the golden prison but instead was hurling a sandstorm from across the other side of the dome.

  “Yipe!!” George squeaked and dodged to the side. Helena pulled out an aqua potion and the sand reduced to mush, the sharp grains falling to the ground in big clumps.

  “Argghh!” Kildark yelled. “You and your potions! Try this for size!” He waved his arms at the tooth in the ground and it vibrated. From the black lines on the floor, a huge assault of zombies grew. They had grey, hanging skin and dead eyes. Their fingernails were long and dangerous-looking. Despite being clumsy they were quick, and soon they were closing in on them.

  Somehow, with the power of his blue boxing gloves, Meddo was killing them off with single punches. “They’re not too strong or resistant!” he explained, but then another wave came in. “Ahh! There’s too many!” They smothered him and started to attack him with their claw-like nails.

  Helena thought for a second, then her face lit up. “You mean we need extra men!” she said, and lobbed an ‘x3’ potion at the struggling Meddo. The thin tube hit him on the head and shattered, splashing liquid in his hair. Suddenly, Meddo split into three identical versions of himself. All of them said in unison: “Nicely done!” and they continued fighting. The zombies were pushed back.

  Kildark was soooooo mad at that point. He started to throw his full range of attacks like rocket punches, tornado kicks, and a fire slide, which were all likely to be impossible to dodge at once (unless you’d been studying dodging for six months, or could dodge at the speed of light…which they hadn’t…and they couldn’t.)

  “We are not gonna make it!” Meddo said with his two clones. “Hang on!” they added. George used his metal staff to deflect many of the attacks but he was knocked back with a ——-

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  ALEX DROPPED THE REMAINING PAGES AT THE SCREECH OF A HORN.

  Both he and Charlotte dived sideways for cover, fearing a collision with whatever was quickly approaching behind them. They heard the squeal of brakes, and the sense of something very large, very close.

  A second or so later, it was clear that any threat of impact had passed.

  Slightly winded, Alex got to his knees and shuffled over to Charlotte. ‘Are you okay? Are you hurt?’

  She sat up, breathing quite rapidly, brushing dust and small stones from her palms. ‘No, I’m fine. Just shock I think. What’s going on?’

  A solid, squat man stood over them. ‘Really sorry about that. Only just saw you in time. Count yourselves very lucky. It’s just that there’s something really important I’ve got to do, and I’m in a bit of a hurry.’

  Alex looked up into the older man’s face. ‘Us too,’ he said.

  *

  Tom didn’t have time to give his grandmother an answer. The wind started to howl around them and grit and dust bombarded their faces. They stumbled around as they tried to find cover, only to then be confronted with grass that tried to grip at their ankles. Arms protecting their eyes, they pulled and yanked their feet up high, pulling up stubborn clumps of turf with each step, resembling an ungainly jig.

  It was then that Tom realised that they had nothing. All along this adventure they had been able to utilise the things around them, the things that belonged to the real world, in order to keep the perils of the story at bay. But now they were well and truly in it, they had nothing with which to defend themselves. No electric cables, no fire extinguishers, no skipping ropes.

  They’d walked right in to Kildark’s world and left themselves exposed.

  Ben grabbed the collars of both the Hollidays and dragged them away. There was a dip in the earth that he’d seen earlier, a hollow that would offer them some sort of shelter from the dust storm. They dropped down into the dip. Thankfully the terrain was more sandy here and the creeping grass had less opportunity to take hold.

  ‘What do we do?’ shouted Tom. ‘What have we got?’

  Through squinting eyes they looked from one to the other, searching for inspiration. There was only one object that had made its mark so far that had travelled into Greensphere with them. Grandma Patty held up her walking stick with an
air of triumph. ‘I think this means it’s my time.’ She pointed to one of her stickers.

  ‘Hawkwind?’ asked Tom.

  ‘Nothing wrong with a bit of space rock! Give us a leg-up, Ben!’ With a bit of a heave, Ben pushed Patty out of the hollow. She stood on the lip, and with a lunge forward, thrust her stick up into the sky.

  It was unmistakeable, although something that Ben could safely say was a sensation he had never felt before. Even so, unmistakeable.

  It was the beating of wings.

  Like a blast from giant bellows, clean and crisp air rushed past them and took the storm with it. Somehow Patty remained on her feet as the pulse from invisible giant wings buffeted her with wave after wave. Ben and Tom looked up over the edge of the dip, their faces level with her Converse boots, and saw that the storm was all but gone.

  And saw the Kildark creature howl in frustration ahead of them.

  Ben laughed. ‘She’s something else, your grandma!’

  ‘Yeah, she is,’ replied Tom, as he clambered up to join her. ‘That was pretty cool, Grandma.’

  ‘Nah. It was a breeze!’

  Their eyes turned to Kildark. His makeshift office had completely disappeared, save for the desk that had somehow managed to stay in place, with all the adornments still on it. He stood in front of it, guarding it.

  Patty reached into the top of her tie-dyed shirt. ‘The other thing we’ve got from our adventure is this.’ She pulled out a cord that had the key on it that they’d found in the cracked rock of the fountain. ‘I’ll wager that opens that little silver box.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Tom. ‘But it already opened the box that had the ivory dagger in it.’

  ‘So you’re still assuming this is a normal key?’ She shoved it back into her clothes. ‘Come on!’ They marched off in Kildark’s direction.

  By unhappy coincidence, the thing that had once been a man had in its oversized hand the very dagger that was normally sheathed in an ivory tusk, and that had once been buried in Ben Field’s stomach. At the sight of it, Ben could feel a twinge in his gut, but didn’t know whether or not that was just because of the association or whether it meant something terrible was about to happen.