I crossed the sea alone in Little Boat. The garden on the roof was gone, burned, destroyed. I was adorned with bandages but I could do this. It had to be done, and done now. You know, before things got crazy or something.

"The First Human's defenses were ten seconds away," the Radio said from my necklace. "They were set to maximum capacity, to full strength."

"Thank you, Radio. You…I'm glad we met. I'm better for knowing you."

"Owen was melodramatic himself, after all. Three seconds." But there was a hint of fondness in the voice of the Announcer.

The Little Boat chugged forward. Nothing happened. Nothing at all.

I waded ashore, dragging the Boat, beaching it. I stood on the same spot I'd fished with Cassie, Sean and Armand. It was a lovely morning. There, to the right, was the clump of bushes that had held the raft with my initials.

I waited. Soon enough, running down the trail from the main camp, a welcoming party. Five burly, cold-eyed muscle boys, led by a sixth.

It was Sean, the old meat version. Not the melancholy Ghost I'd gotten to know; this was puffed-up, threatened and posturing muscular Sean, crewcut newly installed, chin and eyebrow ridges menacingly bony. He was even more ridiculous than I'd remembered.

And more pitiable. Poor Sean. He didn't deserve what had been done to him. Any of it.

He said stuff. I didn't pay attention. "Get your dad, or I'll have to get him myself," I said.

Sean's gaze slid rapidly left and right to his associates. Oh, of course. It was supposed to be a secret.

I turned, reached into the Little Boat. Pulled out a bent, half-melted scrap of white hull. Aircraft hull, with a distorted logo: Lockheed Martin, and a blue stylized star. "This is what's left of your drones," I said wearily.

Sean and the muscleboys stared in horror at the wreckage. They recognized it, that was clear. It seemed like a surprise to them; that was good. I'd been worried they were the ones piloting the drones, but later learned it was all AI.

I waved to get their attention again. "And Sean's his son, if you didn't know." I turned and faced the sea. "Let's get rolling, Fools."

I hadn't been speaking to the welcoming party.

A rising whistle rattled everyone's bones. Like the payload from a World War 2 bomber, specifically the Bolo, I suppose. It went up, up, louder, closer–

Something hit the island. It knocked everyone down; not me, because I'd been ready, and didn't want to get my bandages dirty. The welcoming party was on its back, goggle-eyed at the island's new addition:

It was an iron spike, perhaps a mile in length, stretching up into the sky. Each of its three sides were carved with blazing runes that flickered with Magic, with power, with tiny sparks of lightning. The spike was at a slight angle but still pointed pretty much upward. A cloud had been skewered by it.

The trees rocked back, a delayed reaction to the impact. Wind and stones, sand, water, all roaring back, away from the spike, like a bomb with no explosive had hit. I brushed debris away from my bandages. Should have worn more than just my board shorts for this, but a brand has to be maintained. Surfin' Shrek.

Three of the welcoming party fled. They didn't yell, or panic or anything similarly theatrical. They just vanished into the trees. Good for them.

I helped Sean up. He was staring at the spike in horror, amazement, what-have-you. "It's gonna be a busy day, Sean."

A hideous meaty impact, THUNK. Like a colossal watermelon striking from orbit. Sean actually yelped, but to his credit he stood his ground. Again, the swaying trees, the wind, the dust and sand. Screaming birds. The remaining young men ran like deer.

Because now the iron spike, the one stretching into the sky, was adorned with a head. It was huge, iron-gray, decorated with batches of white pearl eyes, a long, long pugnacious gash of mouth filled with row after row of glassy teeth. Horrific, deep-sea fishy ugliness, vast, the size of a department store. It had been neatly shish-kabobbed onto the spike.

The head had been severed…torn loose from an unimaginable body, and now its circulatory fluids were dripping in nasty red-and-blue threads, down, down the spike onto the sand, into the water.

The eyes moved, twitched. The jaw slowly fanned open, closed. It was still alive. Not enthusiastic about it.

"That's the Grand Episiarch of the Leviathan Armada," I told Sean. "Your dad will understand." I put my hand on his shoulder. "You'll be all right, Sean. Go get him, okay?"

A wait of maybe ten minutes. Then, down the path, Harrigan, his tablet, his white lab coat, his gray smile. His stupid eyebrows. I'd forgotten how he actually looked. He looked … well, frightened. But he stepped up, I'll give him that.

Behind him, like a sad parade, were his trembling campers. Why bring them? Oh, of course: they were hostages, in the end. Young men, young women, all in the worn cargo shorts, shoes and white t-shirts. They were very, very nervous, and to my critical eye, unhealthy, malnourished. Why weren't they bolting?

The paralysis pulse, of course. I'd forgotten that. They didn't want to get hit with it, and who could blame them? Harrigan had a pretty good evil bastard cult setup going here.

I brought out the EMP bomb from my pockets. It blazed invisibly with runes, potency and contagion.

"Come to ask about that job?" Harrigan said.

I smiled. The man had a spine. "What job? Oh, the…no, thank you. I'm otherwise engaged. I'm here to annex this place. It's now part of the Feast of Fools."

He laughed theatrically: ahhh ha ha haa. But he gulped afterwards. Nobody was convinced.

The crowd began whispering. Pointing. They pointed at the iron spike with the monster head on it, the spike a mile high. That one.

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

Because the base of it, embedded on the beach, was now covered with vines, flowers that bloomed in waves of color, patterns. The circle of the Radio's speaker tore its way from the spike, huge, and the tuning window and that silver knob the size of a Volkwagen bug. The monster blood and viscera dripped down, speckling the vines and flowers.

"THE ISLAND OF THE FIRST HUMAN HAS JOINED THE FEAST OF FOOLS," the Radio shouted. "WELCOME TO ALL!"

The trees vibrated again. It was loud, good, terrifying.

Harrigan drew himself up. He said: "I never agreed to–"

"LUNCH IS ARRIVING SHORTLY, FOOLS! AND NOW, TAKE THE A-TRAIN BY DUKE ELLINGTON AND HIS ORCHESTRA!"

The song bloomed, blasted out over the island. It was a really, really good song. My mom had played it for me when I was a kid.

Harrigan was twitchy. He looked at the Radio, the spike, the head of the Episiarch as it glared and grumbled up there. He reached for his tablet under his arm, popped the stylus loose.

The more observant Campers saw it. Then, one of the sadder things I'd seen: a lot of them just lay down, right there in the sand, before Harrigan could paralyze them. No concussions that way, I assumed. Behavior learned from experience.

Tap. Tap. Harrigan scowled, snarled. Tap tap tap, went the stylus on that broken screen. He spun in place. Nobody was falling. The Campers on the ground looked confused. Hadn't this been the point where they'd all gone floppy? Powerless? Helpless.

Harrigan looked at the EMP in my hand. "Oh, of course. I never actually saw what your bomb looked like. Explains it." Because the tablet screen had been frozen, locked on whatever interface he used for his zap. Now it blinked out. Dead.

"I can still do it. I will, Owen. All of them, and it'll be on you." He was cornered, but still trying to be commanding for his people.

"You want to ignite them." When I said it, the crowd of campers froze. Eyes wide. They knew what I meant.

"I'll do it. I can do it still." His eyes, desperate but still determined, still in the game. "You're going to help me get my funding–"

"Everyone's been infected," I said. "Too late. Go ahead. Look with your Mandivision."

"My what?" But he looked. He saw, and he didn't like it.

Because the virus had already struck, and had been here since before I'd arrived.

"We made a plague, Doctor Harrigan," I said. "It's one you would have wanted yourself. Everyone has it here, all the Humans."

Because all of them, all the campers, were now flickering, blazing with individual souls of their own. Frightened souls, angry souls, heroic souls. All sorts. All sorts.

"You can't," I said. "Igniting your green fire won't work on any of your campers. Everyone has a soul here."

Sean stepped from the crowd and gently took hold of that tablet computer. Harrigan didn't resist; his mouth hung open, eyes wide, desperate, searching. Those eyebrows were trying to escape to his hairline. His last trick had been played.

Sean paused. He seemed to think about it.

Then he approached me, handed me the tablet. "The password is–" He grimaced. "PASSWORD123."

"Thanks, Sean. I have someone who'd like to meet you."

He looked confused. Then:

"Good morning," boomed the voice of the Ghost. Sean the Ghost, who'd lived in my Observatory but was out running around today. His voice was from the sand, the air. Almost louder than Take the A-Train. "Sean, we need to talk."

The Campers didn't look as frightened as you'd expect. I mean, there was already a monster head, still living, on a mile-high spike at their front door. Their overlord, the fearsome Jeffrey Harrigan, had no more power over them. Over anyone. A lot to take in.

I figured it would be a matter of seconds before they realized they could simply tear him to shreds. Humans, after all. Just make him into a bloody smear on the sand.

"Doctor," I said. "Let's get into the boat."

He met my eyes. Looked left and right without moving his head, like his son had when I'd arrived. Trying to stay cool. Nodded rapidly. Took a step.

A sphere of flesh, shell, meat and fury popped into being, expanded. It was from the empty air. The crowd reacted, shouting in horror as the thing developed multijointed bug limbs, numerous eyes, devouring maws filled with teeth of all kinds…

A fluting, cold voice, sounding like it was made with a musical instrument.

"He's not for you, Owen," said Cassie. "You go too far sometimes."

The sphere, with its legs, claws, limbs, tentacles and whip feeler antennae, dropped to the sand. Its spidery legs picked delicately, gracefully, as if driven by a poised young lady. A yoga instructor, perhaps.

Cassie's voice rang. "Just a body."

It was too much for the campers. They scattered, screaming, into the forest, into the shallow sea, away from her.

So fast, Cassie was so fast…she had my EMP bomb before I realized it. An organ popped into being on her armored body, black, shelled, cylindrical, one that buzzed, whirred.

Sparked. Delicate blue lightning.

"A little current," Cassie muttered. She formed a new limb, a horrific clawed hook…

And struck. Harrigan screamed. The EMP was in his chest, he grabbed, tore at it, but there was something wrong something wrong–

Because he was all gray tar. It was leaking from the hole she'd made, spreading, and there was another loud pop, lightning–

And Harrigan, with no blood, no flesh, only the gray tar in a dirty lab coat, with Cassie, spiderlike, vengeful, perched on his chest, his face–

–shot into the sky.

The EMP, with its upsi-daisium casing, full of electricity, held him up there by his gray tar guts. We couldn't see what was happening. He was in the central tangle of Cassie's fury, her new versatile monstrosity.

"THE FEAST OF FOOLS HAS BEEN JOINED BY THE NEW STEWARD OF THE CARNICANTEUM: CASSIEDOR!" The Radio boomed jovially.

And from over the horizon, lunch arrived.

The Observatory and the Aegis had been shattered and destroyed. But then, with the blinding speed the Makers preferred, repaired. Combined.

It was a flying landmass, an island, but its central dome, shattered and rebuilt, was an amalgam of the black stone and silver flying metal. The trees that had festooned both the Aegis and the Observatory laced the entire structure, giving it a grace both had lacked. Flowers, all colors. Leaves from hundreds of different plants, crops. Waterfalls. Lovely, colorful birds that Gary would end up killing.

And the entire thing, this new salvaged, improved wonder, was surrounded by Gardeners and their propeller boxes, roaring along with it over the shallow sea. A terrifying cloud blocked the sun: the Big Smart Bees made landfall, droning like the end of the world.

The final chorus of Take the A-Train trumpeted as the Feast of Fools gracefully descended. It gently touched down, allowing a tree-limb bridge as access from Harrigan's island, one that moved with alarming vitality.

The door to the new Observatory blasted open, outward, both doors. Mandy was there in her white dress with the round bare tummy, and she waved to the crowd like a politician.

The Campers, returning from their hiding places, knew her. Smiled when they saw her. Cheered.

Makers swarmed from the sea, causing more screams of fear, but they simply charged past the frightened Humans. A river of armored and artistic insanity that ran on many-jointed green legs.

"Come eat," Mandy shouted to the stunned campers.

And they did.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.