Boney arrived at the hotel just as the last wisp of sunlight faded from the sky turning it entirely black. But the street remained bright thanks to the excess of lights glaring out from all over the orange shell of the tall, classically grand building. In contrast to the lustrous tower, flanked at either side of the glowing red carpet laid out at the entrance to receive visitors were two large Egregors. One was a marble pedestal with an entire squid attached to its top standing on spider legs at its base. The other Egregor was what looked like a plastic animatronic of a puffy-cheeked, round-bellied boy dressed in the traditional attire of the Swiss Alps, but three-quarters charred and melted around one eye missing.
They appeared to be the only two guarding the hotel's exterior, but Boney was not fooled. From the alley facing opposite of the hotel, it could sense more, much more, hiding from its sight. There were plenty of humans coming and going through the grand tower's glass entrance, but it would be a bad idea to let Jackie enter the same way. Boney still had a connection to the Wizard and heard its former master's orders to tear Jackie apart on sight.
Honestly, Boney was reluctant to allow Jackie into the building, knowing he would be walking into extreme danger. However, it felt in Jackie an immense stubbornness that made it clear that no amount of dissuasion would stop the scrawny young human from trying. That left one course of action for the skeleton monster.
A wave of impatience alerted Boney before Jackie could slip off its shoulder. It held up a hand to stop him and then gently put him down.
Jackie felt three taps on his shoulder. Well, they were more like thumps. There were three more before Jackie finally got what Boney was trying to tell him.
"Wait on the count of three?"
There was an affirmative knock on the wall.
Jackie wasn't sure what was going on, but he decided to trust Boney and crouched for a running start. "Alright. Whenever you're ready."
Knock! "One."
Knock! "Two."
THUMP! "THREE!"
Boney and Jackie sprang at the same time. Being larger, Boney overtook Jackie by several feet and then launched itself on the two Egregors guarding the entryway. It gave the squid-headed pedestal and the animatronic a barbaric beating as Jackie ran for the glass doors. A fifteen-foot tall, human-shaped shadow tore itself from the wall and reached down to grab Jackie but was struck in the head by the animatronic which was tossed like a frisbee by Boney. When he saw more shadows tear away from the walls and ground to surround Jackie, Boney leaped into the center of that horrifying circle and spun while holding the marble pedestal monster by its bundled tentacles.
The shadows were all sent flying into the night sky around an ignorant Jackie who wondered what was going on after bumping into Boney's left thigh. After pausing to rub his sore nose, hoping it wasn't bleeding, he continued on into the hotel's lobby.
Egregors everywhere tried to chase after Jackie, but Boney was not about to let them ignore him.
As soon as Jackie slipped through the door, Boney jumped right in front of it, barring the other monsters' way in. It raised its arms and braced for impact as dozens and dozens of the monsters charged at it.
Boney held firm for one, two, maybe three seconds before being swept into the flood.
Jackie ran into the glittery, glamorous lobby that, with the lighting, looked like it was made entirely out of gold and looked around before rushing to the elevators. A lady receptionist and two security guards saw the teenage boy and instantly smelled trouble.
The receptionist reached for the phone to call the police and the guards swiftly flew to stop the boy. She grabbed the phone. They reached the elevator hallway. Jackie pushed the button ten times in one second.
The guards were just about to lay their hands on Jackie's shoulders when suddenly-
CRASH!
The entire glass front of the hotel burst. Glass shards and mangled steel flew into the lobby. Following the crescendo of noise came screams of horror as confused patrons fled from the destruction. The guards turned around just as the elevator door slid open and Jackie slipped inside.
He heard the crash and hesitated for a second, but decided stopping the Ritual was more important.
One guard noticed, but he couldn't decide where his priorities should lay fast enough. The decision was made for him when the elevator doors closed. So, with his partner, the guard charged into the mayhem and helped usher people to safety.
No one could see the monsters or stuck around long enough to see them. Luckily for the guards and everyone else who couldn't get out in time, the monsters quickly realized that their target had already escaped to the second floor. They were not allowed to go in beyond the lobby, so they could not give chase. Since it was futile to stay, the monsters returned to their posts, leaving behind the chaod they had caused.
Boney was the only monster to remained. With how many times it had been trampled over, it was no surprise that this brave Egregor could not move even a finger as it laid on its back and stared at the lobby's central crystal chandelier. But even as every part of it burned with pain, Boney could only think about Jackie, hoped he would be okay and wished the boy who had saved its life before Godspeed.
Its thoughts were suddenly cut short by the gravelly sound of glass pieces crushed under foot as someone calmly strolled into the lobby. Each second step was accompanied by a sharp tap from the end of a cane which had, unbeknownst to Jackie at the time, was capped with metal.
Whoever approached stopped beside Boney's head where it could see a familiar pair of glistening black dress shoes. A very, very familiar pair of shoes.
**********
The Wizard had the cage monster crawl over to the stage with its many, many insect legs and sit down where Alice could get a good look at the performance she had failed to stop. This also allowed the Wizard to watch Alice futile struggle against her bonds, and struggle she did even as she felt the unexpectedly sharp ribbons dig painfully into her skin around her wrists and neck. Beads of blood had actually been drawn out, but Alice didn't care.
"Don't do this!" she cried as everyone got into formation. "The Ritual's not what you think! You're going to end up killing a lot of people! Stop!"
Annoyed, Zak loudly asked, "Can someone please shut her up?"
"I'll do it," said a girl from the crowd.
But the Wizard cut in, "No need. I'll do it."
He snapped his fingers and more silk ribbons descended from the shadowy top of the cage to tightly wrap themselves around the lower half of Alice's face from beneath her nose. Her lips were pressed tightly together, preventing her from speaking more. All she could do as she writhed around was scream muffled screams, hurting herself in the effort.
"Okay," said the Wizard, rubbing his hands together. "So now that Alice is out, I'm going to need a new Acolyte to take her place. How about you?"
He pointed to a pleasantly surprised thirteen-year-old boy, the same one that Jackie had tried to talk out of joining the Ritual earlier. Shortly after fleeing from Jackie, the boy had found a bus that took a shortcut to the hotel, beating Boney by several minutes.
"Me!?" went the boy. He couldn't contain his excitement.
With a big grin, the Wizard beckoned him over. "Yeah, you! Congratulations, kid. Today, you're an honorary Acolyte. Work hard from now on and that honorary title will turn into a full-blown one. Now get over here."
With a huge smile of his own, the boy hurried over and took the place originally reserved for Alice as everyone around him applauded congratulations. Some, however, wore frowns of envy and vowed to work harder in their lessons to achieve better.
"Seven Acolytes, check. Big magic circle, check. Me, check."
That illicit some giggles.
After making one final check, the Wizard announced, "Everything checks out so let's get started! It's pretty easy. I'm going be standing here, doing my thing, my wizard thing. The only thing you all have to do is hum. Just keep humming. Breath in when you have to."
There were relieved sighs from the crowd and even among the Acolytes, some thinking to themselves, "Oh, is that all."
Quite a few people had been nervous and feeling unconfident about pulling this Ritual off, especially without knowing what they were supposed to do before.
Alice continued to scream through the wrappings, imploring them all not to go through with it. But her muffled wails fell to deaf ears. No one was even looking her way, except for the Wizard who gave her one last sneer before throwing all his concentration to the task at hand.
"On the count of three," he instructed the Gathering. "One . . . Two . . . Three!"
Everyone, save for the Wizard and Alice, closed their eyes and hummed. Their sounds came together in unison. It was musical, almost beautiful, if not for what the song was for.
The Wizard pulled out his smartphone and began reading aloud from a PDF file he got open. Alice couldn't hear what he was saying over all that humming, but she could his lips moving in ways that she could not recognize. And as he continued to chant, the humming got louder and louder.
Around Alice, the many eyes of the cage grew wide and their pupils constricted, signs that the Ritual was already starting to have an effect. The ribbon's hold on Alice's wrists and necks tightened, causing pain to shoot through them.
Alice winced. She tried again to implore the Gathering to stop, but her cries had become feeble as it became harder for her to breathe. The ribbons around her neck had begun to crush her windpipe, cutting off oxygen to her brain. Everything in front of her spun while turning darker and darker.
Ah, thought Alice, I guess this is it for me. I really wished I could have stopped the Ritual. But at least Jackie is safe.
Complete blackness was about to take hold. And then -
BAM!
Everyone in the dining room ceased humming.
The ribbons loosened their grip, and Alice could finally breathe again. She breathed in deep through her nose at least three times before the fog in her head cleared. When it did and the spinning around her slowed, she turned her gaze to the kitchen doors, one of which had flown open and slammed hard against the wall and made the noise that startled the Gathering and interrupted their Ritual.
To Alice's complete shock and horror, she saw standing there at the doorway with white light spilling in from the kitchen around him and a deep, dark shadow stretching out from his feet, Jackie Li who was drenched in sweat and panting like she was.
After taking a moment to catch his breath, Jackie straightened up and stared at the crowd staring back at him.
"Stop right there, Wizard!" he shouted. "Or should I say, Donatello Putts!"
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