Love Conquers All _The Sequel_

Chapter Thirty - The Jolly Roger

Tex's POV:

A whir whooshes from behind my back, and I already know what's happening. Michael's here, and his arrival is so long overdue that it makes my hands and legs shake with excitement.

I don't exclaim anything as I run towards him, my arms outstretched for a hug.

Our meetings have become more and more silent and increasingly depressed. Mary's still gone. He says it's been two weeks exactly since she left, although I could swear I've been here for at least two years.

Michael is sitting in front of me, cross legged, and I'm braiding his hair. I'm doing a French-fishtail braid that is basically the only thing I know how to do.

"She hates us," Michael utters. He's still dwelling on the nonexistence of Mary, which of course her absence bothers me, but my main concern is escaping this torturous place.

She doesn't hate me, I didn't banish her favorite cousin to an unknown realm, I think, but I don't say it out loud so as not to upset Michael even more.

"How come you always stay in this exact spot? Don't you ever want to venture off?" He asks, and his head wobbles, which makes me lose my grip on the braid.

I groan in frustration and sit back, dropping my hands from his head. He turns around completely, awaiting my answer.

"Because, if I venture off I might get lost. And then I would never find my way back here, and then the next time you come to visit me I wouldn't see you. It's just safer to stay here," I explain.

"I have an idea," Michael says.

"Hm?"

"What if I banish myself to this realm? I'd be stuck here with you! That way we're never alone," he suggests.

"No way! What if Mary comes back? What if you accidentally banish yourself to some other realm? You don't even now how you made me end up here!" I protest. My mind screams for me to punch him, but I ignore it.

"You're right." He sighs. "I'm just tired of this endless monotony of waiting either for Mary to come back or for myself to fall asleep every day. It's like I have nothing to live for."

"You could go search for her," I say, trying to underly my voice with an optimistic tone.

Michael just makes a disapproving grunt and shakes his head. "It'd be hopeless."

To be honest, the depression of our encounters is starting to vex me. I want to laugh. I want to be happy when I see him but all he ever does is whine about how everything sucks.

"I'm almost forgetting how she looked," Michael says dramatically, reaching his hand out towards the clouds.

"Oh shut up," I remark, hitting his arm. He looks back at me and gives me a half smile.

Over the next hour, our conversation dwindles and dies out. Soon enough, the grass is beginning to glow a burnt orange, reflecting the tint of the rising sun.

Michael takes a deep breath and says, "Well, see ya next time, kiddo."

We hug, and moments later, he's fading away and turning to thin air right before my eyes.

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ET's POV:

Oh, I got my time machine, all right. I built that sucker myself; I used the resources of the jungle. It's a beast, I oughtta say... Works like a charm, too.

Today, I'm more than overjoyed because I'm going to execute whatever I must execute to eventually be able to return to Neverland. Today, I'm going to travel around in time and kidnap myself, crash the concert, and kill Michael. I'm doing everything that I know has happened.

Also, I've gotta write down that letter and put it under Michael's pillow. You know, that letter that he said contained his deepest, darkest secret? Well, he told me his secret not too long ago. I'm the only one that knows about it. And that's how ET wrote the letter. It was me.

So that's several things on my to-do list. If I can get them all done in one go, I can hopefully return to Neverland by tomorrow.

I don't really consider myself Mary anymore. Now, I'm ET. That's just who I am, I guess. Until I go home. When I go home everything will be better.

I step inside my time machine, which I have named the Jolly Roger, and begin to flip some switches into gear. I was able to make time travel possible with the spark of my godly magic; I was able to harness the power of time and relative dimension in space, basically.

The machine shakes and rumbles, tossing me around, but eventually comes to a jolting halt with a echoing ding announcing our landing.

I step outside and there I am. It's strange, really. The house is right there... I'm inside there, and so is Michael, and Tex, and... Wow. The thought is hard to grasp.

I find the room where I ran to after Tex harassed me and stand in the window waiting for the old me to come running in.

After a while, she jogs in, panting.

I ignite the light in my finger and croak, "Phone, home."

Then I blast a gust of wind in her face to knock her out.

There I am, unconscious on the floor. I panic for a second, and quickly I write down a phone number and tape it to the phone. Michael will call it, and I'll tell him that the old Mary is with one direction.

I take the old me to the mansion of Liam Payne, where him and all the other boys are. I drop her off on the front step and knock on the door.

I look at her/me. I look really stupid when I'm unconscious.

The door starts to open and I immediately fly away, on to complete my next task.

******************

So here I am, bleeding out on the floor of the Jolly Roger, my spaceship/time machine, where I'm playing dead so as to convince Michael and Mary and Tex that I am dead.

I remember this happening so clearly; never did I think that I would experience it from this end.

I watch the scene unfold: Tex is trying to undo the handcuffs I locked around Mary's feet and Michael is frantically untying the belts I tied her up with. Dylan is lying dead on the floor across from me, and it saddens me a bit. I miss her... I wish she hadn't betrayed us.

And now comes my time. Michael has undone the belts and is hugging me, and that's my que. I grasp the dagger in my slimy, shriveled hand.

As quietly as I can, I sneak up behind Michael and press the tip of the knife into his shirt.

Then, with all the strength I could possibly have, I shut my eyes tight, and shove the knife straight down through his back and into his chest cavity. The squeak of his voice as his last breath escapes his lips makes my heart twist.

But I've gotten it over with. I've completed the hardest task. I'm done. Now I wait for Mary to grow a tree through me and burn me and my ship. That's gonna be painful, but worth it in the long run.

Mary peers over Michael's limp shoulders and looks at me. I've never seen so much pure hatred in my own eyes. Little does she know that I am her.

Along with her fiery glare, Mary grows the tree and stabs me straight through the heart with a spiky limb.

It's excruciating. I'm hanging from the branch, gasping for air, and eventually I faint. But I lose consciousness with smile on my face, dreaming of the day the wedding comes. That'll be the day that I am revived. I will rebuild my ship and travel back into the future and fix everything. It'll be okay.

I can feel the heat of the flames, barely, in my unconsciousness. It feels like my body is diffusing... I can't see anything, but I feel spread out and shattered, in a way. I know what's happened. I've become ash... I'm turning to soil. And that is how I'll live until the wedding reverses me, with the dirt of the earth.