P.I.E. Operation: PARASITIC

LIII: Rose Thorns

Well, this chapter turned out to be more of a bloody monstrosity than I expected.

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Light woke up as soon as Johnny pretty much yelled his name. The first thing he saw was a girl wearing dull green 1700s attire. Her hands were around his face and they were extremely cold.

"Am I dead, or have your hands been frozen in ice?" Light mumbled.

"There's one way to see!" Amie said, her french accent shining through her simple english. She took the rose out of her hair, and the stem formed into a covered knife in her hands. She took the worn, thorny stem-themed case off of the rusty dagger and held the weapon over Light's head with an odd gleam in her eye.

"Wait!" Johnny Toast said, barely able to reach the knife.

"Whoa! I'm alive, I'm alive!" His shoulder made a gross popping noise as he lifted his arms to shield his head with his hands.

The flowery weapon stopped in midair. "Okay!" Amie said and stuck the rose back in her faded, rust colored hair.

Light's hand hovered over his injured arm. He glanced at both of them, then back to Toast. "Who is that?" When his eyes returned to Amie, she waved and greeted him innocently.

"Bonjour!"

He eyed the weird rose pin in her hair, then turned back to Toast another time. "Is she crazy?!"

Johnny twiddled his fingers for a bit while staring down at them. "W-Well, I don't know..." When he lifted his head, Light was staring at him in disbelief. "Okay, that was... uncalled for." Moving on as silence began to pursue, he asked, "What happened to your arm?"

"The other Johnny..." Toast's forlorn expression influenced Light to change his words out of pity. "I mean, the ghost possessing Ghost escaped like you'd never hit him upstairs. He woke up so suddenly, then forced me to drop him by quietly lodging a sharp piece of floorboard--almost like a giant, painful splinter--into my arm. I must've fainted or something after that..."

"Johnny Ghost is possessed?" Amie asked, curious to know the darker details.

"We're still unsure if that's the truth..." Toast said quietly. His feet were twisting around each other every once in a while to keep his balance steady, causing his dress shoes (definitely not something to wear if you're trying to stay quiet) to constantly click against the cement floor. "Where are the Acachallas?" Johnny asked.

"They must've gone after Ghost!" Light said.

"They wouldn't do that?" Johnny pointed out. "Do you suppose he... took them instead?"

"Oh, I can help find Johnny Ghost!" Amie chipped in cheerfully, as if this were a scavenger hunt.

"That'll work, I guess..." His expression was mostly calm, but discomfort was obvious in his voice. "I'm... sorry about what Johnny did to your arm. You should probably leave and, uh... get that fixed." Toast mumbled to Zeron.

"Aw, no way!" Light said, oddly enthusiastic despite the pain in his limb. "My life has never been so interesting! I could probably get this out on my own, too." His childishly excited smile suddenly faded.

Toast's eyes widened when he noticed. "What's the matter?"

"Even if I wanted to leave, I don't think I would be able to..." He pointed at the wall where the door Johnny and Amie came through once was; just as Amie and Johnny Toast looked in that direction, it formed itself into a longer hallway of doors.

Amie gasped. "Does Johnny Ghost know how to change real life?"

"No. T-There's a different explanation for this." An unfortunately similar voice spoke from behind.

It sounded like he was dragging his body across the wall.

Johnny Toast was the first to look back where the sounds came from. He really wished he hadn't.

Jimmy Casket's body was partially fused with Johnny Ghost, almost making them seem like twins wearing the same shirt from their similar appearance.

Johnny Ghost wore a face of devastation. There was a bruise where Toast's fist recently clashed with his face. He couldn't talk, but he slowly mouthed out the words directly to his friend: Help... me...

Amie and Light gaped at the horrific sight.

Toast fell to his knees.

"I ad-admit, Toast," Jimmy's voice became deeper at the mention of his name, "you almost got me with that s-sock to the face. How-However, your weakened strength against me... Which probably connects to your disgustingly p-pure 'soul,' only partially separated the two of us..." He lifted up one of Johnny's arms. "With me being--yes-- a parasitic ghost physically c-conjoined to G-Greg--Gregory, who is full of life, you've warped your own real-reality to something more of my taste." The two-faced creature smiled with sharpened teeth.

Sharpened teeth... Toast had a flashback to moments before he'd punched his best friend in the kitchen. At that point in time, Johnny Ghost gave him that same demonic grin.

His head began to spin, and his face became paler. His nose felt like it was beginning to bleed again. He couldn't take this.

"T-Tilt his head back." Light said quietly to Amie.

"Why?" Amie asked, as she didn't understand medical methods other than magic since she first became a ghost in the 1700s.

"He will probably bleed to death... Nevermind that--Just do it!" Light said a little more forcefully.

"Are you okay?" Amie asked Johnny when she came towards him.

Toast seemed like he would've already passed out had Amie not broken through the thoughts in his mind.

The british Paranormal Investigator politely refused the French girl's help. Instead, he stared stone-faced at Jimmy. "You." He said. "I know who you are."

"Well, it-it's about time you noticed." Jimmy replied nonchalantly.

"You're--" Johnny Toast's body jerked towards the ground, but he held himself up with his arms. "Only one person knows Johnny Ghost's real name besides myself... You're his other friend from grade school... You're Jimmy Johnson!"