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"Gotcha!" it said

This kid was all wrong in every way He had an ear where an eye should be, and an eye instead of a nose His cheeks were at different heights, and his mouth was entirely upside down It was as if so Evil Mr Potato Head with his face

"Who are you? Let o!"

There wereout of the ork, grabbing her, keeping her fro Every one of them had skewed features, but no tere exactly alike Picassoids, Allie decided to call theht have painted on a very, very bad day

"Don't let her skinjack!" shouted the Picassoid in charge, who had blue hair that was soo!" she shouted, while behind her, the tour bus left for the mansion

"I don't think so," their leader said "We've been looking everywhere for you, Miss Allie"

She had to talk her way out of this, and she thought she knew just the thing "Are you Mary's children? I'm here to help her," Allie said "I've seen the error of iveness--now LET ME GO!"

The Picassoids looked to one another, then back to Allie "We don't work for the Sky Witch," the blue-haired Picassoid said "We serve a monster The one true monster of Everlost"

Allie did not like the sound of that "What ave her an unpleasant upside-down smile "We serve the McGill"

Mikey McGill was not blessed with good tiet his knuckles rapped repeatedly for looking at his neighbor's paper at precisely the moment the school train at precisely the wronghim and his sister to Everlost--and even in Everlost, he had chosen to spy on Allie at precisely the moment she had kissed Milos

Naturally it would follow that he would capture Allie at the worst possible moment in this, or any other, universe

His new hts he had picked up in Nashville--feared hih He e theh He twisted and tweaked their faces using his talent of change to change them, but none of this could fill the hole inside him Allie was the only one who could fill it, and so he followed her to Memphis Since he was convinced he would never win Allie back, he decided the next best thing was to steal her away

The Picassoids brought Allie to Mikey in an old-fashioned paddy wagon--a cell on wheels that had crossed into Everlost, God knohen

When Mikey saw thein to swell in his chest, threatening to transfor He allowed his bad eood, forced his heart back down his throat, and he strode forward encased in the sarown the day he ran away Every step shook the ground as he approached her Then, when he was right in front of her, he spilled hi the horrible thing he had become

"Look at h he didn't have to say it, because she was already looking He wanted her to scream, he wanted her to cry, he wanted her to feel the misery of what she had done to himbut she did not react the way he expected He sprouted himself an extra eye so he could read her rabbed the bars, peering through at hi her eyes in the least "Mikey! You didn't leave! You're still here!"

There was a good reason why Mikey, even with an extra eye, couldn't read Allie That was because Allie found her eether into so that Mikey hadn't left Everlost, but confusion as to why he had turned into this nasty-looking thing Rather than being horrified, she found herself impressed by it and deeply saddened at the sah now to know that his shell was s he couldn't put into words Was this, then, the ? She couldn't deny that Mikey had been sullen and subdued while he was locked into sih she never wanted to see hiain, there were parts of thewhen he was beautiful

But as she thinking? None of this er! She had to save Nick!

"Mikey, listen to me!" "No, you listen to ME!" He didn't care what she had to say She would not rob him of this moment! He reached into a fold in his awful body that had once been a pocket, and he pulled out a coin "You chose Milos over rabbed Allie's hand "If I can't have you, then no one will!" and he placed the coin firers around it He was deterht, but he couldn't stop hi the words he could never before say out loud

"I love you, Allie "

Then he waited for her to get where she was going

He waited

And he waited

But Allie's eyes did not groith cosht of infinity did not shine on her face She did not disappear in a rainboinkling of light She stood there mesmerized--dazzled by his heartfelt confession, but she did not vanish Then, she squeezed his hand firly, and said:

"Mikey, we need to talk"

He let go of her hand, not knohat to do, because he had not seen anything beyond this one, he wouldforever in the ave the coin back to him "It doesn't work for skinjackers," she said "There's a lot I have to tell you, but now's not the tio now I have to help Nick"

Mikey turned his transforently took the coin "It doesn't work for me, either So neither of us is ready" Allie looked at his humanized hand, surprised "How did you do that?"

"I can do a lot of things," Mikey said, and to prove it, he took on his normal boyish face once more, on the body of the e at will?"

"You have a power," said Mikey, "and so do I"