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“What was that?” I asked

“Dru will be teleporting here,” Toland told me He chewed his upper lip nervously “He wants a full debriefing, and he has soood”

Of course they didn’t Because nothing could ever just be fixed When things fell apart this dra toppled, and everything else fell with it

“So we’re just going to sit here and wait for hie to leap from my chair in front of Toland’s desk and pace the rooer

“Oh, goodness! They can’t talk to the Custodians looking like that,” Shen threw in, shaking her head

“Ho ahead,” Toland said

“Go ahead? With what?”

The ic professor didn’t answer in words Instead, she did that thing with her hands that she had done the first tiston, and I were soon wrapped in her cleansing blue cloud I looked down at myself as it dissipated It hadn’t made much of a difference My skin was cleaner, but the clothes were co me for tunics one of these days

“Toland, good to see you” Dru strode into the office and greeted Toland as if he hadn’t seen him for a week instead of the better part of a year He shook Toland’s hand and sat down in the last available seat He glanced over us alaze

“Why are they here?” he asked in a tone of mild curiosity

Ah, okay So ere keeping our communications on the do

“They were the ones who made it possible for us to come back to earth,” Toland said “I felt they could add valuable contributions to this conversation”

Dru frowned slightly, then shrugged “If you like Before we go into your experiences in the underworld, leton up here”

The headmaster pushed a switch on a little machine that sat on the desk “Mind if I record this for reference?”

Dru waved a hand “Not at all Now In the last year, fallen attacks have been increasing at an unprecedented rate Huht So far, the hu on the market, or a violent new viral trend Copycat hues, inadvertently ”