Page 42 of Velveteen vs. The Consequences of Her Actions

“I’m not grandstanding,” said Velveteen. She sat down on the branch before easing herself down to the ground. Human flesh and blood broke a lot more easily than rag-doll floppiness. “I just didn’t want to come down until the big bad whatever the fuck Scaredy actually is was gone. What is he?”

“The thing children fear when they walk in the woods. Fewer woods, less fear, less reason to have something that dangerous running free. It’s almost midnight, little girl. What do you have to say to me?”

“I want to go home.” The words seemed somehow fragile, small, like they belonged in a different sort of story. A rabbit-eared headband wasn’t so different from a red hood, not really, and there were wolves in this wood. Velveteen squared her shoulders, refusing to shrink in on herself, and looked Scream Queen in the eye. “I want to be able to be Velma Martinez, not just Velveteen. I want friends, and a bed, and a chance to live my life on my own terms, not because the story says so. I want to be myself again.”

“I see. You realize that by saying this, you’re denying me my treat, and I’m within my rights to trick you.” Scream Queen’s smile was toothier than it should have been. Whoever handled Halloween’s orthodontia must have been making a fortune. “What’s to stop me keeping you past midnight, and making your choice a foregone conclusion?”

“Did I say I wasn’t giving you a treat?” Velveteen snapped her fingers. Something else dropped from the tree and moved to stand beside her.

It wasn’t a woman, although it was shaped like one: it had two legs, two arms, a torso, and a smiling muslin mask of a face. It crinkled when it moved, like dead leaves crunching together. It wore a frilled dress, like all good dolls did, and as it turned its blank button eyes toward Scream Queen, it was impossible to avoid the sensation of being watched.

“See, I was in Halloween when I learned that if I animate something that’s supposed to be a superhero, it gets their powers. Dolly here is supposed to be me.” Velveteen looked at her creation. “Dolly?”

The rag doll waved her hand. A corn jenny scurried out of the woods on cornhusk legs, pressing herself against Dolly’s ankle. Velveteen turned back to Scream Queen.

“She can watch the corn for you,” she said. “You don’t need me.”

“And when you stop animating her?” Scream Queen asked.

Velveteen shook her head. “I already did. This is Halloween. She’s a living doll. Your narrative says she won’t die until she’s done her job, and it’s her job to protect the corn. You can let me go.”

“I suppose that’s true,” said Scream Queen, and stepped closer. “Last chance, hero. Stay or go?”

Velveteen looked at the doll she’d made from her own shed skin. Looked at the haunted wood around her. And finally, reluctantly, looked back to Scream Queen. “I want to go home,” she said again.

“Very well,” said Scream Queen. She snapped her fingers. Velveteen collapsed. The rag doll remained standing.

Scream Queen raised an eyebrow. “She was telling the truth, huh? Well, then. Let’s take care of this, shall we?”

She waved her hand. A door formed from the branches of the nearby trees. Together, Scream Queen and the doll hoisted Velveteen’s body and tossed it through, into the void beyond. Then, still together, they walked into the trees, and Halloween went on around them, eternal as only a holiday can be.

* * *

First there was no door and then there was a door, a paradox of a thing, standing unsupported in the middle of a suburban lawn. The door opened against the wind—a wind that was too cold, a wind that smelled like blood. There was a long pause, like the world was waiting for something, before the body of a woman tumbled out of thin air and collapsed on the grass. She lay there, motionless, unaware of the world around her.

For better or for worse, Velveteen had come home.

VELVETEEN PRESENTS ACTION DUDE vs. Doing the Right Thing

Action Dude—who hadn’t been able to stop thinking of himself that way in months; it felt like Aaron Frank had become a luxury in the days since he had been named one of the co-CEOs of The Super Patriots, Inc.—paced in front of the big picture window that made up one wall of his office. He missed the person he’d been before everything went terribly wrong, but when the call had come, he had answered, and now he was paying the price. Technically, he shared the position of CEO of The Super Patriots, Inc. with Dotty Gale and American Dream, a fact that had earned them more than a few snide comments from government pundits. “If they’re going to set up their leadership like it’s a politically correct photoshoot, how can we trust them to regulate themselves?” was one of the nicer things he’d heard, and he was pretty sure that it hadn’t been intended as friendly.

One of the biggest conflicts he’d had with Vel when they were kids had always been over secret identities. She’d wanted to maintain one after she turned eighteen and the government stopped mandating it; he hadn’t. He’d always insisted that a proud superhuman should be able to go out without the mask, and say “Hey, I know that we may have our differences, but let’s leave them at the office when it’s time for the PTA meeting.” She’d never agreed with him, just looked at him sadly and occasionally whacked him with a pillow for being so unthinkably stupid.

Now, years and miles and deaths and resurrections and tragedies and terrors from that level of innocence, he found himself looking out the window at the manicured grounds of the company that had raised him (complete with the deceptive blue serenity of Lake Pontchartrain, who had come home from the Princess’s castle when things began to get complicated, yet hadn’t returned to her human form in months) and realized that somewhere along the line, he’d started to agree with her. He would have loved a secure secret identity, something he could wear out of the house. He hadn’t been to Shabbat services in months. It wasn’t safe.

Nothing was safe anymore. Not even this room, with its big glass windows and the bloodstains hidden under the carpet. Nothing was sacrosanct. And soon, the new CEOs of The Super Patriots, Inc. were going to need to make a choice. Did they let the government into their records, those careful, terrifying records kept by Supermodel, after she’d gone bad and before she’d died? Or did they refuse, and face the consequences of that refusal?

“You’d know what to do if you were here, Vel,” he said, ceasing his pacing and leaning his forehead against the window. He wished he could go flying. Things were always so much clearer when he flew. “You’d tell me to stop being stupid and do the right thing, and then you’d tell me what the right thing really was. Why couldn’t you stay?”

“Because you don’t go making promises to holidays if you’re going to break them. Holidays have their own rules, and I wouldn’t want to get on their bad side.” The voice was young, female, and utterly guileless. That was part of Dotty Gale’s shtick. She could sound innocent while she was ripping someone’s larynx out.

Action Dude turned. The current avatar of the idea and ideals of Oz was standing in his doorway. There were no red spots on her silver slippers; she hadn’t killed anyone recently. That was a nice change. “Dotty,” he said. “What’s up?”

Her expression sobered, as much as it was capable of doing so. “We just got an anonymous call from someone in Portland. It’s about Velveteen. She’s back.”

Action Dude broke the sound barrier leaving his office.

* * *