Suddenly, then, the girl were running through the forest once again. This time, though, they were headed to the Matheson Farm.
"But wait!" Max stopped Lauren before she could get too close. "The last time we were here, Slenderman attacked us. Is there any way can get inside without him sensing us?" she asked. Lauren bit her lip and shook her head uncertainly. Maybe if they had Kate... But they didn't. In this place, there was only Charlie Jr. But then again, last time Lauren met Charlie, Charlie had jumped her... Oh, speak of the literal Devil! Charlie suddenly appeared in the doorway of the farm, looking at the two girls intently.
"Should we reverse?" asked Max the moment his little skeletal body appeared.
"Not yet," Lauren responded. "Let's see what happens. Slenderman hasn't shown up yet..."
A few more moments later, Charlie began to limp towards them.
"Oh crap!" Max muttered, stepping back. Lauren did likewise, carefully stepping in front of the other Caulfield. Neither of them moved until, at last, Charlie stopped right in front of them and spoke.
"Lauren?" he asked, voice warbled and broken. This stunned both girls into silence.
"Oh crap!" Max repeated, but this time with a different intonation.
Following the stinger that Charlie was free, could talk and knew who Lauren was, the duo became a trio. Charlie confessed that he, like Kate, was a proxy, but wasn't under Slenderman's control all the time. Instead, it was only when Slenderman needed him, or was nearby.
"But if he's busy somewhere else, it's just me," Charlie explained. "Now come on! We've been watching you for quite some time and we need your help real bad! Follow me!"
"Wait. We?" Max interrupted. Charlie looked up at her and she tried not to hurl as she saw his face up close and personal in all its gory glory.
"Yes, Maxine Caulfield," he said. Then Max almost hurled again just out of pure shock that he knew her real name.
"How did-?" she began weakly.
"Kate told me," he explained.
"Oh," Max laughed nervously. But then Charlie said something else that made everything just a little bit stranger again.
"Kate told me, and so did Chloe Price."
Charlie then explained how, ever since Slenderman had come to the forest many generations ago, more and more people had become trapped in this Hell of a park. Kate was the most recent prisoner, the one preceding her being Chloe Price.
"She's here?" Max gasped, looking like she was trying to keep herself from sprinting back through the entirety of Oakside just to find Chloe.
"Yes," Charlie nodded, head looking like it was about to flop off. "She came in a few weeks ago!"
"That sounds about right," Max muttered darkly.
"Yeah. Slenderman brought her in, bullet hole still in her head, but he fixed her. Sort of..." Charlie frowned, a horrific sight. Then he elaborated.
After being brought in, Slenderman made Chloe into his proxy, named Blueblood. He resurrected her, closing that bullet wound in her head. From that day forward, her sole purpose was to wait. She did roam the forests and kill several travelers, but she wasn't a heavy hitter. Not yet at least. Lauren didn't meet her during her exploration for Kate. But she certainly met Kate, the Chaser.
"I think he's been hunting you longer than you think," Charlie muttered at Max, who shuddered in agreement. She wasn't sure just how long Slenderman had been after her, but given that he knew enough to set up an elaborate death trap to kill Chloe to test her mettle meant that it had been for quite awhile. In the back of her mind, Max began to wonder if Slenderman was the reason she got taken into Blackwell Academy. What if he had rigged her acceptance into the school just to get her back into Arcadia Bay because of Chloe? It might've sounded like a stretch, but given who Slenderman was, something like that couldn't have been too hard to do.
"So what are you asking us to do?" asked Lauren, breaking Max's thoughts.
"To come with us, quickly! We think we have a way to save ourselves, but we need your help, really badly!" he looked particularly hard at Max and she nodded knowingly at once. She had no clue what Charlie's plan was, but if it gave her the chance to see Chloe again...
"Let's go now," she insisted. Lauren cast her a wary glance, but she nodded her consent and gestured for Charlie to lead them on. He looked relieved before darting back towards his farm. Instead of going into the barn, house or chapel, though, he was going to the basement.
"Oh, wonderful!" Lauren giggled nervously. Max looked at her before taking her arm. Lauren calmed down slightly and smiled at her before following her and Charlie into that basement.
"Kate?" Lauren, despite coming in last, was first to speak once she got into the basement. Sure enough, there, sitting cross-legged in the center of the shabby place, was Kate.
"Lauren?" Kate looked up at her and despite her mutilated face they could all see genuine warmth in her eyes. She got up and limped over to Lauren and the two old friends were suddenly weeping in each other's arms.
"But where is Chloe?" asked Max anxiously.
"She's, uhhh, not technically here," Charlie mumbled.
"But you said-!" Max accused, drawing herself up angrily.
"I did!" Charlie admitted. "But I meant that while she was a proxy she was still one of the more dangerous ones!"
"You little-!" Max looked ready to throttle the boy for lying to her.
"I had to say it to get you here! We really do need you!" Charlie pleaded, backing up in fright. Max felt fury rising in her heart, but then she couldn't help but see Charlie's point. It was a massive disappointment to see that Chloe wasn't here despite being, well, here, but it made sense. Her time powers made her useful and anybody who needed her would say anything to get her. She had to concede that Charlie did the logical thing by twisting the truth to get her to come down here. Besides, even though Chloe was still an evil proxy, if Kate could break the cycle, so could Chloe! So maybe all hope was not lost yet...
"Ok, fine!" Max exhaled slowly, forcing herself to calm down. "What do you need me to do?" she asked. Charlie looked up at her in relief and Max couldn't tell if this was because she'd pretty much just sworn her loyalty and obedience to him despite his deceit, or if he was just glad that she wasn't going to pound him into the cement that made the basement's floor. Perhaps it was a bit of both. He really was a scrawny little kid. Max could've probably broken him in half with two fingers!
"I have a spell book," he said, slowly, but confident that Max wasn't going to turn him into a pile of goo after all. "I think it's how Slenderman was brought over here from Germany," as the boy said this, Kate fetched the book in question. It looked like a very cliché spell book to be sure, large, with a big black cover and musty old pages. Opening it up, it was even full of unintelligible runes.
"So what do you need me for?" asked Max.
"Well, I'm going to try and decipher it. If all goes well, we can send Slenderman back," Charlie said. "I just need you to-"
"Make sure he doesn't arrive and if he does, use my powers to rewind time and fix things," Max interrupted.
"Yes," Charlie replied, impressed and sheepish.
"Ok," Max sighed in resignation. "Let's get this party started."
A bit later, the group was standing in the old Matheson chapel. As creepy as it was, there was almost a peace in the place, like it knew things were about to get back to normal. Of course, though, life was strange and nothing normal could stay. Charlie was only halfway through the spell when who should appear but Chloe herself, snarling and demonic, glowing eyes dead set on Max.
"Max! Look out!" Kate and Lauren both bellowed as Chloe ran at her on all fours, like some kind of wild animal.
"Chloe?" Max reached out to the girl.
"MAX!" her friends cried out to her again. But now it was Max's turn to ignore them in favor of Chloe. She could see why Lauren had found it so hard to resist Chaser before. But if Chaser could be saved, couldn't Chloe?
"Argh!" Max had reached out for Chloe, but Chloe only grabbed her arm, twisting it backwards violently until something in her arm snapped like a twig. The brunette clutched her arm in agony, miserable eyes staring up at Chloe's wild figure. Breaking Max's wrist had incited a new fire into her and it was only an attack from Charlie that kept Max from being killed at once. She cried out, though, when Charlie punched Chloe square on the nose, a small gush of blood shooting out of her nose when Charlie's bony fist made impact.
"Don't hurt her!" Max pleaded as Chloe stumbled backward, clutching her face and snarling angrily.
"Are you mad?!" Lauren cried.
"She's my Kate!" Max responded, and Kate cocked her own head up in reply.
"Not anymore, she's not!" Charlie responded, still trying to hold her back.
"But let her go!" Max pleaded again.
"No! Reverse time!" Charlie ordered. "If I let her go, she's going to kill us all! Reverse time and we can trap her because we know where she'll come in at!" the boy pleaded, and Max realized he was right. Charlie's plan was sound, so she obeyed his orders.
Charlie was only halfway through the spell when who should appear but Chloe herself, snarling and demonic, glowing eyes dead set on Max. Max had been ready for this, however, and when Chloe came running at her, Max pulled out a rope that she had been hiding behind her back. She threw one of the ends to Kate, who had also been anticipating this moment, and then the pair quickly wrangled Chloe in, ensnaring her.
"Whoa! You weren't kidding when you said she'd be here!" Charlie marveled up at the blue-haired girl while Max gave him a sad smile.
"It was thanks to your plan," she said, then she told him about what had happened in the previous timeline.
"Wow!" he cried, sounding pleased with himself.
"But the spell! Finish the spell!" Lauren pleaded and Charlie quickly returned to what he was doing, opening the old spell book again. It became evident that Charlie had been planning this kind of escape for a long time and even though he was still struggling with the meaning behind some of the runes and symbols, he actually had quite a lot of them down!
But sadly, another interrupter came along. This one was Ticci Toby.
"Still trying to kill our master, eh Charlie?" the older proxy teased the younger cruelly. "He won't be too happy about that!"
"As if I care what makes him happy!" Charlie shot back. "He's vile and cruel and deserves what he has coming to him!" the boy insisted, waving the spell book a little to illustrate his point. The moment Charlie's focus slipped, however, Max noticed that some of the lights in the chapel were starting to flicker. She said nothing at first, however, observing as Toby and Charlie began to argue. Still tied up, Chloe snarled and screeched. She could sense the rising tension in the air and wanted in on the action.
"Face it Turdy Toby!" Charlie snarled. "You just don't want to send Slenderman back because you're too much a coward to live on your own!"
"Coward?! COWARD?! You calling me a coward?!" Toby thundered, drawing his axe and waving it. Charlie didn't back down. At last, however, Max knew it was time to call it quits and she quickly reversed time before Charlie could get killed.
"As if I care what makes him happy!" Charlie shot back.
"Enough!" Max interrupted before Charlie could keep going. "Toby, please! Surely you can't want this life?!" the brunette continued to spend the next few seconds trying to get Toby to ally with her. She wanted him to see that Slenderman was little more than a slave-driver. Though he might've made wonderful promises to Toby, surely a life like this, hunting a forest searching for the peace that would never come while he was still so bitter and anger, couldn't be a life he really wanted, but Toby was stubborn. He ignored all of Max's pathetic attempts at reasoning and continued, instead, to taunt her, Lauren, Charlie and Chloe.
"You'll never make it, you know?" he demanded coldly. "Even if you win, she will die," he flicked his head to Chloe. "And so will she!" he added, pointing to Kate. "If you finish the spell, you won't just be killing Slenderman," Toby warned dangerously.
"What?" both of the Caulfields asked.
"It's true!" Toby swore. "Every proxy is tied to Slenderman, and if he dies, we die! So unless you want to sacrifice them..." he trailed off and suddenly, another impasse had been reached.
"No," Charlie broke the silence. "No! We don't care! We don't care Toby! We don't care! We don't care what the cost is! We have to stop Slenderman and you won't stop us!" he continued to rail against the ugly proxy before them. "If his life costs us ours, who cares?! I am ready to die if it means that he dies too! This is a small price to pay, Toby, and your dumb threats don't scare us!"
"Are you sure about that?" Toby began to manipulate Charlie but Charlie tried to stay firm. He might've still had the body of a little boy, but after spending decades upon decades as nothing but a shell and a shadow, a vessel to Slenderman's every whim, he had grown quite the spine and he wasn't bluffing when he told Toby that he no longer feared death. Sure, he didn't want to die, but he didn't want Slenderman to live either.
At the same time, while the two male proxies were going at it, Lauren was clutching Kate's face and pleading with her, begging to know if what Charlie had just said about proxies being tied to Slenderman's life force was true. Kate wasn't exactly denying it, but she wasn't agreeing either, trying instead to push Lauren off of her. Max wasn't paying attention to any of it, staring brokenly at Chloe, who was still thrashing psychotically against her rope prison. She was still snarling, spitting and screaming, like a rabid animal. It would've been absolutely terrifying, had it not also been so very heartbreaking. Max had come so far after so long only to hear that it was a doomed quest from the get-go. Even if she did find some way to bring Chloe out of her proxy state, she would still have to die in order for Slenderman to truly be defeated. It took all of Max's strength not to break down crying right then and there.
"I'm sorry, Chloe," she rasped weakly at the wild girl, then she reversed time one last time.
"As if I care what makes him happy!" Charlie shot back.
"Enough!" Max cried. Then she let go of the rope she was hiding behind her back and she let Chloe come barreling in, uninhibited.
"What are you doing?!" Lauren and Kate cried in unison. But Max ignored them both, pointing to Toby.
"Ha! As if she'll listen to you!" Toby sneered at Max, but Max didn't even bother to argue with him. Instead, she began to run in his direction and, since Chloe was chasing after her, this meant that Max's move was forcing Chloe to chase after Toby as well.
"READ THE SPELL!" Max screamed from the three-way chase that she was stuck in. Charlie sat there in stunned silence for just a moment before Max's scream woke him up and he began to chant again, flipping through the musty old pages of the spell book. All the while, he cursed his idiot ancestors that had summoned Slenderman in the first place. This was all their fault!
But one last interruption was still due. This time, Slenderman himself arrived.
"Oh, Charlie! Friends! All of you! Did you really think you could defeat me?" he asked, tentacles winding out to pick up each and every last one of them as he, in all his demonic glory, suddenly appeared at the chapel's doors. He was so very tall and thin that he had to bend over to get in, but any humor of such a gesture was lost on the pure horror everyone was experiencing just by him being in their proximity. One could never laugh at how silly Slenderman was on a physical level just because his mind and reality warping were too distorting and disturbing to allow for any humor to be felt. There was nothing but confusion, chaos and fear as he made his grand entrance, picking up every single living being in that chapel and dangling them high in the air. The only one left standing was Ticci Toby, looking triumphantly up at his godlike master.
"You especially, Max!" Slenderman added, faceless face boring into Max's such that she began to sob and scream even though she was only looking at an empty palette. "You thought your time powers could possibly stop me! Didn't you know that I was the 1 who created that power? I can take it away just as easily!" then one smaller tentacle pushed forward and plucked the necklace from Max's throat.
"NO!" Max shouted, writhing even harder against the tentacles than ever before. Slenderman only uttered a chilling chuckle that sent a literal chill down all of their backs, then he proceeded to torture them all, dangling the necklace in front of every face as his dark magic began to literally eat away at them until all they could hear was their own screaming and all they could smell or taste was their own blood under tides of agony. What ever spell it was that Slenderman was using, it was a mix of overstimulation of the senses and a rapid decay of the body. He continued to play with them, bouncing them up and down in his tentacles as he continued to work his dark magic, sinister laughter echoing the old, empty building as his continued to torment his victims for his own enjoyment.
But ultimately, such pride and sadism was Slenderman's own undoing because, as he continued to torture them all, except for Toby who had skittered off back into the forest in triumph, the pain woke Chloe up. Slenderman seemed to forget that she was still under his spell firmly enough to constitute as an ally and, instead, his desire to torment Max was overriding that rationale and he basically, accidently, tortured Chloe back onto Max's side. The pain and decay she was suffering finally snapped her out of her mini comatose and she was suddenly aware of herself, dangling about 15 feet in the air by her ankles, being waved around by a thick, slimy black tentacle that was causing her immense pain of the body, mind and soul. It was not exactly the warmest of wakeup calls, but it was enough. It was enough to bring Chloe back. And even through her agony, confusion and surprise, the blue-haired girl could see Max, in a very similar position. Just one look at her friend's face and it was like a light had been switched on her in brain. Despite spending weeks under Slenderman's diabolical and corruptive influence, all of that seemed to wash away the moment Chloe got a chance to see Max's face again. That was all Chloe needed.
"Hrrgggaaahhh!" Chloe uttered a nightmarish scream of pain and she let her eyes glow with insanity. Slenderman turned his empty face to her and although seeing it began to cause her to hallucinate, she continued to play the part of a possessed proxy, and she played her part very well. Slenderman began to dangle Max's time necklace in front of Max before slowly drawing it over to Chloe's face. He dangled it there, turning his faceless countenance back to Max as though to silently say, "Look, I've got your friend and your powers. What can you do to stop me?" and that was just the distraction Chloe needed. While Slenderman continued to inflict this psychological trauma upon Max, Chloe managed to swing forward and snatch up the necklace. It was strange, too, even though she had no explicit idea what the necklace was, it was like her implicit memory did and, without even realizing it, she managed to activate the powers and reverse the clock.
Chloe found herself stuck in a rope net being held onto by Max and some other freaky girl. Chaser. Wasn't that her name? And as Chloe slowly regained her bearings, she could see Max arguing with the axe-boy, Ticking Toby, or whatever. Chloe couldn't hear what was being said over her own roaring and screeching, but she didn't need to know. Instead, she moved desperately to one side of the rope, trying to catch the eye of the Chaser girl. It was because, even though Chloe couldn't remember much about her, she did remember learning from some source that this was a girl named Kate, who was good friends with a girl named Lauren, who was Max's older cousin. That was all Chloe needed to know to guess that Kate was an ally, a good proxy, one who wanted for this nightmare to end just as much as she did, so while Max continued to argue with the Toby guy (who was most definitely not an ally), Chloe tried to get Kate's attention.
"Come on, Kate! Look up!" Chloe pleaded softly. She tried to wiggle her arm out of the makeshift rope-prison she was stuck in. She had to admit that it was quite impressive, what a tight job Kate and Max had done, especially given that it was only one old strand of rope that had been down in the basement of the Matheson house. It wasn't anything new or fresh and it wasn't like a metal chain, but it still had Chloe immobilized. She continued to wriggle, though not just in attempt to get Kate's attention, but to grab onto Max's necklace, which was now hanging from her throat. She wanted to have it in hand in case something screwed up. She may not have been a Time Lord, but she'd heard Max describe to Lauren through their earlier adventures how the powers worked and that was enough for her to have some idea of what the necklace could do and how.
But ultimately, Chloe didn't need to use the necklace, because Lauren looked up, and when she saw Chloe's throat, Max's necklace resting upon it, she inhaled sharply, though she made no other obvious moves. Instead, she pretended to look away before looking back up at Chloe. She stepped backward, pretending as though whatever Toby was saying currently was scaring her, then, once she was more in Chloe's line of vision, she slowly turned her head towards the blue-haired proxy. Chloe felt Lauren's eyes upon her and she, at once, turned to meet the other Caulfield's eyes. In a matter of a few seconds and a couple gestures, she managed to pantomime exactly what needed to happen next:
"Free me so I can distract Toby. I'll give you this time necklace thing. Finish the spell. Save the day." Lauren understood all of this.
"Shut up, Toby!" Lauren screamed out of nowhere. Toby, Max and Charlie, who had all been arguing, paused midsentence.
"Oh. I'm sorry. What did you say?!" Toby sneered, waving his axe again, somewhat surprised by Lauren's seemingly random interruption.
"She said shut up!" Kate answered for her, feral growl slipping into her speech at the sight of Lauren being threatened.
"Oh! I suppose a great Chaser like you is going to stop me?" Toby sneered, turning on her next, still waving his axe threateningly.
"Not without a little help!" Lauren said, then she took a few steps to the left, grabbed the rope from Kate's hand, and tossed it to the ground. With Kate no longer holding half of what made up Chloe's prison, the blue-haired proxy was able to escape in no time. Toby didn't even have time to blink before she had suddenly tackled him harder than a football player. He bellowed in shock and pain, but Chloe was deaf to his screams as they engaged in a battle fierce enough to rival the one Kate had had with him in an earlier timeline from what felt like eons ago.
While Chloe went after Toby, Kate eventually joining in the fray once she seemed to realize that Chloe was now a friend somehow, Charlie finally got a chance to finish his spell. Or at least, he almost did. While the proxies battled each other, this left Max and Lauren as Charlie's sole protectors and they were powerless when Slenderman made his entrance, one tentacle shooting out to grab Charlie. The moment Charlie felt his body going up, he dropped the book downward at the two Caulfields, a simple command embedded in that one little gesture: finish the spell. That was the last message he ever got to convey, Slenderman then slowly ripping the boy apart at the limb, the grotesque sound of tearing flesh and cracking bone audible even over the proxy scuffle happening at his feet. Lauren picked up the spell book, trying to finish what Charlie started.
"Foolish mortal!" Slenderman thundered, all tentacles out and active, lashing out at anything that moved, but Kate managed to pull herself away from the fight with Toby to lunge to Lauren's aid, shielding her with her own body.
"Help me protect her!" the ex-proxy thundered at Max and Max obeyed, she and Kate both shielding Lauren from Slenderman's attacks while Lauren herself tried to finish up the spell. Chloe was fighting as hard as she could to keep Toby subdued on her own.
"You will never escape!" Slenderman vowed, then he began to teleport them all around the chapel in attempts to separate and stop them.
At last, he caught Max. She screamed in agony and terror as one of his tentacles curled around her elbow and hoisted her high. He laughed wickedly, the sound rasping and rumbling through the very foundation of the chapel as he celebrated his little victory.
"What will you do now that your little Time Warp has been caught?" he sneered down at the others in triumph. Max was sobbing and screaming against Slenderman's cold tentacles, but she was powerless to escape.
"Reverse time and fix things!" Chloe responded in a human voice, finally removing herself from Toby's grasp.
"WHAT?!" Slenderman hissed, turning to her. Empty face or not, she could tell that he was beyond furious. The blue-haired girl dared to pull out the necklace, which she had since hidden up her jacket's sleeve during the little scuffle with Toby.
"WHAT?!" Slenderman repeated, turning his empty face back to Max who shut her eyes at once. She felt like was going to pass out despite not looking at Slenderman and she felt his tentacles slither grossly around her neck. No necklace.
"HOW?!" Slenderman asked the question Max wanted to ask but couldn't since he was presently cutting off her air supply.
"It's a long story," Chloe answered, voice deadly quiet now as she continued to swing the necklace between her fingers, tauntingly. "And I am afraid that I do not have the time to relate it to you now, and I'm certainly not going to try and reverse things just so I can," she added.
Then she made a big show about turning to Lauren. Slenderman followed her line of vision and another surge of unmatched, unholy anger filled his entire being. Lauren had finished reading. The spell was complete. While Chloe and Max had distracted Slenderman, Lauren had finished reading the spell, Kate still standing protectively in front of her. They were standing at the ruined alter at the far end of the chapel and a black portal began to open up around them. They both stepped back safely from the edge and the thing began to rumble ominously.
"No. No! NOOOOOO!" Slenderman howled, the sound of crashing chords and a distorting static screaming in everybody's mind as, for once, this eldritch abomination began to panic. Slowly, it was drawn back into the black pit from whence it had come, slowly unraveling like a ball of black and white yarn until it was only one thin line finally tapering off into nothingness as it was fully sent back to where it belonged. All the while, as Slenderman became one long string of black and white, the entire chapel filled with flashes of black and white until no one could see anything, but the moment the demon had been totally vanquished, everything returned to normal. Almost.
Once the dust had settled, two more were missing.
"Chloe and Kate," Max murmured hollowly as Lauren stood holding her in a protective hug, spell book dropped on the floor.
"No..." Lauren choked out miserably, but it was true. Her and Max's best friends were gone too, and even Charlie's body had vanished as well.
"They knew this would happen," Max responded. Then before Lauren could even ask, she spoke about what happened in one of the previous rewinds in which Toby had tried to manipulate them into surrendering in order to keep the proxies alive.
"Why didn't you tell me? Lauren choked.
"And force you to make the decision we all know had to be made?" Max asked back, crying too. Lauren wanted to say more, to be mad at Max for keeping this secret from her but she couldn't. Instead, she only wept, and Max did too, crying out for Chloe as she held onto Lauren like a lifeline.
But the two girls could not cry forever and as the sun began to glare through the dusty, stained-glass windows of the chapel, Max spoke.
"What do we do now?" she asked, still trembling but no longer sobbing.
"Go home!" Lauren responded with a weak sob as she began to pull Max out of the chapel. They both staggered to the door and them limped their way right past the once-foreboding gates of Oakside. They emerged from that awful forest just as their parents and the cops had arrived, once more, to Kate's house for further investigation. The two girls hung back once they saw the swarm of cops arriving, neither of them wanting to have to face the drama that would be sure to follow when they, bloody and bruised as they were, were to make their grand entrance, but as they could not run and hide either, they only exchanged one little look for reassurance before turning back to the crowd of police.
"Together?" asked Max and Lauren replied by squeezing Max's hand tightly in her own. The two exchanged weak little smiles before they resumed their walk home, all of the cops and their parents each staring up at them in shock, horror and utter confusion and disbelief as they made their strange arrival home.
AN: So this was literally a weird, fever-dream crossover fic I got inspired to write after realizing that Max Caulfield looks a bit like Lauren. I'm sorry if it's OOC or if Max's powers don't behave the way they should and I also apologize for any plot inconsistences, but I hope you still liked the general gist of this tale. (Please, review, and if you want, point out any inconsistency so I can fix it!)