Modelland (51 page)

The bus sped fast through the alley. A lone shopkeeper locked up his store, then headed into the alleyway right in front of the bus. The driver slammed on the brakes, and the bus lurched to the left. Everyone screamed and shot forward. Tookie’s head hit the windshield, and she immediately felt a jab of white-hot pain.

And then everything went black.

Searing pain pulsed at Tookie’s scalp. The cold ground chilled her bones. After a moment, she opened her eyes. The night stars and round moon glowed overhead. The Obscure Obelisks towered off to the left, three giant spikes in the sky.

Where was she? The last thing she remembered was Lizzie picking up a piece of sharp metal and—

Tookie shot up. The bus lay on its side next to the Obscure Obelisks, its windshield smashed, its tires flattened, its front end crumpled. The driver was nowhere to be seen.

“Dylan? Shiraz? Piper?” Tookie called quietly, her heart hammering.
Please make them be okay
, she silently willed.

“Over here,” Dylan’s voice meekly responded. “All of us.”

“Are you hurt?” Tookie scrambled toward them.

“No,” Piper said weakly. Shiraz murmured that she was all right too.

Tookie peered into the darkness. One friend left to find. “Lizzie?” she cried.

Nothing.

Tookie leapt to her feet. “Lizzie?” she called louder.
“Lizzie?”
Again, nothing. Tears began to spill down her cheeks.
No. No!
The image of Lizzie slamming the sharp metal into her wrist swam through her mind. She had failed Lizzie again.

And then everything just came to a head. Everything Tookie had been through—people walking over her like she was trash during every SPLD; the daily fear that the Unicas were going to be mutilated and murdered; Zarpessa’s nasty secrets and cruel spirit; Tookie’s toothbrush bulging in her father’s pocket on its way to prove she wasn’t his; Gunnero’s mean taunts; feeling unlovable, then loved, then humiliated by Bravo; every second, every minute of her existence suddenly erupted like lava from a long-dormant volcano.

“How could I have lost you again?”
Tookie wailed loudly, her voice echoing into the night.
“Why do I keep letting you down? I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry! I’m so sorry!”

The sobs made her buck and shudder. Her wails were so intense they reverberated off the mountain in stereo. Finally, Tookie stopped, held her breath, and looked around. Even though she’d quit crying, the wails kept coming.

“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.…”

Tookie spun around in the direction of the noise. Was that
someone
else
sobbing? A figure kneeled at the base of the Obscure Obelisks. And then … 
thwack
. A twisted reed struck in the moonlight, landing on the figure’s back. Blood rose through the figure’s thin shirt.
Thwack. Thwack
. “Oh my God,” Tookie whispered.

Ci~L.

Before Tookie’s eyes, Ci~L—and only one Ci~L this time, not three—started to claw at herself. Tears mixed with blood streamed down her face. “I’m sorry!” she wailed, her voice raw. “I’m
sorry
!” She tore at her shirt to get down to her bare flesh. Huge new welts rose on her skin. Older ones were still an angry keloided red. The blood dripped down her back, pooling on the ground.

Tookie gasped.

Ci~L raised her head and spied Tookie. Her eyes widened. Her mouth became tense and hard. Her nostrils flared. She stood and advanced toward Tookie with her bloody hands outstretched, her expression unhinged and twisted, her hair snarled around her face. Tookie backed away, her heart fluttering madly in her chest.

But instead of running away again, Tookie mustered up all her courage and stood firm. It didn’t make sense to keep running. Ci~L would just find them again and again and again.

“Take me,” she said softly to the advancing Ci~L. “Experiment on me instead of my friends. Torture me, sacrifice me, kill me. Let them live.”

Ci~L halted in her tracks and stared at her. After a moment, she started to tremble. She covered her face with her hands and turned away.
“I’msorryI’msorryI’msorry…,”
she began to moan once more.

Tookie frowned. “What’s happening to you?” she demanded. “Why are you crying?” She certainly hadn’t expected this from
Ci~L. Rage, yes. Fury, certainly. Painful death at her hands, absolutely. But not desperate sobs.

“It—it’s my … my fault,” Ci~L blubbered into the concrete. “It’s m-my fault. M-my … f-f-f-ault!” She could hardly get the words out through her choking sobs.

Tookie blinked at her.
The sacrifices
. Clearly Ci~L was racked with guilt over what she’d done to earlier sacrificial girls, perhaps to become a Triple7.

Then Ci~L turned to Dylan, Piper, and Shiraz.
“With all my powers, I should have been able to save you!”
she screamed.

The girls looked at each other, confused. “Save them?” Tookie repeated in a whisper.

“I don’t think she is meaning Unicas,” Shiraz said.

Ci~L took in huge gulps of air, whirling around to face the Obelisks. “I miss you s-s-so much!” Then she collapsed onto the base of the Obelisks, her forehead against the tallest pillar. “Every day I told you that you were good enough, special enough,
beautiful
enough, that you deserved to be at Modelland. All I wanted was for you to know how amazing you were, how perfect you were just as you were. I should have shut the hell up when I noticed your night sweats, your headaches, your bulging veins. It’s my fault you got sick and caught the …”

“Who is she talking to?” Piper murmured. “She needs to be hospitalized.”

Then Ci~L rose once more, and turned to the mountain.
“You killed them!”
she yelled to the mountain, her whole body shaking.
“Bloody murderer!”

She turned back to the Obelisks. “I searched for you,” she moaned. “I searched and searched. I couldn’t find you. But I kept
searching. And then I found you, underneath. I dug and dug and dug till my hands bled, and there you were …” Ci~L smiled dazedly, as though in a dream. “… all three of you. I don’t know how long you were buried, but you still looked so beautiful to me. And we were together again. But you didn’t wake up. You wouldn’t open your eyes!”

Then Ci~L whirled again and pulled on Tookie’s arm. Tookie reared back, afraid, but Ci~L’s face was crumpled and extremely vulnerable. “Help me, Tookie,” Ci~L whispered. “Help me open their eyes. Help me wake them up.”

Tookie stared at the Intoxibella. All at once, everything she’d assumed about Ci~L flipped upside down. She still wasn’t sure what was tormenting the Intoxibella, but one thing was certain: Ci~L was not guilty of murder. The guilt she felt right now was over something far more abstract, something more like bereavement and failure.

When Tookie didn’t move, Ci~L groaned and fingered the reed on the ground, preparing it for her back once more. Moving quickly, Tookie reached out and grabbed her wrist. “Ci~L! Stop it!”

Ci~L paused and stared at her through cloudy, dazed eyes.

“Please, Ci~L!” Tookie sank to her knees in front of her. “Give me the reed. You can’t do this to yourself. Not anymore.”

Ci~L clutched the reed hard. “I deserve this! I need to pay for what I’ve done!” Her eyes darted to Dylan, Piper, and Shiraz. “I need to pay for not saving you!”

“Ci~L, look at me,” Tookie commanded. “You’re not talking about
them
, are you?” she asked tentatively, gesturing to her friends. “You’re talking about someone else, right? Someone who died in the Diabolical Divide?”

Ci~L shut her eyes tightly, as though reliving some terrible, debilitating pain all over again. “My sister-friends from home—Hendal, Woodlyn, and Katherine. When I became a Triple7 Intoxibella, the first thing I did after that tournament was teleportal back home so I could celebrate with the three of them. I told them they were worthy, that Modelland’s rules were ridiculous and that they deserved to be there more than I did. Hendal was so beautiful, so voluptuous, with bright lavender eyes. Woodlyn’s hair and skin were pale and luminescent like a full moon, and Katherine was so tiny and had the cutest freckles and the most luxurious curly brown hair.”

Tookie flinched. She looked over her shoulder at Dylan, Shiraz, and Piper. Their mouths hung open in shock.

Tookie turned back to Ci~L. “So what happened that got you in so much trouble with the BellaDonna?”

Ci~L shut her eyes. “Because of my SixxSensa power, I feel things intensely. I was living in an amazing penthouse in LaDorno, and my sister-friends would visit me every day after I finished with photo shoots, Run-a-Ways, posing for my picture on Metopian money, being the guest of honor at parties thrown by royalty, worldwide televised poetry slams, and autograph signings. My life was an insane dream overnight, but I would always, every day, run back to them. But when a week passed and there was no sign of them, I knew something was wrong, and I knew exactly where to go. To the Divide. The creatures there are like things you wouldn’t even see in your worst nightmares, and there were moments I wasn’t sure I’d get through it alive. But I found my sister-friends, one by one. Two were buried and … I … I dug up their bodies with my bare hands. I was planning to trot their bodies through
LaDorno in my own personal parade to show the world—it was time people understood that Modelland’s narrow beauty ideals are flawed and in need of a change. But Gunnero got wind of my plan and went on a search for me. Luckily, I heard about his pursuit before he caught me, so I quickly created this monument in my sister-friends’ honor and buried them here.” She pointed to the Obelisks. “I couldn’t parade their bodies through the town square, but this was the next best thing I could do. Then I gave myself up to him.”

Dylan backed up from the three pillars. “Wait. There are dead
bodies
under here?”

“Body Girl …,” Shiraz whispered.

Ci~L nodded and fought back another sob. “That’s why the BellaDonna has been punishing me.”

Piper rocked on her heels. “Why didn’t LaDorno just demolish the three Obelisks when they first went up?”

Ci~L wiped her bloody hands on her shirt. “Most people in LaDorno thought the Obelisks were some kind of mystical sign, and in the six months after I put them there, tourism increased tenfold, so the mayor allowed them to stay. The BellaDonna demanded they be taken down, but she has no jurisdiction over Metopia. So she takes her frustration out on me.” Suddenly, Ci~L’s face twisted with pain, and she gripped her stomach and raised the reed to beat herself once more.

Tookie caught her arm again. “Don’t.
Please
. What happened is
not
your fault. You can’t literally beat yourself up over this. You were chosen to be an Intoxibella—a Triple7, Ci~L. And you’ve used your fame to spread your message all over the world, and everyone loves you. Your friends … yes, they’re dead, gone forever. But they still live inside of you. And now, inside of Piper and
Shiraz and Dylan. Maybe it’s time to let them go. Let their souls rest. So that
you
can rest.”

Ci~L shook her head. “But Tookie, I feel like my soul is dead. I feel so lost. Like I’ve gone insane.”

“With all due respect, Ci~L, I must agree with your last statement,” Piper murmured.

“Me too,” Shiraz said. “You cry lots, but how we know you still won’t do the tortures to us? The killings?”

Ci~L flinched. “Hold up.
Kill
you?”

“First there is the experimenting,” Shiraz clarified. “And then the killings.”

Ci~L blinked hard. “
Killing?
Are you serious? Do you realize how I rebelled to get you three to Modelland? The rules I broke? On The Day of Discovery, you weren’t on the list they gave me. I got rid of that thing and specifically chose you three instead.”

“So we really
weren’t
on the list,” Piper said morosely.

“No, you weren’t.” Ci~L shrugged. “The only one who was on the list was Tookie. She was the first pickup, and when I saw how unusual-looking she was, I thought maybe this was my chance. I could be a renegade. Pick girls
I
wanted, girls who could make up for Hendal’s, Woodlyn’s, and Katherine’s deaths. It was my experiment. My grand project.”

“But why
me
?” Tookie blurted out. “Why did Modelland want
me
on the list? You just said I’m unusual-looking!”

Ci~L raised her hands helplessly. “I’m sorry, Tookie. I don’t know.”

Shiraz still didn’t look convinced. “But you looking at us so strangely in class!” she protested. “You give us evil eye! Like you want to squash us like bug!”

Ci~L winced. “If I’ve been looking at you like that, I’m sorry.
It’s just … you remind me so much of
them
. Your spunk, your sassiness, your intelligence. Do you know how refreshing it is to have girls like you at Modelland? It’s never been done before! So sometimes I stare at you and can’t believe I did it—I can’t believe I actually got you to Modelland, and I can’t believe I figured out a way to get the BellaDonna to
keep
you there. And then I get flashbacks of my sister-friends and my mind starts doing crazy things. I’m sorry if I scared you—it was a combination of crazy and tough love. But I feel like you’re making a huge leap … for
all
of us. For girls everywhere. You too, Tookie. Don’t think you’re excluded from this.”

Tookie and the others exchanged uncertain glances. Tookie thought of the terrifying conversation she’d overheard in the BellaDonna’s chambers not long ago and realized she’d had it all wrong. They were Ci~L’s experiments, all right … but not in the way she thought.

“But … we’re
not
at Modelland anymore,” Piper said slowly. She gestured around at the Ladornian skyline. “Obviously.”

“And that’s why I’m here. To bring your butts back,” Ci~L said.

“How did you know we left?” Tookie asked. “How did you know to follow us?”

Ci~L put her hands on her hips and looked down at Tookie. “Girl, I have SixxSensa. One of my Triple7 powers, remember? That look on your face when I was taking you to ManAttack … I just
felt
that something was up.” Then she checked the kaleido-watch on her wrist. “Oh Lordy. They’re gonna notice you’re gone soon, and I can just see Gunnero’s bitchy little face if he catches us. Then you all
really
won’t be able to come back to Modelland. C’mon now. We gots ta go!”