The Fandom(103)

I shove my fingers into my head as if I can somehow reach into my brain and untangle all the information. ‘But if the Fandom created you, how do you have a childhood, a past? It makes no sense. Your existence could only have begun when the story started.’

‘There are many paradoxes involved in transdimensional quantum resonance, which I do not expect your monkey brain to understand. Perhaps an analogy will help. Another perpetual loop – the chicken and the egg.’

‘Which came first,’ I whisper. Baba used this same analogy; she was taunting me even then.

‘Yes. Well done. I’ll get you a banana. Did the Fandom create us, or did we create the Fandom? Did the book create us, or did we create the book? It matters not. It’s a question which cannot be resolved. Both are true – our universes are symbiotic – the Gems have childhoods, we have a history, we even share a history with your universe. But time flows differently in our universe.’

‘I don’t get it.’ I feel so stupid. I wish Nate were here; he would do his Sheldon Cooper thing and he would understand. I feel his loss intensely, a hollowing-out of where my heart should be.

‘No, I don’t suppose you do.’

I swallow back the tears, try and slow my breathing. ‘So why am I here?’ I finally ask.

‘That’s the thing with a genetic super-race. We can solve most problems, given enough time. We devised a way to breach the layer between our universes. A way to reach her.’ He points to the portrait of Sally King.

‘But . . . Sally King is dead.’

‘She is now. But she wasn’t. You remember how she died?

‘She killed herself.’

‘Because of the voices in her head?’ He taps his temple with a long, elegant finger. ‘Sometimes the mad aren’t really mad.’

‘The voice was you?’

He nods. ‘I tried to convince Miss King to write a sequel and break the loop.’

I look at Sally’s face, the sadness behind those oversized glasses. ‘You killed her?’ I feel such anger, such hatred, towards this man. For Sally, for Nate, for Matthew, for all the Imps he’s killed. I lift my teacup to my lips to avoid speaking, afraid I might shout or scream or curse.

‘Not intentionally. She was our only hope. The problem was, when she started The Gallows Dance sequel, we had artistic differences.’ He smiles to himself. ‘She wanted the Imps to prevail. I did not. I’m afraid I may have pushed her too far.’

‘She died protecting the future of the Imps?’ I recall the pelican again – giving life with its own blood – and a brief smile touches my lips.

He ignores me. ‘But then a new hope emerged. A rising fanfic writer.’

A clear image forms in my mind’s eye. Bronzed legs wrapped around bronzed legs, almost like two stems twisted together, opening out into two separate blooms. The sleeping lovers – the two blooms – almost form the shape of a heart. I reach for my necklace then remember I broke it. My best friend, the fanfic writer, the beautiful Imp who loves a Gem. It almost hurts to say her name. ‘Alice.’

The President nods. ‘Anime Alice. Thanks to her, a new Fandom grew, holding the promise of a new story, an existence beyond this eternal loop. We could feel their presence, this new Fandom. We began noticing tiny changes in canon, new characters appearing, little glitches here and there. Alas, nothing dramatic enough to change our future, to break the loop. But imagine if this Alice returned to your world and wrote a sequel, a published story which reached a whole new audience. We would have a Fandom powerful enough to break the loop. We would have a future.’

‘You would have another book – another loop.’

He claps, long and slow. ‘You must be one of those clever monkeys that can sign and do tricks for peanuts. No. What we will have is an opportunity. Who knows what will occur once we are freed. Your A plus B equals C logic is rather antiquated.’

I feel my brow knot together, hear the rattle of porcelain against porcelain as my legs continue to shake. ‘So why am I here?’

‘We realized our mistake when Sally King died. Sally was pro-Imp, of course. She is an Imp, you all are in your universe. And telling her to be pro-Gem, it just didn’t work. We needed Alice to live like a Gem, to become a Gem, to learn what animals the Imps truly are. So now, when she returns to your world and writes us our sequel, she won’t remember her little adventure, but she will be Gem through and through. She will create a future in which we Gems would like to live.’

I begin to feel sick. ‘It was you? You brought us here from Comic-Con?’ The trill of the teacup crescendos and abruptly stops as the cup topples. Hot tea soaks into my thighs, but I barely register the pain.

The President just laughs. ‘Yes. Like I said, we have brilliant scientists. If you like I can bring one of them in. He will explain the quantum physics of transdimensional tunnelling, but I fear your primate brain may explode, and I’m wearing my favourite suit.’

I look at my cup, broken on the floor. Two perfect halves. ‘And does Alice know about this?’

‘No. Alice knows nothing. As far as she’s concerned, she’s having a lovely time living with the Gems. She still thinks so long as you don’t complete the canon, she gets to continue living here. If she knew the truth she would feel . . . manipulated.’