Chapter 35
Charlie watched as his evil father gasped for air and fell to his knees.
His eyes closed, and he then disintegrated.
The black substances left behind from his evil father blew away into the sky and disappeared out of sight.
Evil Joe was gone for good.... And now his army of undead were no longer under his order.
The undead watched as their master vanished, then turned back to Charlie, who had killed him.
Charlie put up his sword. Rocky put up his fists. Sheila turned into her full cursed form again. They were ready to fight back.
But Will and Starr were weak again.
“What do we do now?” responded Starr.
“Um...I’m not sure,” replied Will. “But I still have this.” He held the Book of the Underground out in front of him.
Then Jacob shouted something at them. “You two, with me!” he ordered them as he appeared to be standing next to the well.
“I guess we’re going in there,” responded Will.
“Come on,” said Starr, following Jacob.
Will followed.
And the final showdown was on. The undead came charging at Charlie, Sheila, and Rocky at the same time they came charging for them.
Sheila leaped up on top of one and ripped its head off. The creature momentarily disintegrated.
Charlie sliced one in half, leaped up into the air, came crashing down on another, grabbed it by the horns as it struggled to break free of his grip, and stabbed that one as well.
Rocky began smashing the undead once again, throwing a few into the air and back down to the ground, knocking the life out of them.
The undead stood no chance against the three powerful heroes.
Will and Starr got to the well where Jacob was standing.
“Come on, let’s go,” ordered Jacob.
“You’re crazy,” replied Will.
Starr was confused.
“Here,” said Jacob, handing them what was a rope attached to the ground next to them, the other end at the bottom of the well. “You first.”
Will stood there. Why am I doing this? he thought.
“Come on, let’s go!” ordered Jacob.
Will took the rope and began to climb down the well.
“Thatta boy, you’ve got this,” said Jacob.
It was Starr’s turn now….
Without warning an undead entity then grabbed a hold of Starr from behind her and pulled her away from the well. She screamed.
Will could hear her scream from below. “Starr!”
But Jacob wasn’t strong or fast enough to save her. Four or five of the undead entities were already too close to him. He knocked one out with his fist then took the rope leading to the bottom of the well. “She’ll be fine, my friend, everything will be taken care of shortly!” he informed Will as he began climbing down the well.
“Are you sure?!” questioned Will.
“Yes, now forget about your girlfriend right now, we have bigger problems to take care of!”
Will shut up.
“Do you have the book?” asked Jacob.
“Right here,” replied Will, and he handed him the Book of the Underground.
Outside of the well, Charlie, Rocky and Sheila continued to fight the undead.
After taking out a couple more of them, Sheila decided that it was now the time. “Come on, Charlie, we need to get to the well, this isn’t going to end!”
“Okay,” he replied. He quickly looked around for Rocky, who was now on top of the building of the library.
A bunch of undead entities eagerly were waiting for Rocky to drop back down. Rocky then jumped off of the building in a body- slam, landing in the center of the giant pit of undead. He smashed at least six of them all at once.
“Rocky!” called Charlie. He whistled. “Come on!”
Rocky got back up to his feet, looked up at Charlie, and began making his way towards him. He knocked out a few more of the creatures along the way.
Sheila then grabbed Charlie without warning and flew him to the well. She entered through the wide tunnel with him and was shortly at the bottom.
They entered the dark room in the well where Jacob and Will appeared to be standing. The room with the portal that Charlie had been captured and taken through when he was brought to Dultona’s castle by the Hunter.
Rocky followed closely behind. As soon as he got to the well he jumped in, throwing one of the undead out of the way on his way down.
The creature that got knocked out was reaching its arms down the well as if it thought it could actually grab a hold of someone.
Rocky pounded his feet down on the surface at the bottom of the well as he landed.
Charlie, Will, Sheila, Jacob and of course, Rocky, had all now made it into the well. And it was time to close the portal to the Underground.
“Alright, now that we’re all here, Jacob, let’s get this over and done with,” ordered Sheila.
“I’m already working on it,” he replied, kneeling down in front of the shiny blood-red portal on the wall in front of him, the words “Portal to the Underground” and “Enter Here” with the red arrow next to it in graffiti.
In Jacob’s hands were the Book of the Underground.
“Alright, there should be a page in here
somewhere,” he said aloud as he paged through the book, eventually stopping at a page near the end. “Found it.”
In the page was a picture of a blood-red portal, just like the one on the wall in front of them, with writing underneath it.
Charlie, Will, Sheila and Rocky all watched as Jacob kept his eyes on the page in the book and began to read the paragraph of writing below the picture of the portal.
He read it aloud. It was in that weird other language, so no one could really understand what he was saying.
As he read it, a breeze began to blow.
“What’s happening?” asked Will.
“It’s supposed to happen,” replied Sheila.
Charlie just continued to stare along with Rocky as Jacob continued reading.
The breeze began to grow heavier.
Jacob finished the last line of text and closed the Book of the Underground immediately. He then turned to face Charlie, Sheila, Will, and Rocky. “Alright, we must hurry...there’s a storm coming.”
Charlie and Will grew looks of shock on their faces.
Sheila turned to them. “Relax, boys.”
Jacob turned to Sheila. “Sheila, you must make your decision now, are you leaving or staying?”
“Staying.”
Charlie was happy to hear this again. Sheila was finally free from the Underground. And ready to return to the civilian world. But what about Rocky?? He thought. Oh, no.
“Alright, whoever is returning to the Underground, say so now,” ordered Jacob. He looked up at Rocky. “That includes you, big guy.”
It was time for Rocky to return to the Underground.
Charlie wanted to cry. He hadn’t thought much about the fact that he was going to have to say goodbye to Rocky sooner or later. They had already lost Ted... and now Rocky?? The big guy had helped Charlie escape Dultona’s castle and the forest. And Charlie had given him that nickname while they were in the room of cells.
It was a tough thing to do, but Charlie had to say his goodbye to the big hero who had helped him go a long way in the Underground. No matter how sad he was to leave Rocky, he needed to do what had to be done.
Rocky then did something that made Charlie maybe a little more emotional than he thought he was. He reached out his hand and placed it on Charlie’s shoulder. “Goodbye, Charlie,” he said.
Charlie couldn’t help but to break down. “I’m going to miss you, Rocky,” he said to him as he wiped a tear from his face.
He then decided maybe a hug would be nice. He stepped up close to Rocky and gave him a big hug, wrap
ping his arms around his enormous rock- built body.
Charlie couldn’t let go. He was going to miss him.
But time was running out and the portal was about to close. And Rocky had to leave.
He let go of him and smiled at him once more. Rocky smiled back.
“Goodbye, Rocky.”
And with that being said, Rocky turned around and disappeared through the portal. He was gone.
Charlie wiped one last tear from his face and turned around to see that Will was wiping tears from his eyes as well. He couldn’t help but to laugh a bit as he witnessed his best friend actually getting emotional. “What are you crying about?”
“I’m sorry, I’m just....I can be a little emotional sometimes.”
“Ah, come here, Will,” he said to his best friend, reaching out to give him a brotherly hug. “I love you, bro.”
“I love you, too, bro.”
It all then ended abruptly.
“Alright, we need to get out of here as soon as possible, it’s about to get dangerous!” ordered Jacob.
That’s right, we almost forgot about the storm, thought Charlie.
The four then exited the well from a wooden ladder stored in the room next to them that Charlie hadn’t realized was there before.
Jacob placed the ladder up against the side of the well, and they began to climb.
Sheila held it in place and once Charlie, Will, and Jacob had all reached the top, she flew herself out.
Now that they were out of the well, the four hurried to shelter. They ran for the giant hole dug up by the dragon earlier when Charlie, Sheila and Rocky had returned through the portal from the secret room in the castle.
Charlie, Will, and Jacob quickly stepped into the giant hole in the ground next to the building of the library, chunks of loose dirt with patches of grass all around it.
Sheila flew to it, landing next to her friends.
“So what exactly is happening?” asked Will loudly over the heavy wind that was increasing.
“Don’t ask questions, we all need to get as low as possible!” ordered Jacob.
“Down here!” ordered Sheila, who appeared to have gone far enough down into the pit to look about the size of some sort of small animal.
“Let’s go!” ordered Charlie to Will, and they began making their way towards the bottom of the pit.
Jacob followed, quickly turning back into the black cat as he made his way to the bottom.
They soon were all at the bottom of the pit. It was now time to wait until the storm was over.
The storm continued to increase, the heavy wind growing stronger and stronger. It eventually was fierce enough to whistle throughout the entire town of East River.
From a downtown street, the Sheriff appeared to have returned to town in his police car, now with Sharon and Tara in the back of the car. Up ahead of them was the main street, where a few buildings were on fire and a bunch of abandoned cars were holding it up as a result of the undead and their fleeing victims.
“Alright, I’ll have to stop the car here and search for him on feet, there’s no way we’re getting through all of those vehicles,” informed the sheriff as he parked the police car next to what appeared to be a playground and stepped out. He then walked to the rear door on the driver’s side and opened it to let Sharon and Tara out.
“So what do we do?” asked Sharon, getting out.
“Wait here with your daughter.”
“But-”
“Just stay by the car, I’ll be back in a – whoa!”
The sheriff and Sharon both looked up towards the sky and noticed the big tornado-like whirl of wind forming in the center of town.
The force of the wind then abruptly affected him and the surrounding area. All they could hear was the sound of the wind.
But this wasn’t a tornado. Above it was what appeared to be the sky opening up into what was a circular bright-red light... a giant portal in the sky.
“Stay, Tara,” ordered Sharon to her daughter, who was about to step out of the vehicle.
“What’s going on, Mommy?” she asked from the backseat.
“I’m not sure, Sweetie.” Sharon was in shock.
From the center of town, the remaining creatures of the undead stared up at the giant whirlwind from where they stood in a street next to the East River High School.
Once the wind had reached them, it affected them in a very strange way. Their mouths suddenly dropped open and their eyes rolled to the back of their heads as the black smoky substance trapped inside each of their bodies then appeared to exit them slowly, leaving them lifeless. Their bodies collapsed in place.
The black substances flowed up into the sky, and what appeared to be evil-looking faces were then formed in the substance as they were sucked away into the giant whirlwind.
They were evil spirits of the Underground, most likely from the Lake of Souls, that had been taking control of the people of the town and had formed Joe’s army of undead... the Soulites that Ted had mentioned about back at his hut.
The evil spirits eventually were sucked into the whirlwind and were no longer visible when they reached the giant portal directly above it.
Sharon, the sheriff, and Tara continued to watch as the storm was now sucking the strange black smoke into it and up into the portal.
“What is that?” asked Sharon loudly over the wind.
“I’m not sure!” replied the sheriff.
Tara then yelled to her mother from the back of the police car. “Mommy!”
Sharon and Sheriff Wesley both turned to her, who was pointing at something.
They looked towards the direction she was pointing to see some sort of giant brown creature with a tail flying towards them.
“GET DOWN!” ordered the sheriff, throwing himself and Sharon to the ground.
What was the dead body of Nightwing flew past them, nearly hitting them as it was pulled towards the whirlwind.
Sharon got back to her feet. “What in the world?!”
The sheriff stood back up too and his eyes lit up as together they watched the lifeless dragon get sucked into the giant portal, tail first.
“Whoa,” spoke Tara, staring up at the sky.
Meanwhile, Charlie, Will, Sheila, and Jacob were still waiting for the storm to end from the giant pit in the ground next to the library, where the eye of the storm was taking place above the well. They laid there against the slanted surface of dirt as close to the bottom as they could get.
“When is it going to stop?” asked Will.
“I’m not sure!” replied Jacob.
Charlie just laid there quietly in between his sword and Sheila, facing her.
She was smiling at him. “As soon as this is over, you have no idea how thankful I am, Charlie,” she told him, placing her hand on his. She then looked down at his hand and appeared to be admiring his Blue Ring he acquired from the Black Cave.
Charlie smiled back at her, then turned his head back the other way and planted his face down on his left arm, which was held up in front of him, and closed his eyes.
The wind stopped abruptly and everything faded to black....
Chapter 36