Alex's+Second+LInk

Laurella didn’t really want to go after Gregory into the Forbidden Forest, not after the things she’d heard about it. She just crossed her fingers and hoped for the best for Gregory. Maybe he would be all right on his own. She decided to explore Fairy City to put her mind at ease, or at least to distract herself from her worries. She walked all around the pristine area, marveling at the enormous sparkling buildings and all the friendly fairies she bumped into on the way. She saw the Fairy City Hall and the Fairy Library of Congress. She looked at all the monuments to famous fairies of the past, ranging from scholars to warriors to political activists. She ate fairy food (which ended up being little more than skim milk and honey). She even wandered into less prestigious areas of the city, including the slum district, where there were many homeless and pan-handling fairies. Organized fairy crime acted out in the open there, and fairy children joined street gangs. After a few days, Laurella went to the Fairy King again. By this time she had become quite good friends with the King, who enjoyed her company as a celebrity, being the only human in all of Fairy City. But something was bothering Laurella. “Excuse me, Mr. Fairy King, sir. When Gregory was here and ran away into the Forbidden Forest, you said something about him being schizophrenic. But I don’t understand.” And the kind Fairy King replied, “That’s right. Gregory does have schizophrenia, and I wanted to cure him of it. You see, we’re all a part of Gregory’s imagination. I hate to tell you this, Laurella, but none of us really exist.” Laurella was shocked. “But if you ‘cured’ him, then, what would happen to all of us?” “We’d go away, Laurella,” the Fairy King continued. “We’d go away for a long time, and I’m not sure exactly what would happen to us. I know it’s scary, but if you think about it, and if you really do care about Gregory, you’ll want what’s best for him. And ideally, he wouldn’t have us around to make him crazy. He’d fit into society more readily and succeed.” “I suppose so,” Laurella said with a sigh. She felt scared but she did want to help her friend. “The only problem,” the Fairy King went on, “is that Gregory is lost in the Forbidden Forest, as you know. And I would be a very poor king if I sent even my best fairies in after him. They’d be walking to their own deaths. On the other hand... I suppose there is one possibility. But, no, no, never mind.” “What is it?” Laurella cried desperately. “I’ll try anything.” “Well, Laurella, I didn’t want to tell you this, but you remember Phineas McMaster? Well, he’s here in Gregory’s mind, too. He actually operates a nuclear power plant a few miles outside of Fairy City.” “So, you’re saying... that we could overload the nuclear reactors at the power plant, causing a meltdown, wiping out all of Fairy City and us, thusly curing Gregory?” “That’s right,” the King said. “But there’s a problem. Phineas is a bad fairy, and does anything he can to cause trouble. Normally blowing up Fairy City might sound like a grand idea to him, but he wouldn’t do it simply to get in the way of our plans to cure Gregory!” “Oh, don’t you worry,” Laurella said. “I’ll handle that.” Hours later, Laurella had Phineas, who turned out to be the smallest as well as most irritating of all fairies, pinned against the ground. She was about to give him a wet willy when Phineas finally caved in. “Okay, okay,” he said. “I’ll cause the plant to self-destruct.” And with that, he hit a button on the wall. Somewhere a siren went off. But before Laurella even had time to say any good-byes, the place exploded terrifically. Most of Fairy City was vaporized, but what wasn’t eventually burned to the ground from the infectious fires that raged in the streets. Fallout poisoning took care of those who were not killed in the direct blast, and before long there were no remaining signs of life in Fairy City. Gregory never heard from any of his friends again. His parents never heard him talking about his friend “Laurella” anymore, so they were relieved. They thought he was okay. But everything was not okay in Gregory’s mind. He walked around aimlessly and without a purpose. He never could make new friends, and so spent most of his time alone. As the years went by, he left home for the city, where he drifted around backstreets, talking to no one. He turned to hard drugs, the only way he could touch fragments of the past with his fingertips, but he was never able to fully grasp the memory of Laurella again. He suffered terribly from lonliness and darkness eventually enshrouded his tormented mind. = **THE END** = = =