“Not on purpose! And you hurt Harper!”
“I didn’t mean to!” I say defensively. “But I want to apologize. I screwed up.”
“Yeah, me too.”
Ahead of us in the streets is a parade—all types of people dressed in cosplay sashay down the avenue to the tune of every fantasy and sci-fi theme the marching band behind them can play. There are Vulcans and mechas and Jedis and Labyrinth goblins, anime demons and zombie pirates and dragonborns and sailor scouts and dark elves—heroes and villains and everyone in between. Whatever apologies we were about to make to each other for messing up our friendships fall away as we’re caught up in the magic. I’m filled with the memories of stargazing on hotel rooftops and singing the Starfield theme off-key with a bunch of strangers I didn’t know but understood and seeing all of those radiant Amaras through the viewfinder of a camera—
And all of the stories I want to tell.
Only when the parade has passed and the street clears do I turn to the girl who could have been me in another impossible universe, and I say, “I want to save Amara.”
WHILE JESS IS GROVELING TO HER ASSISTANT, since he clearly will never want to see me ever again, I fix my pink hair—wig no longer needed—and march straight into ExcelsiCon to gather reinforcements. The moment I flash my badge, my badge, to the attendant and ride the escalator up to the showroom, I feel like myself again, and I breathe in the con stink as if it’s fresh air.
I need to find Milo and Bran. They’re the only ones who can help me with two parts of Jess’s plan, which rides a little on the side of batshit but, to be fair, some of the best ideas do.
“If we’re going to save Amara, we need to prove she exists,” Jess had told me.
I didn’t expect the plan she laid out next. It will take an impossible amount of luck to pull it off, but ExcelsiCon has always excelled at the impossible. I just hope it can work its magic one more time.
At some point I also need to text Harper and tell her the truth. I don’t know if she’ll ever want to be my friend again—especially after I purposefully hoodwinked her into hanging out with someone else—but I can’t not try. Harper and I have been internet friends for years. She’s the one person who believed in my Save Amara initiative when no one else did, and I’ve been the ultimate crappy friend to her.
I just hope Milo and Bran are at my moms’ booth and not at some movie screening. There isn’t enough time to hunt them down, and with my luck they’d be missing.
Instead, when I turn the corner, I find Harper at the booth talking to Milo. They both notice me at the same time—my pink hair does kind of stand out—and their conversation instantly dies.
Welp. There’s nothing quite as uninviting as ruining good conversation.
My moms are on the other side of the booth, by the FunkoPop throne, assisting a customer buying that gorgeous Nightwing figurine—you know, the one with the really nice butt?—and I hurry over to Milo and Harper sporting my best apologetic smile.
Harper watches me wearily as I approach. “So, you’re Imogen.”
“Hi, Harps,” I say painfully.
She doesn’t look as surprised as I thought she would. Even worse, she looks disappointed. “So the other person really was…”
“It’s a long story. I’m sorry—”
“Sorry?” she interrupts with a scoff.
I wince. “I know. But trust me, we didn’t think—” But I realize that whatever excuse I have doesn’t account for how long we lied. “I’m sincerely sorry, Harper. But it’s so nice to see you in person.”
She sighs. “This is so messed up. Because I…” But then she trails off and shakes her head. “It’s just messed up.”
“So why’re you here and not Jess? Did she get bored?” Milo asks.
I sneak a look at our moms. “Can we go behind the booth for a moment?”
From the back of the booth, Bran pops his head out. “Ooh, are we about to learn some secrets?”
“You deserve the truth,” I say. “All of you.” I look at Harper, and she nods decisively.
While our moms are distracted, I corral Harper and Milo into the storage space with Bran. Milo has to hunch over to squeeze inside the small space, and we all barely fit. I take a deep breath, and then I tell them what Jess told me. About the script, and the thief, and the internet comments trolling her mercilessly.
“Why are they saying it’s her fault that Carmindor dies?” Harper asks. “That doesn’t make any sense. Amara died—ohh-hh. They’re blaming her for dying, which is why Carmindor is dying.”
“That makes about as much sense as their usernames,” Bran says. “LukeSkywanker69. Huh. Nice.”
“Babe,” Milo chides.
I take my phone out of Bran’s hands and deposit it in my back pocket. “So will you help us? Jess and I need to track down the thief who’s posting these excerpts. We think they’re going to post who the script belongs to and out Jessica during the panel in two hours.”
Bran shakes his head. “That isn’t a lot of time.”
“We think we know who it is—Vance Reigns—we just need to prove it. That’s where you come in. We were thinking, Bran, that since you’re our tech wizard genius, you could hack into the thief’s Twitter account and then hack into the phone, and when we give you the cue, make the phone light up or something and—”
“Imogen, I appreciate that you think I’m a tech wizard, but I’m not that magical,” he interrupts. “And that’s illegal.”
Well, crap.
Everyone’s quiet.
Then Harper asks, “Can you hack into the account?”
“I mean, that’s the easy part,” he replies. “Still illegal, but yes.”
“Then could you get the phone number linked to the account and call it?”
“Oh yes, I can definitely do that.”
“Harper, that’s genius,” I say and then turn to my brother. “And now for the other part of the plan…”
Milo quirks a bushy eyebrow. “There’s another part?”
“Jess needs your help to steal the Princess Amara dress from the exhibit. That’s going to be the hard part.”
My brother blinks and then leans in to me. “Excuse me, what did you just say?”
“You are going to steal the one-of-a-kind, ultra special, super important Princess Amara ballroom gown on display in the exhibit. With Jess.”
“Oh, okay. That’s what I thought you said.”
“And Harper’s going to help too,” I add, nodding to my friend, who doesn’t seem too keen on the idea. She will, won’t she? She’s been with Jess this whole time, so I’m sure she won’t mind. I put my hand in the middle of us. “Okay, who’s with me!”
Milo and Bran exchange a look—communicating in a second that this plan is about as bulletproof as Princess Amara driving a spaceship into the Black Nebula—but they put their hands over mine anyway, three-fourths to completing our friendship circle. “Harps?” I say, glancing to the last person on our team.
Her brows crease, and she sighs and shakes her head. “I’m sorry. I’ve been pulled along in this scheme long enough. I gotta get back to my booth. Good luck, Monster.”