The Color of Fear (16 page)

“How awesome is that?” Caitlin said. “A mind-reading forest.”

“Can it pick winning lottery numbers?” Natalie chirped.

Caitlin’s head abruptly tilted to one side. “Hey, I have a question.”

Rapunzel nodded, encouraging her to ask.

“The atoms in our world,” Caitlin said, “They’re made up of protons, electrons, and neutrons. So what are the particles of imagination made of?”

Natalie eyes lit up. “Yeah—excellent question.”

Rapunzel and her friends shared a troubled look. Rapunzel then turned back to Caitlin. “That’s one of the reasons why you need to see the caterpillar. He’ll have the answer to such a question.”

Sleeping Beauty tugged at Rapunzel’s shoulder. “We’re losing time.”

Rapunzel nodded and looked Caitlin straight in the face.

“Now concentrate hard, Caitlin. Think about where you want to go.”

Caitlin responded with an expectant look. “To the hideout of the caterpillar, correct?”

Rapunzel’s face soured. “Sounds more like a question than an answer. That’s just the kind of doubt that will leave you stuck in the woods for a couple of centuries. You have to be certain about where you’re going!”

Caitlin’s eyes darted around, restlessly surveying the expanse of forest. She had to get this right.

“I’m going to see the caterpillar. Pronto!”

Rapunzel grinned. “Better.” She turned to the group. “Everyone ready?”

Caitlin wasn’t sure if she’d ever really be ready for this. She had no idea where the caterpillar’s hideout was or why they were going there. The only thing she knew about the caterpillar was that he appeared in
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
, which her mom had read to her almost every night when she was younger. Caitlin remembered that the caterpillar smoked a hookah. And now, apparently, she learned he had given that up in favor of drinking organic tea. But to her, the idea of getting stuck in a forest for centuries was unsettling to say the least—and total claustrophobic hell at the very worst!

Inhale.

Exhale.

Caitlin rotated her head around and around, relaxing her neck muscles. “Yeah, okay,” she said. “I’m ready.”

She took a hesitant step toward the edge of the tree line. Zeno’s Forest loomed large before her.

The six girls simultaneously stepped into the ominous blue forest, first with one foot, then the other.

Before Caitlin could blink, Rapunzel, Cindy, Beauty, Snow, and Natalie blurred into twisting, liquid forms, and then at hyper-speed
—

SWOOOOOSH!

They were gone!

The memory of Rapunzel’s voice hovered like particles in the air around Caitlin, a dreamy tone with a hollow echo.

Caitlin kept walking, but she didn’t generate any motion, like in a nightmare. The dread of paralysis toyed with her mind, pushing her toward total panic. She tried running, but no scenery passed her by. She remained imprisoned in the same spot. Her muscles stiffened like cement. She opened her mouth to holler for help.

Before she could, another twisting, blurry form streaked toward her at lightning speed.

SWOOOOSH!

The blur thickened until it looked like pudding. Standing there before her were Natalie and the zombie girls. They stared at Caitlin in bewilderment.

Profoundly relieved, Caitlin threw her arms up into the air. “What happened?”

Rapunzel shook her head. Cinderella put her hands on her waist and exhaled. Snow stared at Caitlin with sympathetic eyes. Beauty was admiring a few green pines still left in the forest.

Rapunzel extended her arm. “Still too much skepticism. Push your thoughts aside and take my hand. I’ll help you through the forest. Until you get the hang of it.”

And with that,
SWOOOOOSH!,
off they rocketed at unfathomable speed, deep into Zeno’s Forest on their way to the secret hideout of the wise caterpillar.

The one who traded his hookah for a teacup.

Jack rode fast and
hard on the back of his new friend Alfonzo the Frog Prince. His vaulted, jarring strides made Jack feel as though he were riding a riotous bucking bull.

“How long ’til we get there?”

“Worry not, amigo, we will find this Caitlin of yours.”

Together they leaped and bounded through a tall jungle of brown-bladed grass. The air was humid and thick. Sweet nectar—one of the last few nutrients still to be found in this decaying universe—scented the wind.

Alfonzo wove in and out of blades, some wide and withered, some gaunt and narrow. Tall, sapling-like stems suddenly appeared. The stems were a pale shade of green, thicker than the dead trunks of grass. The whole area was somewhat shaded.

Weird. Is this place alive?
Jack wondered.

“I am famished from overexertion,” Alfonzo said. “The honeyed nectar is coming from a plant a short hop away. I shall refuel before we continue our quest.”

Jack slid off Alfonzo’s back. The frog then hurdled his way toward a sweet-smelling pitcher plant.

Jack heard an ominous hiss rustle through the stalks.

“Hehhh … Hehhh … ”

He quickly realized the hissing was coming
from
the stalks.

He cast his glance farther up the meadow. He watched as Alfonzo leaped on top of a large pitcher-shaped plant. When he landed atop the rim, he began licking up puddles of nectar. A split-second later, the Frog Prince’s legs were scurrying in place, as if he was running on a treadmill at breakneck speed.

Alfonzo began sliding down the inside wall of the pitcher. Despite frantic attempts, his feet could not gain traction to push himself back out. Suddenly the Frog Prince slipped and vanished from sight, leaving behind only a fading croak.

Jack’s eyes bulged.

And then, without warning, Jack was swallowed up in one rapacious gulp by a snarling Venus flytrap! Ensnared in its cruel mouth, he felt the oxygen draining out of his lungs fast. Jack jammed his arm between the fangs of the flytrap. He pulled as hard as he could, trying to separate the jaws. He wrenched harder. The jaws widened, and fresh air brushed Jack’s face.

Mucus dripped from the fangs and seeped under his palms. Jack’s hands went slick, and he lost the grip. The jaws snapped shut.

The walls of the plant suddenly began secreting what Jack knew must be digestive juices. The level of liquid on the inside began to rise. Within seconds, Jack was ankle-deep in fluid. He pounded on the plant.

No way I’m dying in the mouth of some flower!

The liquid rose to his knees.

Jack drew his sword. He locked both hands on the hilt. He raised his weapon like a skilled and stalwart knight. He swung that sword with a mighty blow hard against the fangs.

It shattered into a thousand slivered pieces.

Jack had forgotten his sword was a harmless novelty Halloween prop, not a lethal, unsheathed weapon of steel.

No wonder it was pulverized.

The digestive fluids now reached his waist.

Jack reached up and took hold of a narrow slice of plant tissue jutting out from the roof of the plant’s mouth. He hoisted himself up in the air and began to swing, back and forth. When he gained enough momentum, he swung himself full force into the fangs, feet first, kicking as hard as he could. This time he shattered the flytrap’s teeth, crashed through, and leaped out of its mouth. He fell to the ground. His knight outfit was smoking slightly. He rolled in the dirt to wipe off the digestive juices.

Jack stood, grabbed a nearby vine, rolled it tight, and raced over to the pitcher plant. He tied one end of the vine to the base of a plant stalk. Then he tied the other end to his wrist.

Jack heard something. A faint, muffled cry. Coming from inside the plant.

“Help!”

Alfonzo!

“Save me! Amigooo … !”

Jack started climbing the carnivorous plant. When he reached the slippery rim on top, the honeyed scent of nectar kissed his nostrils. It was so sweet it was almost intoxicating.

What a deadly trap this is!

Jack hung onto the rim for dear life, trying not to slide inside. He glanced up. On the other side of the rim was a large centipede, almost the size of Jack. It began crawling along the rim—angling straight for him! Suddenly, the centipede’s fleet of legs started skating on the slick surface. Jack shook the rim. The insect lost all of its footings and plunged down into the pool of digestive enzymes.

“That multilegged arthropod nearly landed on my head!” shouted the Frog Prince from down below. “But I am grateful nonetheless, amigo, for you have kindly come to my aid. Now please get me out of here.”

Balancing as best as he could on the perilous rim of the plant, Jack lowered his upper torso deep into the pitcher cup.

This better be worth it.

He kneeled down so he could reach even deeper. He extended his arms as far as he could.

Alfonzo grabbed hold of Jack’s hand—and that was all it took.

Jack lost his balance and slid down the greasy, leafy wall. He splashed into the pool of acid.

The centipede was next to Jack, struggling to stay afloat, and quickly losing the battle.

Alfonzo treaded gracefully in front of him. He dripped with gastric juices, though, and a thin drift of smoke rose from his flesh. “I have about a minute—and you amigo, have perhaps two minutes—before we disintegrate to the bone and become lunch for this most unpleasant plant.”

The vine was still tied to Jack’s wrist. He pulled it taut and began climbing back up the wall. “Grab onto my leg, and I’ll pull you out.”

Snap!

The vine split, and Jack fell back into the pool.

Now he was
really
getting angry.

“Bloody hell, frog, how about
you
try getting us out of here? My skin’s starting to burn.”

“Well,” Alfonzo said with a sudden gleam in his eye, “wade around to my backside.” Jack swished his way through the thick liquid and stood behind the frog prince. “I usually like to save this move for the ladies,” Alfonzo pointed out, “but here goes.”

Prince Alfonzo began to puff out his vocal sac into the bulging shape of a ball. He puffed some more, inflating his throat until it expanded like a giant hot-air balloon. As the membrane swelled, it pushed back the liquid enzymes in waves. Alfonzo kept puffing until the swollen sac pressed against the inside wall of the plant.

The plant began to inflate. It doubled in size, then tripled.

It swelled and expanded outward until the pitcher cup finally exploded.

Jack and Alfonzo rode a gushing shock wave of digestive fluids out, soared momentarily in the air, and crashed to the earth in a tumbling roll.

Jack leaped up and stripped down to his skivvies, wringing out his smoking tunic and pants.

“I smell fresh water, amigo,” Alfonzo said. “Climb aboard, quick.”

Jack quickly bundled his knight garb under his arm and slid onto the frog prince’s back.

Alfonzo made a beeline to a soft-flowing river coursing through a low-lying section of the meadow. Without stopping at the edge of the riverbank, the frog prince plunged straight into the water with Jack still riding on his back. They dunked under the cold water and splashed around, washing the acidic juices from their bodies and garments.

When they finally emerged from the river, they stretched under the sun-swept sky.

“In no time the sun and wind will dry us like a desert sand dune, amigo.”

A puzzled look then crept over the frog’s face.

“But I am sorry to say that I think I have lost the trail.”

Jack dressed back up in his knight costume, all the while shaking his head as he wondered how he was going to find Caitlin.

A pleasurable “Ooh” emerged from Alfonzo’s mouth as a big blowfly bumbled by. The tip of Alfonzo’s sticky red tongue snatched the bug midair, then quickly rolled back into his mouth. Alfonzo gulped it down.

“
Eating
lunch is far better than
being
lunch.”

Jack winked. “Wouldn’t mind a snack myself.”

Alfonzo nabbed another fly. He held it out to Jack, presenting it ceremoniously on the tip of his tongue. The fly was still alive; it wriggled back and forth, trying to unstick its wings from Alfonzo’s tongue.

Jack gave a dismissive wave of the hand. “Thanks anyway.”

Alfonzo picked the fly off his tongue with two digits on one of his front legs. He held the bug up in front of his eyes, admiring the winged delicacy. “Well in that case, I’m ready for my dessert.”

“Stop!” the fly shouted. “I beg you not to eat me.”

“Flies are a nuisance,” Alfonzo replied to the insect. “You serve no purpose beyond pestering people.”

“I can help you,” the fly pleaded.

Alfonzo laughed. “How could
you
possibly assist
me
?”

“Not you,” the fly replied. “
Him
.”

Jack’s eyebrows rose. “Me?”

The fly nodded. “Let me live, and I’ll reveal vital information. The whereabouts of two humans and a royal foursome.”

Jack fist-pumped the air.

Alfonzo let the fly go. The insect flew over to Jack and landed on his right shoulder.