Day 24

Jem Louise Margaret, having been stabbed by one of the ghosts yesterday, went off on revenge to find said ghost. She found them again, all right. Red offered to take the body back to the lodge and deliver a helpful comment.

Red: It's the final countdown! Na na na na! Na na na na-

Grace: OUT! 

A charter bus would arrive at 10:00 a.m. on Eastern Time. One girl would board it later that day, but which one? Grace knew she would be the one to go home. She was the good girl, the innocent one, not the murderer. If killing someone would help save the rest of the world, so be it. Grace had proved herself capable of killing for the greater good, but this time her death would have more consequences. Or was it always for the greater good? Did perhaps Grace arrange for the confrontation to save her skin? Ghosts couldn't testify in court, but if BHR got away alive... Well, Grace didn't want to think about it.

However, BHR would bet that she was the one going home on that bus. BHR had a family to go home to, a family who would love her no matter what. Would they still love her if she was a murderer? If Grace remained alive, her whole future could be jeopardized. But perhaps BHR was innocent. Perhaps today was the day she would truly become a heroine. Today, she would strike down the murderer of so many friends and be regaled as a blonde heroine at last. She would prove that blondes had the power to do anything when they fought with justice at their side.

Fencing foils had been waiting for the girls at their favorite spots at the dining room table. Who had laid them there? JLM was off on her ghost hunt or dead. The staff members were all out, getting up to whatever shenanigans the ski lodge staff got up to. If the lodge knew the mysterious gift-giver, it wasn't telling. 

The girls drifted around the lodge, avoiding each other and dreading (and also hoping) for the final time when they could face their destinies. The clocks ticked out each second, agonizingly fast, agonizingly slow, like a clockwork heartbeat. Minutes and hours ticked past, all pointing to the final time when the girls would do battle.

Finally, like ghosts they drifted into the large polished ballroom. What had seemed to be a pleasant, light-filled room earlier now seemed to be an execution chamber in the gloomy light of the cloudy day. The fencing foils suddenly seemed to lose their blunt ends and became deadly. As the girls lingered in the ballroom, they grew sharper, thicker, heavier. They began to dance, as befitted a ballroom, but it was a deadly dance. One mistake could mean death. Each dancer suddenly seemed to have more strength, more speed, more skill than they had before. Yesterday, they were ordinary girls, but today they seemed possessed by specters of professional swordfighters. In the heat of battle, no one could tell how much time had passed, but eventually Grace's strength began to flag. Not only was BHR an older girl, but her archery also gave her larger muscles and more stamina. Grace tried to resist her fatigue, but BHR sensed her weakness and increased her attack's feroicity. The foil was swept out of Grace's hand in one move and she dropped to her knees, staring white-eyed at the girl she once knew. The foil in her hand was now much longer and heavier and did not resemble a foil at all. The girl had changed nearly as much: her face bore a wicked smile and oddly vacant eyes.

BHR: I'm so happy you could join me here today, Grace. I'm afraid you won't be going home to your parents after all. I'm told the ghosts are very nice and I'm sure they'll welcome you. I know you'll want revenge, but what can you do? You're all just ghosts, after all, spectral bits of memories, and I have so much power in my hands. I've always been considered a little odd, I suppose, but that's only because people are afraid of me. This place has real power. I can feel it. The ski lodge is alive, Grace. Can't you feel it? The ski lodge has so much power but it can't cause change by itself, so it summons us here to work for it. It tempts us with pretty snow and fun games but in the end, Grace, it's all just a big trap. We've all fallen into it, only I will rise out again at the end, because I listen, Grace. I alone listen to the siren song of power. I am going to tell you a story now, Grace, a story of a group of skiers.

I've always loved wolves, and they're are tame ones around here. I fed them sausages until they trusted me and then I told them to play as they wanted. They took down Teresa quite handily, I must say. Next, I wanted to initaite my own murder. I took Gollum bungee jumping with me and cut the line while she was jumping. She has yet to learn not to turn her back on her enemies. Next, I wanted to remove suspicion. Everyone knows that Corina is my dear, dear friend. I seem so nice and happy, don't I? I would never kill a friend, would I? I made her tea and poisoned it and she never suspected a thing, dear sweet trusting girl that she is. Afterwards, I summoned my old friends, the alien unicorns. I begged them to capture one of you for study. You see, I could have taken you all out at once, but I didn't. I made you afraid of who would die next. I made you suspicious. You've noticed that I'm strong right, Grace? I used my strength to knock over a boulder at the top of a ski run and it smashed someone. I hardly targeted any particular one. If my attacks were random, they could not be predicted, and I couldn't be tracked. They were all so easy. I signed S.E. up for a death sweepstakes contest, summoned the giant rabbit to crush Theo (Melody taught me how, so many thanks to her!), and released a toxin in Watermelon's dinner. Once you became suspicious of Ivy, I used that suspicion against her and rounded up a mob. I called Bounty's mother once Watermelon mentioned that her mother would skin her and spread false stories of Bounty and Watermelon being naughty. I crushed Blu with a piano, konked Lizzy with an old bowl, drowned Blackberry in a tub of glitter, and summoned the Weeping Angles. We go way back, you see. I ordered an assassin through Melody's google account, whacked Gilraen with a candlestick, and ran over Skyler with a bicycle. I used the fear of the narrator as an excuse to guillotine Red. I called my old enemy kudzu over to dispose of Tovah and removed it as well. I let a radioactive spider out of the box I found it in and made it bite SC. There were so many names, SC, and so many faces. So many people died and they're all blurring together in my mind. You'll stand out alone in my mind, Grace, as my best death. I'll take some advice from Watermelon and Bounty, Grace. It's been lovely knowing you. Now, off with your head.