copper acropolis

8/14/2019 Copper Acropolis

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COPPER ACROPOLIS

by

Rob MacDonald

(c) 1996 Rob MacDonald

(1st Draft 16,989 words)

1

‘Tarnished Homes and Egg Rolls’

The old mansion stood atop one of the steeper hills in the community of Afton Road, overlookingthe sinewy end of the East River tributary that flowed from the Hillsborough Bay. A blood red dirt

drive, its connection to Route 2 hidden amidst a heavy growth of scrub brush, peristaltically wound its

way up the hill, through an overgrown grove of dying willow trees, breaking into an open field of grass that surrounded the large, ivory-white edifice.

The mansion was a three and a half story building; the top half story being composed of a large

dome, which some of the older people around Afton Road claimed at one time housed an observatory.

A number of Greek columns supported the expansive veranda that occupied the whole width of thefront of the house. Above the large, wooden double front doors, ‘Copper Acropolis’ was engraved into

the sandstone; the engraving now as faded and worn as the rest of the stone of the house.

Large blocks of red Island sandstone were used as a facade around the house. At some point in its

life, the structure was bathed in a heavy coat of whitewash paint. Due to the heavy, hard rains of

countless springs, and the wind and snows of years of harsh Island winters, the whitewash had fadedoff the red stone in such a way that gave the impression, to those who saw the house from Route 2,

that the building was bleeding.

Other than the blood-dripping red and bird-turd white of the faded whitewash stone, the only other

colour to be seen on the outside of the mansion was the tarnished green of the window shutters,

gables, and the many buttresses of the observation dome. These adornments were all made of pure

copper, and, when first installed on the house, how many years ago, no doubt would have beenstriking in their burnished copper lustre. Now, through years of neglect, they looked dirty. Thick green

tarnished residue, along with the faecal droppings of generations of crows and other birds, had built up

on the shutters, gables and dome over the years of negligence.

This, along with the blood-dripping walls, its Amalgation high atop that steep hill, and the fact thatno one lived in it for years, gave the mansion an ominous and mysterious reputation. No one now

living in the community knew precisely how long it stood there, or whom had it built, but those of

them who studied such things claimed that based on the style of its architecture, it was likely built inthe first half of the 19th century.

Many in and around Afton Road believed it to be haunted.



Doctor Lucille Dewar was the present owner of Copper Acropolis. Born on Prince Edward Island,

Lucille, at the age of five, lost both her loving parents. They, Lucille and her parents, were spectators

of an afternoon card of horse-racing at the Charlottetown Driving Park during Old Home Week, when

a competing horse went mad just as they were rounding the six-eighths’ pole for home in Race Threeand jumped the fence. The horse, sulky, and jockey all landed squarely on Lucille’s parents, killing

them and the jockey. The horse was later shot. Lucille, given the opportunity to pull the triggers on the

double-barrelled shotgun, declined to do so.

Lucille escaped death that day because at the time of the accident, she was off buying an ice cream,a rare treat for a country girl. She had escaped death, but over the next fifteen years wished many

times that she had died that day with her parents. For on that day her life turned upside down. From

her birth, right up to the untimely end of the infamous Race Three at the CDP, Lucille had been ahappy, intelligent, and well-mannered child. After that day, however, love and joy left Lucille’s heart.

She was forced to live with her relatives, none of whom she cared for, nor whom cared for her, and

who would often only take her for a short while before shuttling her off to the next furthest outrelative. Eventually, at the age of eleven, the list of relatives ran out and she was placed in the Mount

Herbert Children’s Orphanage.

Despite the hardship and uncertainty of her life, she managed to excel in each and every public

school at which she was enrolled, and also at the orphanage school. Lucille Dewar was a genius. Shewas sure of it. When she was twelve, and not trusting the Island’s teachers or doctors to test her

adequately, she devised her own test to find her Intelligence Quotient. She scored very high. She knew

that with her keen intellect and burning desire for knowledge, she was bound for greatness. And it wasthis belief that kept her spirit alive.

But where her education flourished, her social life died. Because of her high intelligence, and her

being new to each school every year, sometimes twice a year, she was hated by her class mates and

became a social outcast. As soon as she came of age, she kept promising herself, as boys pulled her hair or called her names, she would move away, off the Island, to pursue her higher education. She

came to hate Prince Edward Island and its intolerably ignorant and mean-spirited children.

When she finally did become legal, she had briefly considered moving to Charlottetown to live, but

feeling that the small Prince of Wales College there could not offer her the quality of instruction thather knowledge-absorbing brain required, ended up deciding to make a clean break from the Island.

After a twenty-six year absence, she returned to P.E.I., unmarried, now a doctor and very wealthy.

One of the Island newspapers reported the ‘Prodigal Island Girl Returns Home A Millionaire Doctor’

and an interest in her began to grow. Her sudden return to the Island; her unexplained, more-than-you-could-make-as-a-doctor wealth; her spinsterish, and frugal lifestyle; her use of strange, big words

made her an enigmatic celebrity on the Island. When asked what areas of study she had pursued away,

or, how she, an unmarried woman, came upon such a fortune, she remained imperspicuous.

Years of social outcasting had, seemingly, evaporated any skills she may have had to handle thesudden popularity. The more questions people asked of her, the less she told. And the less she told, the

more people wanted to know about her. She wasn’t impolite in her silence, and sometimes seemed to

enjoy the attention she received wherever she would go. Soon it became an Island obsession tospeculate on the mystery that was Doctor Lucille Dewar.



And when she, against the advice of everyone but the real estate agent, (there were even letters to

the editors of the papers advising her against it), went and bought the dilapidated old mansion with the

strange name of ‘Copper Acropolis’ and became a total recluse, the obsession grew to the height of its

fever. But like all fevers, once this one reached its height, it quickly fell, and the mania surroundingthe mysterious and eremitic Doctor Dewar eventually died, and everyone left her alone in her big

house to do whatever it was that she did. Even the speculation as to what she did in that big house

gradually ended.

After that, the only time her name even came up in the newspaper was when she hired, as amanservant and chauffeur, the Charlottetown Chinese restaurateur named Yune Mune. Yune came

under her employ approximately three years after the ‘fever’ broke, about four years after her initial

return to the Isle.

Yune, a handsome, classy gentleman, had owned The Blue Mune, the first Chinese restaurant in

Charlottetown. When the local newspapers disclosed that he was being investigated for allegedly

caressing and speaking indecencies to a rich, married, and well respected female patron, he, despite

his claims that the indecencies and caresses were mutually entertained and embarked upon, was, dueto public outrage, forced to close down his previously successful enterprise.

Dr. Dewar wrote him a letter offering employment. He accepted, quickly sold his property for a

ridiculously small amount and moved into Copper Acropolis. Two months later, a page six article in

the newspaper cleared him of any wrongdoing after the rich, married, and well respected female patron dropped her charge, was divorced from her husband and moved to the Yukon with a black

lumberjack out of Halifax. At this point, hardly anyone saw, or cared that they did or didn’t see Doctor

Lucille Dewar. Occasionally she would be seen, with Yune Mune driving about the countryside. Shealmost never emerged from the mansion. Yune Mune was her link to the community of Afton Road,

and to the world. She was forgotten.

2

‘Guy’s Art’s Pristle’s Missing’

The Afton Road General Store was a fairly typical general store in that it had a porch, a squeakyscreen door and all manner of supplies. The owners, Mr. And Mrs. Abercrombie Dunsford, were nice,

gentle folk; well liked by the community. The Afton Road General Store had, like all general stores

generally do, all kinds of regulars who hung around all day, playing checkers, shooting the breeze,spitting tobacco, and minding everybody’s business. The Afton Road regular regulars were Guy

Maddox and Art Schprengel. On this particular day, however, Art Schprengel was not in the store,

and, therefore, Guy had to play checkers by himself, guessing as to what moves Art would have made,if Art had been there. Guy was up three games to two, and about to win his fourth, when Yune Mune

came into the General Store for his weekly pickup of supplies.

“Well, well, well,” said Guy, noticing the petite foreign man. “If it isn’t Yooooooon. How ya doin’,

ya yellow fornicator!”

Almost everybody in the area teased Yune mercilessly, either about his ethnicity, or hissupposititously nefarious dalliance, or both. But Yune always seemed not to notice, and simply smiled

politely, and went about his business, or, rather, Doctor Lucille Dewar’s business, with the dignity and

grace his upbringing gave him.



“I’m well, thank you, Mr. Maddox,” said Yune, bowing deeply. “Where, may I ask, is your check

mate, Mr. Schprengel? It is strange to see such Siamese twins as you and he separated.”

“No, you mayn’t ask!” snorted Guy, returning his focus to the game of checkers. “And who you

calling Siamese? You’re the dumb foreigner, remember?”

Guy hopped his red checker over two of the blacks, and swiped them off the board, laughing atArt’s careless move.

Yune bowed again. “Very good day to you, sir.”

He then turned his attention to Mrs. Abercrombie Dunsford, who was standing behind the counter.

“Good morning, Sarah,” he said, smiling broadly. “Is the order ready?”

Yune was one of the few men who called her by her first name, and she liked him for that. EvenAbe called her ‘the missus’ or some other such objectifying phrase with ‘the’ in front of it. But Yune

was nice to her, and he had class and odd good looks. And she was willing to overlook his seedyreputation, even if it sometimes caused her to imagine him doing and saying unseemly things to her in

the stock room when Abercrombie was away fishing or drinking with the men.

“Hello, Yune. It’s right here. I packed everything myself. I’m afraid, however,” said Sarah, as she

lifted two boxes of groceries and sundries onto the counter, “that I wasn’t able to find that item on

your list. Ginsing, or however you pronounce it. But, my cousin Myrtle is coming down from Torontoin two days and I telephoned her and she’s gonna look for some and bring it. I’ll drop it up to you if

she gets some. Ginsing? It’s a root, is it?”

“Yes. Gin Seng. For medicinal purposes. But, please, do not deliver. That is not necessary.”

“Gin Sing? I bet it’s a medicine,” yelled Guy. “My father took a medicine called whiskey-shine

every night and beat the living tar out of all of us. I bet you had a stomach full of that medicine thenight you grabbed that lawyer’s wife and went for an egg roll in the hay!”

Guy Maddox laughed loudly at his joke, then went back to playing checkers.

“Don’t mind Guy, there,” said Sarah. “When his Art’s not around, he feels it’s his duty to be twice

as cranky and mean to people coming in.”

“Where is his Art?” asked Yune.

“Didn’t you hear?” whispered Sarah, putting the final box marked Copper Acropolis on the counter

and then leaning over it, in spite of the fact that such an uncompromising position might put her in

jeopardy, by exposing the upper parts of her bosom, considering who she was talking to.

She leaned over a little further and whispered. “Art’s daughter, Pristle, didn’t come home sinceWednesday.”

“The little tramp’s probably just shacked up somewhere with that horny teacher,” yelled Guy.



Sarah ignored Guy’s comment and continued the whispering. “Three days. Art’s over at his house,

hoping to hear some news. Constable Mauberly says he might be on to something.”

“No, I did not hear such horrific news,” said Yune. “That is such a shame. She was not that old a

girl.”

Sarah shook her head. “Sixteen, and there’s no need to be talking in past tense. She’s not beenfound dead. Not yet. None of them have.”

Mrs. Dunsford shook her head. “Imagine, now four teenage girls from this area have gone missing,

all in the last year. I dare say all our girls have disappeared before our eyes”.

“Well, I guarantee those bastards’ll never get my Josie,” snarled Guy. “She’s practically the onlygirl that age left around the Afton Road, and I’m making sure she stays that way. And if they ever do

lay their mitts on her, I’ll catch them and I’ll rip their flippin’ eyes out and then stuff them in their

chests so they can see from the inside my knife cuttin’ out their hearts.”

“That’s right,” said Mrs. Abercrombie Dunsford, ignoring Guy’s graphic images, “you’re sendingyour Josie off to the mainland until this horror stops, aren’t you, Guy? That’s a smart move,

considering.”

“Damn straight it’s smart. I can’t be too safe when it comes to Josie, my little sweetie pie. All the

young men in the area’ll be after her once this is all through and the kidnappers get caught. She’ll beable to have the pick of the litterbugs. But until then she’s going to her Aunt Rachel’s. She’s leaving

tonight on the 5:15 train.”

Mrs. Dunsford sighed and shook her head. “Well, it’s just awful that such drastic measures like that

need to be done. I just hope they catch whoever’s doing this so we can all get back to our normallives.”

Yune signed the receipt for the goods. “Do not worry, Sarah. I am sure those girls will come back in

better shape than when they left. The police will figure it out and everything will be pieced together.

They are not dummies.”

Just then, young Cecil McNeill burst in through the squeaky screen door of the general store.

“Heaven’s alive, Cecil,” screamed Mrs. Dunsford, “what’s all the hubbub and stir for you to be

running in here like that?”

“That cheap father of his finally gave him a nickel’s allowance and he’s come here to spend it on

licorice,” said Guy Maddox, laughing.

“They just found them,” panted Cecil, between breaths.

“Found who?” asked Guy, looking up from the checker board.

“All of them,” replied Cecil. “The girls. All of them.”



“My God!” screamed Mrs. Dunsford. “Where?”

Cecil bent over and put his hands on his knees, trying to get enough air.

“Where?” asked Guy, now standing up behind the checker board.

“Way down the road—by a shack, in Fullerton’s Marsh,” said Cecil. “Can I have a Coca Cola, Mrs.Dunsford? I ran all the way from Art Schprengel’s house. They left clues all along the road that ledConstable Mauberly right to the marsh.”

“By Fullerton’s Marsh?” asked Guy. “What were they doing down there, by Fullerton’s Marsh?”

“No,” said Cecil, heading to the ice machine, “in Fullerton’s Marsh. They were found next to an old

abandoned smelt shack in the marsh. They’re dead.”

“The police found all of them?” asked Yune Mune.

Young Cecil McNeill gulped up some more air and then breathed it out. “Pieces of all of them,” hesaid. “Constable Maubery said Pristle Schprengel’s heart’s been ripped clear out of her chest! And

there ain’t no sign of it, neither.”

“Sweet Jesus,” said Guy, sitting back down in his chair. Then all at once, he jumped up, knocking

over the checker board. “Where’s my Josie?” he cried, and ran out the door.

Mrs. Dunsford crossed herself and closed her eyes. “Those poor girls. They’ll live on in our

memories.”

Yune Mune nodded his silent agreement.

3

‘A Dwindled List’

“What do you mean, ‘too dangerous’? Over.”

Doctor Lucille Dewar was in her laboratory, in the dome above the third floor of her home. She was

in the middle of concocting a polish that would quickly and easily remove the tarnish off the abundant

copper accoutrements that adorned the house. This was one of the many last minute tasks that had to

get done and she didn’t have time for any foolish claims of danger.

The intercom buzzed and squawked as Yune’s voice filled the dome. “It is getting very dangerous.

Constable Maubery has just found all the ---“

Lucille pressed the talk button before Yune had finished speaking, and a high pitched whine

intermingled with the rest of the noise. It took Yune a moment to realise what the noise meant, that thedoctor did not want to hear his news. He stopped speaking and released the talk button on the intercom

in the first floor bathroom.



The doctor’s voice immediately replaced the high tone. “--- is what I think of your Constable

Maubery. Now, hurry yourself up here. And bring a wire brush.”

The intercom squawked to silence.

Then it buzzed alive, said “Over,” and again squawked to silence.

After a test scrubbing of a copper bowl, it was found that the copper tarnish remover concoctionwasn’t working nearly as well as Doctor Dewar has originally planned, or as Yune Mune had hoped.

While Lucille quickly got over the partial failure and moved on to the next task on her To Do list,

Yune was left with a bucket of the sludge, a wire brush, a house exterior covered with greened copper,

and only one day to finish the job. When he told the doctor that it would be impossible for him toclean all the copper in one day, and asked if he could hire some helpers, she snapped at him.

“Don’t you dare bring outsiders into this house of renaissance. If it’s impossible to clean the whole

of the copper, as you claim, then could you at least manage to do the dome, and the shutters on the

north face of the house where the lightning rod is attached? We can leave the gables green, I suppose.”

Yune Mune bowed and said that could be managed, and that he would get underway immediately.

“No,” yelled Doctor Dewar. “Before you begin that, we must make preparations for the final stage

of the experiment. The moon will be at its fullest, two nights hence, and I am prognosticating

inclemency in the meteorological sphere at that time. We must be ready.”

“What else needs to be done,” asked Yune, looking around the room where the experiment wouldtake place, “other than rubbing the tarnish and shit off the roof?”

The doctor slammed her notation book down onto the hard, wooden floor of the dome. “Language!”she screamed. “Watch the language!”

Yune ran over and picked up the book. “I apologise,” he said, handing her the book. “I must begetting caught up in the excitement of the impending experiment, and have misplaced my manners.”

“Apology accepted,” said the doctor. “And, I, too, must apologise to you for losing my temper.

There are many factors involved in the success of this experiment, some which I will have no control

over. I hope you will forgive me if I seem a little on edge when the culmination of all my years of work and experimentation is so close at hand, and there are so many things that could go wrong.”

“Nothing will go wrong,” said Yune, reassuringly. He bowed deeply to his employer. “What is it

you need of me?”

Doctor Dewar looked at Yune. “I need you to get me another girl.”

Yune could not keep the sigh from coming out. It was exactly the order he was fearing most. Heknew, as the doctor had explained over and over to him, that, morally, murder in a circumstance such

as this was justifiable because of the greater good which would come as a result. However, he wasn’t

so sure that others would see their point of view on the matter.



And now that the crimes had become officially designated as murder, although for months most

people in the area already believed the girls were murdered but never dared to say so, the people in the

community would be out for blood and justice, and in that order.

Constable Maubery had already questioned him when the first two girls went missing; not becausethe Constable thought Yune had anything to do with them, but because the community demanded it.

Speculation around Afton Road was that if a person was capable of raping a rich woman, as Yune wasonce suspected of nearly doing, then kidnapping teenage girls was also within his realm of

capabilities. Yune Mune, of course, had an airtight alibi in that he was in Doctor Dewar’s companyduring the periods of time when the girls went missing.

“We really need another girl?” asked Yune. “I was under the impression that the Schprengel girl

would have the sufficient components to enable you to complete your work?”

“That last one was a fine specimen, physically. I replaced her breasts, which were perfect, for theones I had planned to use from girl number two. I also took her thighs, one of her hands, her lips, nose

and her left eye. Of course, I planned to, and will, use her heart, as well as some other lesser internal

organs which I won’t bore you with. I had planned to use her brain as well, but upon examining it, Idiscovered that the areas which control the animal urges such as hunger and sex had been damaged.

Therefore her brain was less than perfect and as such, unusable. So, I’ll need another girl so I can use

her brain. Try to find someone smart, if you can.”

“I am afraid the number of young women from which to choose has dwindled to a jejune few,” saidYune. “There is the cross-eyed Shaw girl, thirteen-“

“Too young,” declared the doctor, dismissing her as a choice by a wave of her hand. “Too

immature.”

“Stacey Johnson is the right age,” said Yune, “but she is retarded.”

“Don’t waste my time.”

“Emily Fitzpatrick is available, but she is not pretty,” said Yune.

“Emily Fitzpatrick,” said the doctor, “is far worse off than merely ‘not pretty’. She looks like she

was hit by a train.”

The train. Yune suddenly remembered Josie Maddox, and quickly glanced at his watch.

“Drat! If only I had known your desire for another girl earlier,” said Yune.

“Why?”

“Because Josie Maddox fits your requirements,” stated Yune, ”but her father had her leave AftonRoad for the safety of the mainland. She just left today at 5:15 from Mount Stewart.”

Doctor Lucille Dewar looked at her pocket watch. “It is now only five o’clock. She will still be

there. You can grab her if you’re quick.”



Yune looked at his own watch and cursed himself for again forgetting to wind it.

“If we can get her it will be perfect,” said Yune, “because no one will know she is missing until

after your experiment is complete. Then, when they see the wonderful being you will have created, no

one will mind another missing, dead teenager.”

“Go and get that girl,” said Lucille, as Yune trundled down the steps from the Observatory.

“And her brain!” she screamed after him.

4

‘5:15 To The Mainland’

To get to the Mount Stewart Train Station, Yune had to drive along Route 2. On his way, to ease the

tension, he reflected on some of the nice times he and Doctor Dewar had had driving all along thatvery route. He enjoyed those drives because he could enjoy the beautiful countryside, and she,

because she claimed the effects the motion of the car had on her brain enhanced her thought power.She had even devised an experiment which proved such, but Yune did not understand fully how she

reached her conclusion.

Route 2 was the doctor’s favourite route in all of Prince Edward Island; better than the much

ballyhooed Trans Canada Highway, known as Route 1, because the Trans Canada Highway merely

crossed the Island from boat to boat, ignoring most of Prince County and all of King’s County,starting or ending at Borden, depending on your direction of travel, and ending or starting at Wood

Islands, focusing almost entirely on the central county called Queen’s. And while there were some

lovely sights in Queen’s County along the Trans Canada, they were certainly not the only beauty the

Island had to offer. Route 2, on the other hand crossed the Island from point to point, from Tignish inWestern Prince County, to Souris, in Eastern King’s. Doctor Dewar felt it was truly the Island’s

Route, and Yune Mune had to agree.

The fast, short drive to the train station, and Yune’s reflection on past drives, gave little time for

him to think on what he was about to do. And for that he was glad. Dismembering that last one, theSchprengel girl, really made his stomach turn. It was so messy that he threw up. He felt dizzy the

whole time he was extricating her heart. On the whole, he did a sloppy job of cutting her up. And he

didn’t take the usual care in hiding the remains of the body that he did with the other three girls. Itmust have been an easy trail for Constable Maubery to follow down to Fullerton’s Marsh. It wouldn’t

have been that easy for him to identify what little remained of the remains. He’d have been able to tell

Pristle’s body because of the freshness of it. The others would’ve been all putrefied.

Now, as he was walking up the path that led to the station’s platform, he wondered if,subconsciously his messiness was really a cry for help. Maybe he wanted to get caught and end all the

killing. But that didn’t make any sense, because he was so sure of Doctor Dewar’s experiment being a

success, and, as she claimed, advancing the course of science one hundred years in one giant step. Andhe was confident, he told himself, as he turned the corner around the station house, that the taking of

four girls’ lives was worth a hundred year advancement in science.

Yune stopped when he saw the girl on the platform. Make that the taking of five girls’ lives, thought

Yune. He started to approach the girl.



“Yune Mune,” shouted a voice, “what in the heck of Hades are you doing down here?”

Yune turned around to where the voice had come from. It was Constable Maubery. My God ,

thought Yune, I’m caught .

“Thank God,” he barely heard himself say.

“Constable, hello,” said Yune, offering his hand.

The Constable shook it. “What are you doing down here, Yune?”

Yune found himself wanting to tell the constable everything. Despite the certainty of what he was

doing was right, he couldn’t ignore the heavy feeling of guilt that was weighing him down.

I’ve come to murder another girl , screamed Yune’s brain.

“Me? Oh, nothing,” said Yune, not able to look the Constable in the eye. “I mean, I am doing

something here, at the station. Yes.”

The Constable looked at Yune suspiciously. “And what would that be, Mr. Mune?”

“I am here for a reason,” said Yune, stalling, trying to think of a reason to be here. A legal reason to

be here.

“I am looking for some ginsing,” he blurted quickly.

“What?”

“Ginsing,” repeated Yune. “Sarah’s, I mean, Mrs. Dunsford’s cousin is coming in tonight fromToronto and she may have some ginsing for me.”

“What’s ginsing,” asked the Constable.

“It’s liquor, far as I can tell,” said Guy Maddox, coming out of the station house, buttoning up his

fly.

“No, it is a medicinal root,” said Yune.

“Like a beet?” asked Constable Maubery.

“More or less,” replied Yune.

Guy Maddox walked over to the other two men. “You stupid Chinaman, Yoooon. Weren’t you

listening to the woman this morning? Her cousin’s coming in two nights’ time.”

“Two nights’ time? My, yes, you are correct, Mr. Maddox. I must have got mixed up in my nights,that is all. I guess the horrible news about those girls’ murders has taken a toll on me.”



“It’s taken its toll on all of us,” said the Constable. “That marsh crime scene was the most horrific

thing I ever seen. The girls, all torn up, mixed together like a human tossed salad.”

“I’m just glad my Josie got away, safe and sound,” said Guy.

“Your Josie has got away, Mr. Maddox?” asked Yune.

Guy Maddox nodded his head as he pulled a package of chewing tobacco out of his overall bib pocket and proceeded to fill his cheek.

“Yes, the train pulled out ‘bout five minutes ago,” said Constable Maubery. “I came down to make

sure she got outta here safe and sound,” said Constable Maubery. “I don’t want anymore girls dying

around here.”

“It was lucky we got here early enough,” added Guy Maddox. “The train came in early, and wasabout to leave early. That idiot Mavor Glick couldn’t conduct himself to his own funeral, let alone

conduct the trains on time.”

Yune was surprised that he breathed such a huge sigh of relief. He realised just how heavily the

murders were weighing on him, and how glad he was that the girl was gone. He wouldn’t have to killher. He tried not to, but couldn’t help thinking about how upset Doctor Dewar would be with his

change of heart. Her experiment may well be ruined, and he would undoubtedly be fired. She had

worked so hard and so long on the experiment. Was he being selfish?

“Not only does he screw up the timetable regularly, but he also drops people off at the wrong

stations. That girl,” said Constable Maubery, pointing behind Yune, “that girl was supposed to be

dropped in Cavendish, up on the North Shore. Poor thing, she’s an orphan from Halifax, going to a

new home, and here she winds up in the heart of murderville. I phoned up to Angus Ferguson to comedown and pick her up in his truck and drive her all the way up to the Shore. Told him I’d give him

some money and two bottles of whiskey for his effort.”

That girl? What girl? wondered Yune. And then he remembered the girl he saw on the platform

before the Constable diverted his attention.

Yune turned around and looked at the girl. She had flaming red hair and was sitting patiently prim

and proper, on her little suitcase.

That girl.

A girl.

Again, Yune surprised himself with another big sigh of relief. Over the last few moments, all hecould think about was the immense disappointment that Doctor Dewar would have at having to call

the experiment off. It made him realise again just how important the experiment would be to the

world. He couldn’t let her down, he decided.

He must get that girl.



“Well, let’s get going, Constable,” said Guy Maddox. “We should drop up by Art’s place and see

how they’re all doing. Bring him some comfortin’ booze to make him forget.”

“No,” said the Constable, “I should wait here for Angus and make sure the girl gets away okay.”

Yune turned back to the two men.

“I will wait here, if you would like to go see Art, Constable,” he said. “I’m sure Art would becomforted by your presence. I will wait here for Angus to drive the girl to her new family.”

The Constable looked Yune in the eyes, and shaking his hand said, “Thanks, Yune. You’re a good

man. That rich lady done you a disservice giving you your reputation like she did.”

“You could be waiting a while for that Angus, though,” laughed Guy. “He’s probably driven his

truck into a ditch, drunk out of this world, the dumb Irishman.”

“Come on, Guy,” said the Constable, “let’s get up to Art’s.”

And with that, the two men were gone.

Yune turned back to the girl. She looked over at him and smiled. Yune smiled back.

“Are you smart?” Yune asked the girl.

“Oh, yes, I should say so,” said the red haired girl.

Yune walked over to where she was sitting.

“How do you do,” he said. “I’m here to take you to meet your new sisters. And if you’re as smart asyou say, I dare say you’ll become the brains of the family.”

Yune shook the girl’s hand.

She’s an orphan, thought Yune.

Killing an orphan isn’t so bad .

5

‘Amalga-Girl, Hello’

“An orphan?!”

That is what Doctor Dewar said when she first saw the child. “You brought me an orphan?”

Yune was amazed. He hadn’t said a word about the girl. “How did you know she is an orphan?”



“Look at her!” shouted the doctor. “Dark rings under her eyes, sallow complexion, a smile that so

obviously hides the pain and turmoil of being all alone in the world. I see that smile every day in the

mirror, Yune. Of course she’s an orphan.”

At first, Lucille was dead set against using an unknown waif’s brain as such a crucial part of her experiment. The brain, the most intricate piece of the puzzle, the piece that would ultimately meld all

the other limbs and organs together, had to be a brain of a girl from a stable background, of that shehad been adamant. An orphan’s brain had too many untold influences thrust upon it, of that she was

certain.

“Send her back,” said the doctor.

“Well, now,” replied Yune, “why do not you get to know her. Maybe she will be okay. After all,

there really are no other brains available. Maybe her brain is a good brain. She did tell me she was

smart. And on the way back from the train station she was asking me all kinds of curious questions.”

Doctor Lucille Dewar was in a tough situation. She knew when she began the planning for her

experiment that she would have to make sacrifices and this might very well have to be one of them.

“I’ll give her a day. If her brain doesn’t seem acceptable, she’s out. And I’ll use your brain instead

of hers!”

All the next day, Doctor Lucille Dewar spent time with the orphan girl, to find out all she couldabout the girl, her history, her intelligence. All but the final, last moment tasks of the experiment had

been taken care of. Doctor Lucille thought it might actually be advantageous to be diverted from the

experiment for a while, to rest before its culmination so she would be fresh and alert.

She had to admit, the girl was a sprite. This girl reminded her of a young herself. The girl had muchin common with Lucille, in fact. While both were orphans, and lived with many foster parents, they

both excelled in education. They both were fiercely independent thinkers. They both had low self

esteem, although both imagined themselves in the future as great successes.

Lucille had made a full 180 degree turn in her decision to use the girl’s brain for her experiment. Now, deciding that it must truly be Fate’s hand that delivered such an identical being to her, such a

kindred spirit, she exclaimed (to herself, so as to not upset the child) that no other girl’s brain would

do.

It must be this girl’s brain that I use in the experiment.

“This girl’s brain will make the experiment,” she told Yune, who was just happy that his brain

wouldn’t have to be used.

The doctor so loved the look of the girl’s fiery red hair, that she decided to use it, instead of

Pristle’s black, curly hair that she was planning to use.

At the end of their day of bonding, Lucille looked at the girl, who was getting ready for bed and

thought, This girl, through her brain and red hair, will live forever, and will become the most famous person of all time.



Lucille kissed the girl goodnight, the first kiss she’d given anyone since before her parents’ deaths

all those years ago.

As she closed the door to the guest bedroom, Lucille said to herself, “Correction. She’ll become the

second most famous person of all time. Second, after her creator, Doctor Lucille Dewar, that is.

On the next morning, the morning of the night of the experiment, while the girl was still sleeping,Lucille and Yune crept into her room and slit the girls’ wrists, carefully draining the blood into sterile

milk bottles. They then carried the bloodless body, and the bottles of blood up to the laboratory and

put it all into the large refrigeration unit which she had bought from Yune when he sold off his kitchensupplies from the restaurant. Doctor Lucille Dewar then shushed Yune Mune out of the laboratory and

told him not to come back until eight o’clock that night.

For the rest of the day, she remained, locked up, in the dome, performing the crucial final stages of

what would soon become her greatest triumph.

Yune spent the rest of the day polishing the tarnished dome and shutters on the outside of the house.

He wanted to finish before the rains started, as clouds were moving in from the North.

It was a dark and stormy night, that night, and at eight o’clock, Yune knocked tentatively on the

door of the laboratory.

“Enter, Yune!” yelled the doctor from inside the room.

Yune opened the door. The first thing he saw that was different about the room was the placement

of the autopsy table, which had previously been stored in a corner. It now had total prominence in the

centre of the room. All kinds of wires, tubes, and such were coming from it, leading to various other

medical looking machines which surrounded the table.

On the table was some obviously large mass, covered over by a white silk parachute cloth. Areas of

the cloth looked like they were stained with blood.

The next thing he noticed was that it was raining in the room. That was because, he discovered

when he looked up, a large section of the domed roof had been retracted, and a large metal pole,connected to the table, now emerged from the room, through the hole, and up into the night sky.

Flashes of lightning could be seen cracking through the hole.

He didn’t like lightning.

“Here,” said Doctor Lucille Dewar, handing Yune a notepad and pencil. “I want you to document

everything you are about to see and hear.”

Yune noticed how calm the Doctor seemed, on this, her night of nights. Yune himself was nervous,

yet excited. He began to write in the pad, describing the room.

Doctor Dewar walked over to one of the medical machines, turned a switch, and a low humming

sound permeated the room. She then trotted to the autopsy table, grabbed a corner of the silky cloth,and said, “Behold! Science is about to leap forward one hundred years this night. For I, Doctor Lucille



Dewar, present the world with a creation of my own device. A creation that will no longer need the

externalised love of parent, the affection of friend, the kindness of stranger to survive. For it will find

the love, the companionship, the camaraderie that all people need, within herself. It will never

experience the pain of losing a loved one, for all her loved ones shall be contained within herself. Shewill never be without a chum with which to play, as she can play with herself. Nevermore will she be

teased by her classmates, for she is her own school.”

Lucille grabbed tighter the sheet.

“I present to the world, Amalga-Girl!”

Lucille pulled the sheet from off the table, and for the first time ever, another human being gazedupon the result of Doctor Lucille Dewar’s life work.

Yune Mune was mightily impressed.

Amalga-Girl, Yune Mune figured, was about five feet seven inches in height. She was wearing a

very plain, khaki green frock, which covered her torso, down to her knees. Her arms and legs hadscars over them, some healed over, some fresh. Areas of the skin on her arms and legs had different

pigments of colour, indicating that they were taken from different girls. One foot seemed bigger than

the other. Her face was bruised and slightly swollen, scarred, but strangely pretty. Her hair, of course,was fire red, having been taken, along with the brain, from the orphan girl.

Yune Mune liked red hair. The woman who ultimately cost him his restaurant had red hair, but was

not, Yune reminisced, a natural redhead.

Over the top of her head was a metal helmet, and attached to the helmet were all kinds of wires

which went to all kinds of machines of all sorts.

Yune Mune had to admit that, while he oftentimes doubted his employer’s ability to pull it off, it

seemed that she had created something truly marvellous.

“I must applaud your genius, Doctor,” said Yune.

“There’s no time for congratulation,” said the Doctor, making last minute checks and changes to the

instrumentation of some of the machines. “For the moment is at hand. The tide is high and the time isnigh.”

Doctor Dewar ran up to the machine that housed the base of the metal lightning rod that went

through the hole in the roof. She flicked a switch, ran to the middle of the room, beside the autopsy

table that held her lifeless Amalga-Girl, and looked up to the sky, through the missing piece of dome,and waited.

She stood motionless for about ten seconds. Yune Mune was looking up into the rainy, stormy sky

as well.

He jumped when the Doctor screamed, “Now!” and a second later a magnificent, deafening crack of lightning raced overhead.



Lucille clapped her hands together and laughed.

“How did you know it would lightning, Doctor,” asked Yune.

“Because,” said Doctor Dewar, “I am not only creating life tonight, but also lightning.”

“You’re causing the lightning?”

“Yes. Lightning will recur in five minutes and twelve second intervals. And we must be ready when

the sheet of lightning that will hit that lightning rod gives me the juice to jump start my experiment.”

“How can you guarantee that any lightning will hit the rod at all?” asked Yune.

“Well,” replied the Doctor, “if you did a good job of cleaning the tarnish off, and polishing all the

copper I asked you to, then the lightning will be drawn to it like flies to honey.”

“Ah,” was all that Yune could say. Inside he was hoping that he did a good enough job. The Doctor

would kill him if the experiment failed because of his poor workmanship.

“Now,” said Doctor Dewar, flipping the switch on a machine, “I turn on the Energy Containment

Receptacle which will store the energy from the lightning. The potent energy will then travel down

these wires,” said Lucille, following the course of thick wires, which led to another, smaller, machine,

“and be received by the Energy Conversion Unit, which will convert the energy from its raw, deadlyform.”

She flipped a switch on the Energy Conversion Unit and the machine began to hum.

“Once converted, the energy then make its way to the helmet, and from there, it will enter Amalga-

Girl’s brain, and course through her body, regenerating and rejuvenating all the various organs,tissues, fluids, etceteras.”

Lucille had moved to the top of the autopsy table and was stroking Amalga-Girl’s cheek. “Then,

once the energy dissipates, Amalga-Girl will be left to her own devices. She will be alive and free

thinking, never to rely on the love of others!”

Yune Mune applauded the Doctor. He was truly in awe of her genius and forward thinking.

Doctor Dewar looked at the clock on the wall. “Come, Yune,” she said, grabbing him by the arm,

“Our work is finished here. All there is to do is wait. We will watch from the corner.”

Doctor Lucille Dewar and Yune Mune ran to the corner and crouched down behind a desk. From

this vantage point, they could see the whole room.

They waited a few moments, then the Doctor shouted, “Now!” as she had done before.

Right on cue, a flash of lightning and crack of thunder roared over the open roof. It had missed the

lightning rod, however, and all that was heard was the rain falling, outside and inside the dome. They

waited through two more blasts of lightning, both missing.



Yune Mune was starting to doubt his copper polishing.

The next crack of lightning smashed into the rod, causing the whole room to light up, blue and

white, as if it were midday in a snowy field.

“It has begun!” shouted the Doctor, although no one, not even herself heard her, due to the

incredible noise of the lightning. The lightning, the electricity could be seen travelling down thelightning rod, humming and buzzing blue as it went, into the Energy Containment Receptacle. Finally

after ten seconds of electrical buzzing, the last of the power from the lightning made its way into the

Receptacle.

Once again, all was quiet, except for the rain.

“Why has it stopped?” asked Yune.

“The energy is travelling through the wires to the Conversion Unit. It will begin to whine as it

converts the raw electrical energy into tiny but powerful electrical impulses”

As if on cue, the machine started making a high pitched whine. With every passing moment, the

whine got louder and higher pitched, until Yune was forced to cover his ears. Then the whine levelledout and the wires going from the Unit to the helmet on the Amalga-Girl’s head started to jump in

regular intervals.

What’s going on, Yune was about to ask.

“It’s the electrical impulses travelling to the helmet, and throughout Amalga-Girl’s body,” said theDoctor, anticipating Yune’s question.

After a minute of once-a-second impulses, they began to occur more rapidly, until finally, the wireswere jumping all the time, all over the place.

Then, all at once, they stopped.

Doctor Dewar stood up from behind the desk. Yune did the same. He noticed that he now did nothear the rain, as he expected in this quiet. He looked up through the hole in the dome and saw that the

rain had stopped. When he looked back down, he saw the Doctor carefully approaching the autopsy

table. The creature on the table had not moved a muscle. Yune Mune decided to stay where he was, behind the desk.

Doctor Dewar made her way to the table where her creation lay still. She glanced at the hospital

equipment around the table. The heart monitor was silent. Nothing was showing any signs of life.

The power must have knocked them out , she decided.

She leaned over the table and surveyed the body, the feet, legs, torso, the head. Everything was inthe exact same position it was in before the impulses coursed through its body.

The body had not moved an inch.



6

‘The Lake of Shimmering Waters’

The newly born girl ran and ran. She didn’t care or think about where she was going. She was just

glad to be alive. While she was in the mansion, her mind and body were masses of confusion, acting

as if on their own, independently of one another. But now that she was in the fresh air, outside, shewas feeling better. When she tried to think about what had just happened, it didn’t make any sense.

What did make sense, and what felt good to the girl was being alive again. Alive. Again? Feeling

was once again coursing through her body, this strange body, and the sensations were electrifyingly

sensual. Her hands, whose hands?, felt like they were buzzing. It was as if she could feel every cell inher body breathing, every ounce of blood moving through her veins.

As she ran, the mind of the new girl started to comprehend the miracle of what had happened. It

understood somehow that each piece of her body came from different parts of different girls. In her

mind, she could sense each of the girls’ own personalities in the different body parts of this new body,

and could sense those personalities gradually dissipating as the blood and fluid’s of five girlsintermingled throughout the body.

The new girl’s mind could even sense its own awareness of a new self, as a new girl, growing.

Eventually, by the time she stopped running, all the independent parts began to move, under thethoughts of the mind, as one fully integrated mass of body parts and fluids, and began thinking, not as

an aggregation of parts, but as her own new self. The woman in the mansion had called her Amalga-

Girl. She did not like that name.

She would call herself Newgirl.

After running, aimlessly for about twenty minutes, she came upon a clearing and stopped to more

closely experience the rush of her return to life. She felt strong and healthy. Despite running such a

distance, she was hardly out of breath. Her only complaint was that she was feeling very hungry.

After all , thought Newgirl, some of me hasn’t had anything to eat for nearly a year .

She laughed out loud at the absurdity of this thought. When she had finished laughing, she thoughtshe heard singing.

Carefully, without making a sound, she moved in the direction of the song. She came upon a lake.

Inexplicably, the storm, the wind and rain had stopped. The dark, ominous clouds had disappeared,

unfurling a bright, full moon. The light from the moon cast itself upon the water of the lake, causing a beautiful shimmering affect.

Silhouetted against this lake of shimmering waters, she saw a boy, sitting on the bank. She judged

him to be approximately eighteen years old. He was singing a song about soft ice cream.



Of the five girls that made up Newgirl, only one of them, Pristle Schprengel had ever tasted soft ice

cream. Try as she might, Newgirl could not get a strong enough sense from Pristle’s heart, breasts and

other things, to grasp the whole concept of soft ice cream.

It sounds heavenly divine, thought Newgirl, almost at the same time wondering which part of her used to talk like that: heavenly divine.

Newgirl wondered if this boy had any soft ice cream that she could try.

Quietly, she made her way to just behind where the boy was sitting, facing the water. He had a

beautiful voice, she decided.

I wonder if he’s cute, she heard herself think.

She wanted to make contact with him, but didn’t know how he’d react to her. She didn’t reallyknow what she looked like. She felt like she might be pretty. But then again, she’d just gone through

some major surgery, so she might be pale.

I wish I had some blush, she thought.

"That sounds like Pristle Schprengel," said Newgirl to herself.

Newgirl figured that because Pristle’s heart, a major organ, was used, her personality must still belingering, pumping itself through the body.

“I hope that doesn’t last long,” thought Newgirl.

“Pristle Schprengel sounds like she was vain. I don’t think I would have liked her.” This time the

independent thinker inside of Newgirl was the orphan girl, the brains of the operation.

Newgirl quickly shushed herself.

What was going on? Newgirl decided that the orphan’s brain and Pristle’s heart must be taking

longer to assimilate due to their relative importance in the scheme of things. She figured their

personalities would eventually fade and, then, she would be fully Newgirl. Newgirl concentrated and

tried to think for herself.

For the time being, at least, that seemed to work, as she stopped hearing the other voices.

Newgirl looked at the boy again. He was still sitting there by the water, singing, oblivious to thefact that just five feet behind him stood the world’s first mechanically produced human. She decided

she would risk the consequences and make contact.

“Hello,” she tried to say, but the voice got stuck in her throat, and it only came out into the world asa murmur. Newgirl realised that she hadn’t spoken since becoming undead. She cleared her throat and

tried again.

“Hello.”



It was said loudly, clearly. Newgirl liked the sound of her voice.

It made the boy jump. He quickly turned around, looking left and right, panicked.

“Who’s there,” he yelled.

“Don’t be afraid,” said Newgirl, impressed with the quality of sincerity she achieved with only her second sentence ever. “I won’t hurt you.”

“Who are you?” asked the boy, still sounding scared, but less so. “What do you want?” He waslooking in her direction, but not directly at Newgirl.

“I’m just a girl. I just wanted to say hello,” said Newgirl, trying to answer the boy’s questions. “I

heard you singing.”

She had noticed the boy’s lack of eye contact. “Are you blind?” she asked.

“Yes,” said the boy, getting up. “I don’t recognise your voice. Are you from around here?”

“I am mostly,” said Newgirl. “You wouldn’t know me, though. I’m a new girl.”

“A new girl, eh.”

The boy smiled.

“Very.”

He’s not bad looking . The thought came from somewhere deep within Newgirl.

“I heard you singing. You have a lovely voice.”

“Thank you,” said the boy. “I like to come down to the lake, especially after rains, bring a picnic,and sing here. The water and the surrounding trees gives one’s voice a magical quality.”

“What are you doing here so late, and in the dark?”

“It’s always dark for me, so it doesn’t matter,” said the boy. “I could ask a young girl the same

question, though.”

“Oh, nights like this one seem to restore my health,” said Newgirl.

“My name is Birt,” said the boy. “Birt Gill. I live in that house up there.” He pointed in a generallyWestern direction. “I have some food, if you’d care to join me.”

With the mention of food, Newgirl suddenly remembered how hungry she was.

“Yes, I’d love to,” she said, trying not to sound as urgently hungry as she was.



Birt bent down to pick up a cloth bag. As he did, Newgirl’s left eye noticed, approvingly, Birt’s

nice, tight bum. Her glance at his bum took her totally by surprise, and she wanted to quickly look

away the second she caught herself staring.

She managed to look away a couple of seconds later.

“There’s all kinds of food in my bag,” said Birt. “Help yourself.”

Birt and Newgirl sat down by the lake and ate and talked. Newgirl did most of the eating, and Birt

did most of the talking. After the food was all gone, and the cold settled down upon them, Birt and

Newgirl found themselves inching closer and closer together. Newgirl really liked Birt, and she felt

that he liked her. He was being really open, honest and sincere about all manner of topics. It wasobvious to her that he was intelligent.

“May I touch your face?” Birt asked at one point.

“What?” replied Newgirl, not understanding the question.

“May I touch your face?” Birt said again. “It’s how blind people see. By touching. I want to see if

you’re as beautiful as I imagine you to be.”

“I would love you to touch my face,” said Newgirl, closing her eyes.

When her eyes were closed, she could feel something building up inside of her. It was as if she were

hungry again. But that can’t be, thought Newgirl. All this food has satisfied that urge.

At the moment his fingers gently caressed her cheek, then quickly pulled back as he felt the scars,

and swollen puffy lips, Newgirl understood what this new urge was, and before she could stop herself,

she acted, fully and without thought, on it.

Lust had overcome her. Pristle Schprengel’s heart had once again taken momentary control of

Newgirl. She jumped on Birt and began to smother him with kisses. At first, he was terrified, notknowing what was happening. But as he quickly began to understand what she was doing, kissing him

passionately, grabbing him in places he’d only dreamt of being grabbed, he more than eagerly went

along with it.

Newgirl tried to put a stop to the heavy petting. She tried to gain control of herself, but was losingthe battle. She could sense, as she was thrashing about, ripping the clothes off a blind boy, the other

individual parts of her rising up to their own consciousness.

Soon, she was not trying to control just Pristle’s wild lust, but the teenage lust and curiosity of each

and every girl that was Newgirl. Only the orphan, the brain, refused to join in the frenzy. Newgirl feltlike it was feeding time in a pool full of sharks, each shark fighting for the biggest piece of meat.

What else could she do but join in?



Although there were only two bodies rolling around by the lake of shimmering waters, six

individuals were having the orgy of their lives. One individual, the one that made up Newgirl’s brain,

simply watched.

When it was over, Newgirl, lying on the matted grass, now back in control of herself, more or less,was exhausted. Birt Gill, lying there beside her, was dead.

After a few moments of quiet, not quite understanding how this terrible, terrible horror could have

happened, Newgirl heard some rustling in nearby brush. She sat up to investigate, and saw a young

boy running away fast, heading in the direction of town.

Newgirl got up and too tired to chase him down, proceeded to lope off along the bank of the lake inthe opposite direction.

She got only three hundred yards away when she passed out and collapsed, falling into some dense

brush.

7

‘Exultant Regret’

Doctor Dewar awoke under the autopsy table two hours after her creation had knocked her there,

leaving her for dead. When Lucille tried to get up, she needed the support of the table to assist the

move and was feeling very unstable, physically and mentally.

After a few minutes of dizziness, she was able to stand by herself. It was then that she began toreflect on the miracle that had occurred earlier in the night.

She had created life! Her experiment was a success.

Yes, the experiment, the new life, had tried to kill her and was probably now running, confused,

around the countryside, but it had been a success.

And the success was far greater, and more immediate than she had dreamed it could be. Sheexpected, at the most, subtle indications that the creation was alive. A faint pulse; weak, steady beeps

on the heart monitor; reflexive movement to pin pricks; those sorts of things. But this girl was

immediately and fully alive and hyper aware. She had expected great strength, but not so soon. Theway she just picked up the heart monitor and threw it at Yune –

Yune! Where was he?

Lucille began looking around the laboratory. She yelled his name. She remembered their hiding

place, and when she glanced in that direction, saw a pool of blood coming from under the desk. She

slowly walked over to the desk, walking on her tippy-toes to keep the rather copious amounts of bloodfrom getting on her shoes.

When she looked behind the desk, she found Yune Mune. His body was mutilated, ripped apart,

torn limb from limb, and left in a heap.



“My God,” were the only words she could muster before she vomited.

“I must find her,” was what she was thinking as she was vomiting.

Deep in her brain, Doctor Lucille Dewar was starting to form the seeds of doubt about the morality

of her experiment. In her attempt to make a being that didn’t need love from others, had she

inadvertently created a killing machine? But that thought was deep in her subconscious, slowly percolating. In her conscious mind she could still, and did, justify all the death, even Yune’s, as being

for the greater good.

Even her own death, thought Lucille, would have been worth the manufacture of a new creature that

didn’t need love.

“I must find her,” she said.

When Lucille left Copper Acropolis to search for her ‘daughter’, she took with her a shotgun and an

axe.

It was some time later that night when Lucille stumbled upon the bed of crushed grass where Birt

Gill was loved to death. His limp, partially naked body was still lying there, just as Newgirl had left it.

She put down the shotgun and the axe and went to the body to inspect it.

It was quite obvious to Lucille that this boy had been in the middle of sexual intercourse when he

died. The boy had suffered his Big Death before he achieved his Little Death. The evidence was

standing straight up, looking right at her.

After her cursory inspection of the body, Lucille looked around the field of grass, hoping to see her

creation lying asleep somewhere, but she saw nothing.

Of course, she knew that her Amalga-Girl could not have done this killing because Amalga-Girl

does not need love. It must have been the boy that tried to force himself on her, and she killed him inself defence. That must have been the reason.

Although that is what she tried to believe, she knew, somehow, that that was likely not the reason.

The seed of doubt that had earlier percolated in her subconscious was now starting to bubble up into

her consciousness.

There, leaning over the dead innocent boy, Doctor Dewar had, for the briefest of moments, her firstconscious thought that she had done a very bad thing. But Lucille pushed the thought away, and

focused her attention on what to do now, her next course of action. Lucille decided she had better get

rid of the evidence, the body of the boy, until she figured out a better plan.

She picked up the axe, and swung it at the boy, attempting to cut the body into smaller pieces. Theaxe hit his wrist, severing the hand. The force of the blow caused the hand to fly up and hit Lucille in

the groin. The pain caused her to lose her concentration, and again the bubbling grounds of doubt ran

through her mind.



She began to cry, and once she started, it quickly erupted into wild screaming, mad at herself for

even trying such an immoral experiment, and mad at herself for possibly failing at it. She needed to hit

something. She raised the axe above her head, to swing at the body again. Tears were streaming down

her face.

“Freeze!” came the voice of authority through Lucille’s screams. It caused her to stop her swing.

“Freeze, or I’ll shoot you right here.”

It was Constable Maubery.

Doctor Dewar saw the Constable, standing about thirty yards away, pointing his revolver at her.

Behind him stood Art Schprengel, Guy Maddox, and about five other men, all with weapons.

There was also a boy. It was Cecil McNeill. He had been the one who saw Newgirl with Birt Gill,and had run off. He ran to get help, hence this posse.

Lucille dropped the axe, and fell to the ground, unable to stand. The strain of her emotional andmoral collapse had caused this physical one.

“Is that the one you saw?” asked Constable Maubery. The question was directed at young Cecil.

“It coulda been,” replied Cecil. “It was kinda dark’n’all.”

“Well, is it, or ain’t it?” yelled Art Schprengel.

“Yeah, I guess it is.”

“Alright, Cecil,” said the Constable, “you run along home, and mind yourself.”

“Yessir,” said Cecil, and he ran off. He didn’t like being there, near that death, the strange death he

had witnessed, and he didn’t need to be told twice to go.

Constable Maubery looked at the woman on her knees, over a dead boy. He couldn’t quite see whoit was at that distance.

“What’s your name?” he yelled.

“Doctor Lucille Dewar,” came the quiet reply.

The posse began murmuring at that news, but the Constable quickly quieted them down, although

he never took his eyes off her. He returned his attention to her.

“I’m coming over there,” he stated.

The Constable carefully made his way towards Lucille and the body. Lucille never moved a muscle

as he approached. He stepped over the boy’s severed hand, which was lying palm up on the trampled

grass, reached down and grabbed the axe. He threw it over in the direction of the posse. He then



grabbed Doctor Dewar by the arm, lifted her to her feet, and moved her away from the dead body. She

didn’t resist.

They moved down by the lake and sat on a log. Neither of them said a word for about two minutes,

as the rest of the posse moved as a unit, first over to look at the body, then down to the two by thelake.

Finally, Doctor Lucille Dewar spoke. “I caused that boy’s death.”

The Constable looked at her. “You’re admitting that you killed Birt Gill?”

“No,” said Lucille, “I didn’t kill him, but I caused his death.”

“If you didn’t kill him,” said Art Schprengel, “then who did?”

“I’ll bet it was that yellow fornicator what was always hangin’ around her,” yelled Guy Maddox.

“Shut up, boys,” said Constable Maubery. “I’m doing the interrogating here.”

Constable Maubery sounded like he was madder at the boys than he was at the woman that caused

the death. The boys didn’t think that was fair.

“While you’re interrogatin’ her, Constable,” said Dr. Yeo, walking down to the lake having finished

his preliminary scan of the body, “ask her if she knows who all raped that boy.”

Constable Maubery looked at the Doctor Yeo. “You don’t think someone raped that boy, do you,Doc?”

Of course, the Constable knew that the doctor did think that, he wouldn’t have said it otherwise.Still, the information had shocked the stupid question out of the Constable.

“No, I don’t think some one raped the boy,” said Dr. Yeo. He was from Mount Stewart. He washelping the Constable in the investigational autopsy of the remains of the murdered girls when the

Constable asked him to join the posse.

“By the looks of that boy, the amount of fluids on and around him, I’d say he was gang raped.

That’s what killed him.”

“So, what’re we after, then,” said Art, cocking his rifle, “a wild gang of homo-sexuals?”

“It wasn’t men who raped him,” said Dr. Yeo. “I’d say it was women.”

Everyone of the men, including Constable Maubery, looked at Dr. Yeo. For a moment, it was quiet,

as each of the men imagined themselves as the victim of a sexual attack by a gang of wild women.

“It wasn’t women,” said Doctor Dewar. “It was girls.”

Everyone looked at her.



“What girls?” asked the Constable.

“My daughter, for one,” said Lucille, looking at Constable Maubery. “For one, and for all.”

“You have a daughter?” he asked, surprised.

Doctor Lucille Dewar looked at each man in the posse.

“I have all our daughters,” she said.

She then began to tell the long sad regretful story that was her experiment, her life, and that hadculminated in Birt Gill being gang raped by one person, several beings.

8

‘The Long Dark Truthful Mirror’

Newgirl awoke, three hundred yards up the bank of the lake from the body of Birt Gill about twohours before Doctor Dewar began her tale of woe and regret. She was feeling much better, rested, andquite in control of herself. She hoped that Pristle, nor any of the other girls that were part of her would

surface ever again.

Newgirl got up and began walking, to where she did not know.

After about an hour of trudging through the brush and woods, creeping through open fields, trying

not to be spotted by anyone, Newgirl came upon an old shack. She was starting to feel tired again, andfigured she had better rest. She began to walk towards the shack.

“I know that place,” she heard herself say, although she couldn’t imagine how she’d be able toknow it at all. She made it to the door and knocked. After hearing no response, she went in.

The inside of the shack was sparse. Light from the full moon shone in through the only window, providing just enough light to see shapes and shadows. There was an unmade bed to one side of the

single room. On the other side was a table and two chairs. On the back wall of the shack was a mirror.

Newgirl realised that she had never seen her image before and now wanted to. She was scared that

she wouldn’t like the way she looked.

“How bad can I be?” she said, and walked slowly to the mirror, her head down.

There she stood, head down, in front of the mirror, preparing herself for the visage that awaited her.

The reflection of her face. She breathed in deeply, closed her eyes and lifted her head.

“Well, well,” came a male voice, from the direction of the door, “it looks like yet another of my

students has come for a little late night tutoring.”

I know that voice, came the thought to Newgirl, from somewhere inside her.



How? came a thought from somewhere else.

It was the voice of Mr. Long, the Afton Road School teacher.

How do I know him? asked Newgirl of herself.

Because I love him, answered Pristle, as Newgirl turned from the mirror to face Mr. Long.

The moon’s light hadn’t penetrated far enough into the room, and the remaining darkness afforded

Newgirl’s face the chance to remain hidden from his view.

“It is a little late for educating you,” said Mr. Long, buttoning up his fly, for he was coming back

from peeing in the woods, “and I’ve already taught a girl tonight. She had a long lesson in love.”

Newgirl could feel the rage and jealousy build inside her, could feel her heart beat faster and faster,

pumping the blood of flaming anger from Pristle’s heart to the rest of her body. Suddenly, Newgirl feltthe rage that Pristle had felt and understood its cause.

Pristle had been secretly dating Mr. Long for a whole year. He had told her he loved her and that

she was his only lover. She believed him because she loved him. Now, she was hearing the truth and it

made her mad.

Newgirl could feel Pristle trying to gain control of the body. She could also sense all the other girlsfeeling sympathy pangs of the rage, the jealousy that Pristle was experiencing. Newgirl decided not to

fight Pristle. Hell hath no fury like six women scorned.

“You’re too tired for a little more extracurricular activity, Mr. Long?” asked Newgirl, with a

disappointed poutiness in her voice. It was not the voice Newgirl had expected.

Pristle had completely taken over.

“Who is this?” asked Mr. Long. He took a step forward to try a catch sight of her face.

“No,” commanded Pristle. "Stay there.”

Mr. Long stopped.

“I will come to you. I’m a brand new girl about to enrol in your school. I heard I could get good

marks if I came by and helped you with your homework.”

Mr. Long liked the sound of this girl’s voice. It was deep and sultry. Different from so many of the

girls that lived around the area.

Suddenly he wasn’t feeling so tired. “I’ve been known to raise the odd student’s average by asking

them to come by for a little one on one tutorial. You say you’re new here, eh? How ‘bout I administer an oral exam on you to see how smart you are.”



“Well, Mr. Long,” said Pristle, slowly advancing toward him, taking care to stay out of the

moonlight, “I can guarantee that I’m the oddest student you’ll have, yet I am truly average. And as for

being smart,” she said, entering into a beam of light, exposing her face, “I’m smart enough to know

that you’ll not live through the night.”

When Mr. Long saw Newgirl’s face, he screamed and turned to run. He ran into the closed door,

then frantically tried to open it. However, upon his return from his call of nature, he had locked thedoor, and now it wouldn’t open. He turned so that his back was against the door and he faced her.

“Who are you?” he yelled, looking again at her face. “What are you?”

“I’m your lover,” screamed Pristle.

“What?” said Mr. Long, cowering.

“I’m your one and only, remember?” yelled Pristle, moving closer to the man. “That’s what you

called me. ‘You’re one and only.’ Only you lied to me.”

“I don’t know you!”

“No,” said Pristle, her face a foot away from his, “I don’t know you! Now admit to me you’re a twotimer.”

“A what?”

“A cheater! A seducer! Look me in the eye and admit it!”

Mr. Long looked into Newgirl’s eyes. In her left eye he noticed a familiar twinkle. He knew a girl

whose eyes twinkled like that.

“Pristle!” he gasped.

Newgirl grabbed Mr. Long by the throat. “Admit it!”

“Pristle, I don’t know – “ was all he could say before Newgirl began strangling the air out of his

body.

“Say it,” she growled. “Tell me you cheated on me.”

“Alright, I admit it,” gurgled Mr. Long. “I’m a cheater!”

Newgirl let go of Mr. Long’s throat as Pristle said calmly, “See, that wasn’t so hard, was it?”

Mr. Long shook his head as he tried to get air into his lungs.

“Now, give us a hug and make up,” said Pristle, putting her hands around the man and squeezing.

“And I’ll give you a hickey, because you told me you like them.”



She bit and bit deeply into his neck, her teeth slicing through arteries and veins. At the same time

she squeezed around his waist with all her might, until she heard his back snap. She let go of him and

he fell to the floor, whimpering, wriggling and jiggling.

“Now, where was I?” asked Pristle. “Ah, yes, the mirror.”

She turned and began to walk back to the mirror. On the way to the mirror, Newgirl attempted toregain control of the body, but Pristle didn’t want to give it up quite yet.

The body with the girls in it stopped just out of reflection of the mirror.

“Pristle, we’re stopping you!” said Newgirl, “You’ve had your revenge and we’ve all enjoyed it,

but it’s time to give control back to me.”

“Not yet,” said Pristle. “I just want to see what I, what we look like.”

Newgirl sighed. “You can do that as a part of Newgirl. Now, come on, everyone’s waiting.”

First Girl Killed, whose stomach was being used as part of Newgirl, grumbled in agreement.

Third Dead Girl, who had grown quite attached, both emotionally and physically (part of her was

Newgirl’s anus), to First Girl Killed, farted her vote in favour of Newgirl.

“No,” demanded Pristle, stomping her foot, the left one, down. “I want to see, as Pristle, what welook like. I want to look through my own eye.”

“I can’t believe you’re so vain!”

“Who said that?” asked Pristle and Newgirl together.

“I did,” shouted the Orphan girl, “Me, up here.”

“Oh, don’t tell me Brainiac is going to get her tits all tied up in a knot now,” said Pristle.

“They’re not my tits, Pristle,” said Orphan Brain, “they’re yours. And they were put on crooked.”

Everyone who could look at or sense Newgirl’s chest did so.

“They are not crooked,” screamed Pristle, punching Newgirl in the head.

“Hey, hey,” shouted Newgirl, “knock it off, or you’re going to knock us out!”

“Yeah,” said Orphan Brain. “knock it off. I’ve been sitting up here in the head, trying to figure out

why you’re so vain, and I can’t for the life of me figure it out.”

“I am not vain!” pouted Pristle. “Now let me look at our face.”

“Pristle, will you give me back control of us if we let you look at us in the mirror?” It was Newgirl.



“Yes.” Pristle.

“Well, what do you say, girls?” asked Newgirl of herselves. “Should we let the big baby have her

peek?”

There were grumblings, farts, belches, fluid sloshings and knuckle-cracks as the rest of Newgirl

debated the question.

“Great,” thought Newgirl, shaking her head, “I’ve become a democracy.”

While the others decided how they’d vote, Pristle took advantage of the lapse in attention and

leaped in front of the mirror.

The only one who noticed was Orphan Brain. “Watch out, she’s going to look.”

Dead Girl Number Two slammed shut the right eye, her former eye. But Pristle had full control of the left eye and left it open. She gazed upon their reflection in the mirror.

Immediately she screamed in horror.

“What is it?” everyone wanted to know.

“Are we ugly?” asked Newgirl.

“The face is not so bad,” said Pristle, gulping, trying to recover from the initial shock of the sight.

“It’s a little swollen and bruised, but that can be expected after major cosmetic reconstructive surgery.But that’s not it.”

“Then what?” asked Orphan Brain.

“It’s… it’s the hair,” whispered Pristle. “It’s red. Flaming red!”

“And what’s wrong with red hair?” demanded Orphan Brain. “That red hair happened to belong to

me, you know. I liked it.”

“Red hair is awful,” cried Pristle. “You can’t do a thing with red hair! It’s wiry and awful!”

“Alright,” said Newgirl, “you’ve seen us, now give back control to me.”

“Never!” exclaimed Pristle. “I want to die! I can’t live with red hair. I’ll kill us all rather than havered hair.”

“Well, if she won’t give up control,” said Orphan Brain, “then neither will I.”

“What are you talking about, Orphan Brain?” asked Newgirl. “You don’t have any control.”

“I'm the brain! I’ve always had control,” said Orphan Brain. “I’ve just been doling it out to the rest

of you.”



Pristle laughed. “Prove—“

The body of Newgirl crumpled to the floor.

It lay there motionless for a minute, then it began to move.

“What was that?” asked Newgirl, as their body slowly stood up.

“That was a brain aneurysm,” said Orphan Brain. “I could have let it kill us if I wanted it to.”

“I wish it had,” said Pristle. “Better dead than red.”

“I’ll give you a massive heart attack if your not careful, Pristle,” said Orphan Brain.

“I’ll cut off the blood flow to your ugly brain.”

Newgirl whistled loudly, getting everybody’s attention. “This is ridiculous! We can’t go on like

this, the three of us, cooped up in this one body.”

An objectionable fart rang out loud.

“That’s right, Third Dead Girl,” said Newgirl. “It was remiss of me to leave you other girls out of

the equation. I apologise.”

Third Dead Girl let a thin, odorless one go. Apology accepted.

Newgirl turned her attention back to the matter at hand. “We’ll get nowhere, each of us wanting

control. None of us giving it up. We can’t solve this ourself. Now, here’s my plan. Both of you, Pristle

and Orphan Brain, allow me enough control of our body to get back to Copper Acropolis. If wehaven’t killed Mother back at the house, then we’ll ask for her advice.”

“What can Mother do about this ugly red hair?” screamed Pristle.

“I don’t know?” shouted Newgirl, losing her patience. “Maybe she could dye it?”

“Oh, no,” said Pristle. “Dyeing red hair is tricky. If it’s not done by a professional, it’ll turn green. I

read that in a book.”

“Well, maybe Mother’ll take us to the hairdresser,” said Newgirl. “Would that be acceptable to you,

Pristle?”

“I’d like to be pampered,” said Pristle, conceding.

“Orphan Brain,” said Newgirl, “will you allow me to take us to Mother?”

“I have nothing against you, Newgirl,” said Orphan Brain. “It’s your rotten, stinking, vain heart thatI don’t trust.”



“Pristle is your heart, too,” said Newgirl to Orphan Brain. “You’ll have to trust her.”

“Yes, Orphan Brain,” said Pristle in her sweetest voice, yet in a mocking tone, “I’m your heart.

Trust me.”

“Give me a chance and I’ll stick a stake right through that heart,” said Orphan Brain.

“Yeah, well I’ve got my eye on you, too,” said Pristle.

“Are we agreed, then,” asked Newgirl.

There was a pause as Third Dead Girl made a fart.

“Thank you, Third Dead Girl,” said Newgirl. “Pristle? Orphan Brain?”

“Agreed,” said Pristle.

“Agreed,” said Orphan Brain.

“Well, then,” said Newgirl, putting a false smile on her face, “let’s go and find Mother.”

9

‘A Volatile Combination’

Through the telling of her story, the creation of a new girl, Lucille was able to see clearly the error of her ways. Hindsight has perfect vision and by the end of her story, she knew what she had done was

wrong. She said she was sorry.

“So, let me get this straight,” said Art Schprengel.

When the Doctor was telling her story, when he first realised what she had done to his daughter, hewas furious. It took all his willpower not to shoot her there, on the spot. But, as she continued, and

told of why she did it; because she wasn’t loved as a girl after her parents had died; because she never

had any friends; because everyone made fun of her; because no one cared for her, some of his ragedied as he heard her sad, eloquent story.

“You took all of our daughters, spliced them together, and got a brand new daughter?”

“Basically.”

“And why was that?”

“So future children could be manufactured the same way as this one was, created in such a way that

they would always have the love of the various individuals within them to keep them happy. Theywould be love self-reliant.”



“But you think something went wrong with your, what did you call her?” asked Constable

Maubery.

“Amalga-Girl. Yes,” said Doctor Dewar, “I realise now that the orphan brain that I used must have

been too much of an unstable entity in comparison to the relatively stable upbringing the other girlshad. That stability was why I came back to the Island to conduct my experiment. I knew that there

were hundreds of communities here that had well nurtured and loved children. But when I got theorphan brain, well, she just reminded me so much of myself, and I thought that maybe I could save

her. Give her the lack of need for love that I never had.”

“Did you ever consider adoption,” came the voice from up the lake.

It was Newgirl, on her way back to the mansion.

The speaker was Orphan Brain. “It would have been a lot easier on all of us.”

Everyone looked in the direction of the voice. They could all see that Newgirl had her arm around

Dr. Yeo, who went up that way to have a pee, using him as a shield.

“Amalga-Girl, drop that man!” screamed Lucille.

“Don’t call me that stupid name,” said Newgirl. “My name is Newgirl. And if any of you come any

closer, I’ll kill this guy.”

“I’ll kill you dead, girl,” said Guy Maddox lifting his shotgun and shooting in the direction of the

voices.

“Don’t shoot,” yelled Art. “My daughter’s in that girl.”

Hearing the absurdity of that sentence, Art felt he needed to add a more reasonable reason as well.

“And, besides, you could hurt Dr. Yeo.”

“Daddy?” yelled Pristle, out of Newgirl. “Daddy, I have red hair!”

“Pristle!” shouted Art. “Don’t you worry, Pristle. Daddy’s going to get his little girl out of there. I

promise.”

“You can’t get me out of here, Daddy,” said Pristle. “I’m a part of Newgirl now.”

“Yes we will,” said Art. “We’ll take out your heart, and all the other stuff of yours that’s in that girland we’ll put in a bucket of goop, or something, keep you alive that way!”

“I’d look ugly in a bucket of goop, Daddy,” Pristle said. “Just get me an appointment with a hair

dresser who knows how to dye red hair.”

“No one is going to dye my red hair,” said Orphan Brain. “It’s the hair that I was born with, it’s the

hair that Mother chose for us, it’s the hair that’s going to stay.”



“I’ll let you pick the colour of the goop,” said Art, trying to entice his daughter’s heart.

“No, I’m not going to live in a bucket,” said Pristel. “I’m going to live here, as part of Newgirl, and

we are dying our hair.”

“You’re only staying as part of me,” said Newgirl, “if you promise to let me have complete control

of me.”

“I am going to keep complete control of this body,” said Orphan Brain. “The brain should always

be in control.”

“But I am the soul of me,” shouted Newgirl. “I should be in control.”

“Well,” said Pristle, “what about the old saying ‘follow your heart’? I say I should control our life.”

“No one is going to control your life,” said Doctor Lucille Dewar. “Because you will have to die.”

“Excuse me?” said Pristle. “But that is not an option.”

“You can’t live,” said Lucille. “none of you, either alone or as a whole. You’re too volatile a

combination.”

“But if the soul was in charge,” said Newgirl, “sort of keeping the rest of me in check—“

“No, it wouldn’t work,” said Lucille. “The orphan’s brain is to unstable. It could never get used

living as part of such a close knit family.”

“Oh, no,” shouted Orphan Brain, “don’t blame all this on me.”

“I don’t,” said the Doctor. “It’s my fault, entirely. I should have never used the orphan brain. I

should have let her continue to live her miserable orphan life, never allowing herself to trust another

individual enough to love them, or let them love you. It’s my fault I made you this way, and there’snothing I can do to change it. I’m sorry, but you’ll have to die. For the betterment of society.”

“Yeah?” said Newgirl. “Well, I don’t know about my sisters, but I know I don’t want to die, so

screw you, Mother.”

“I’m with her,” said Orphan Brain.

“Let’s get out of here,” said Pristle. “I know where we can get some nice black hair!”

With that, Newgirl threw down Dr. Yeo, and took off running.

Newgirl ran past the posse and Doctor, into the darkness of the night, before any of them could get

a shot at her.

“Damn,” said Constable Maubery. “She got away.”



“I know where she’s going,” said Lucille, calmly.

“Where?” said Constable Maubery, checking the ammunition in his revolver.

“Copper Acropolis.”

10

‘Goo’byee, Moffer’

By the time Lucille and the posse got to Copper Acropolis, the first faint lights of dawn was creepingover the eastern horizon. When they came to the big double doors, Lucille turned around and faced the

posse.

“You’ve got to let me go in there alone,” she said.

“Why,” shouted Guy Maddox, “so you can build another one of those things?”

“No,” said Lucille, “I’ll never build another creature as long as I live. But if we all burst in there,she’ll kill some of you. You don’t know how strong she is. I don’t want any more dieing. I’ll go in

there and end the job I started.”

“Okay,” said Constable Maubery, against his better judgement. “We’ll give you ten minutes, then

we’re coming in there blasting at anything that moves.”

“Agreed,” said the Doctor.

She began to open the double doors.

“Doctor Dewar?”

It was Art Schprengel. On the way from the lake to the mansion, he had been told that it would be

impossible for his daughter to live in a bucket of goop, and now was resigned to the fact that his

daughter, what was left of her, must die.

“Before you kill them, her, would you tell my Pristle that her mother and me love her a whole lot.”

Lucille found she couldn’t look at the man.

“I will,” she said, then, “I am truly sorry about this, Mr. Schprengel.”

“Just tell her,” came the reply.

Lucille opened the doors and went inside. Once in, she shut the doors and quickly bolted them shut

with a large piece of metal that slid into its sheathe across the doors and the door frame.

“What’s going on in there?” yelled Constable Maubery, trying to open the door upon hearing the

sounds of metal.



“I’ve locked the door,” yelled Lucille, back out the door. “I must do it my own way.”

She heard Constable Maubery order some of the men to run down to the Afton Road General Store

to get a battering ram.

That should give me enough time, she thought.

Lucille walked up the three flights of stairs to the door of the laboratory. It was open, and inside thedomed laboratory she could hear voices. She carefully entered the room and saw her creation, her

daughter, their daughters, pick up one of the medical machines, and heave it across the room. It crashed

heavily, smashing into bits.

“What are you doing?” asked Lucille.

Newgirl turned around quickly, flinching as if expecting some sort of gunshots. There were none.Once she saw that it was only her Mother, Newgirl began to laugh.

“So, Mother has come for her little daughter.”

“You know you have to die.”

“Do I? You know, it’s always so sad when a child dies before her parent. I’d rather that didn’t

happen.”

“Who am I talking to?” asked Lucille. “Is this Amalga-- Newgirl?”

“Yes. Who else?”

“Well, I thought that maybe that vain little heart of yours would be yapping at me some.”

“I’m here, Doctor,” said Pristle. “Don’t let Newgirl fool you into thinking she’s in control. I’m the

one with all the power.”

“Really?” said Lucille. “Don’t you think the orphan brain has all the power?”

“See,” said Orphan Brain. “She thinks I should be in charge.”

“No,” said Lucille, “I think you should be dead.”

“We’re not going to die for you, Mother,” said Newgirl.

“Well you can’t live like this, can you? Three silly girls trying to beat the others to the controls.

Don’t you see, none of you will ever have complete control. Ever. Maybe if I hadn’t used that stupidorphan’s brain.

“I’m not stupid,” shouted Orphan Brain.

“I wish you didn’t use her hair at least,” said Pristle.



“Why, don’t you like her red hair?” asked Lucille. “I like it.”

“No, I hate it. I’m going to get it dyed.”

“You can’t dye red hair,” said Lucille, dismissing the idea. “It would just turn green.”

“How do you know that?” asked Pristle.

“Because I tried to dye your red hair before I brought you to life, and the dye job didn’t work. It

turned your hair green.”

“Where?” screamed Pristle, panic coming into her voice. “I don’t see any green hair. Where did you

dye the hair?”

“Well,” said Lucille, “let me just advise you not to look at your pubic hair anytime soon.”

Pristle screamed. “My pubic hair is green?”

“And red,” added Doctor Dewar.

“Green and red?” shouted Pristle. “I’ll never find a man who’ll marry me!”

Newgirl’s heart began to beat faster and faster, as Pristle began to contemplate her dire future withgreen and red pubic hair.

“Don’t listen to Mother, Pristle,” said Newgirl. “She’s only trying to trick you. Get you worked up.”

“Shut up, Newgirl,” screamed Pristle. “Don’t you understand? I’ll never get a man with an ugly red

and green muff!”

“Not that you ever would have, anyway,” said Lucille, “not with an orphan’s brain as your brain.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Orphan Brain.

“Just that everyone knows that no one would ever marry an orphan. They’re too dumb and you can’t

trust them.”

“You know I’m not dumb,” said Orphan Brain. “You even told me so, the night before you killed

me. You said I was brilliant, just like you.”

“I lied,” said Lucille. “Remember I’m an orphan too, and you shouldn’t have trusted me. I really

think you’re dumb.”

“I am smart,” yelled Orphan Brain. She was beginning to get agitated.

“You can’t be smart,” said Pristle, “if you like red hair. I agree with Mother. You’re stupid.”

“Yeah, well, you’re vain and stupid,” said Orphan Brain.



“I am not vain!” shouted Pristle.

Pristle began to pump her heart in such a way that the flow of blood to the head increased, putting

undo pressure on the brain, causing severe pain in Orphan Girl.

“Cut it out, Pristle,” shouted Newgirl to no avail.

The only retaliation that Orphan Girl could do was to send brain signals to the heart, telling it to beatfaster. While Orphan Brain knew that this course of action would probably make her brain explode, it

would also cause a massive heart failure in Pristle’s heart, and without her heart, Pristle was nothing.

“Stop it, the two of you,” screamed Newgirl, as her body began to writhe in pain, ‘you’re killing us!”

Lucille ran over to Newgirl, who was now oblivious to her surroundings. She grabbed the helmet

that was used to send energy pulses through Newgirl’s body and placed it again on Newgirl’s head,strapping it on.

When Newgirl felt the helmet go on her head, the internal fighting stopped, as all of her wonderedwhat had happened.

Both Orphan Brain and Pristle had suffered extensive damage in the melee.

“Whush goan awn?” asked Newgirl, her voice now slurred from brain and heart damage.

“What’s going on,” repeated Lucille, “is that I’m about to flip the switch that will kill you. All of

you.”

In the distance, downstairs, a battering ram could be heard starting its work against the front double

doors of the house.

“I doan wanna die,” said Newgirl.

“You must die, and I must kill you,” said Lucille. “After all, I created you.”

The pounding on the door continued.

“Ah try ta be khoot,” said Newgirl.

“I know you tried to be good,” said Lucille. “But it’s impossible to be good when you have an

orphan for a brain, and a vain, self-centered heart. And for that you have me to blame. I am sorry.”

Newgirl looked at Doctor Lucille Dewar with her right eye, the left, Pristle’s being now blind.

“Goo’byee, Moffer,” she said.

“Good bye, Newgirl,” said Lucille. “Oh, and tell Pristle, if you can, that her Mother and Father love

her so.”



Newgirl farted.

“Good,” said Lucille. “No one will forget you, I’ll make sure of that.”

The banging on the double doors finally ended, as the battering ram burst through, and the shouts of

men could be heard. They were slowly beginning their search of the old house. She had only a few

minutes left.

Lucille pulled the switch on the Energy Conversion Unit, causing the residue energy still inside to

pulse through Newgirl’s body. The extreme power of the pulses caused the brain and heart, already

damaged heavily, to stop altogether.

Newgirl was dead.

“You won’t be forgotten,” said Lucille to her dead daughter.

She walked over to the desk where Yune Mune’s torn, shredded body lay, pulled some paper and a

pen out of the drawer, and sat down to write.

She could hear the voices of the men getting closer.

She wrote, ‘The woman lived just where the Afton Road main road dipped down into a little hollow,

fringed with alders and traversed by a brook that had its source-’ before Constable Maubery burst intothe room.

She calmly put her pen down and thought, I’ll finish my story in jail .

Constable Maubery escorted Doctor Lucille Dewar from Copper Acropolis and had the Mount

Stewart Fire Department burn the building, and all of its contents. The copper was salvaged, however,and used to make a monument in memorial to the five girls from Afton Road who had all died of

pneumonia in the same year.

The people who knew about and were involved in the going’s on in and around Copper Acropolis

that night had decided to keep quiet, and let the world sleep soundly for a little while longer.

copper acropolis

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