Viki was a little dissappointed when she realized the world didn't end overnight like it mentally seemed to have done for her.  Oh well, it was time to move on.  Forgetting about McDohl, forgetting about wars, forgetting about everything and just starting anew.... AGAIN.

Young Master McDohl woke up slowly in his room at the inn in Radat.  He stretched slightly, before attempting to open his eyes.  He lay still in bed for a moment and then got up.  Stretching some more, he gathered his clothing and smiled.  He was close.

The salty air of Radat could very well be the lake air drifting from Toran Lake back home.  If he was lucky, he could finally catch a ship back to the republic and Gregminster.

Poor Gremio would probably be sick with worry by now.  He was a wonderful person, if a little overbearing.  And Pahn and Cleo would be good to see again.

McDohl wondered what had become of the country since he left . . . as he left the room and headed for the staircase.

Viki was feeling better that morning.  Sure, she failed to find McDohl again, but she had decided to stop dwelling on that fact because it got too depressing.  She sleepily got up. slowly walked to the mirror, combed her hair a little, then exited her room.

McDohl and Viki bumped into each other in the upstairs hallway of the Radat inn.  Viki stared at him a few moments before she rubbed her eyes, looked at McDohl, then backed up surprised.

"Oh!  Lord McDohl.  Sorry, I was a bit too sleepy to realize it was you for a moment there.  Um . . . ? ? ? ? ?  Oh!  Good morning.  Good to see you again."

"Good morning, Viki . . . " McDohl said as he started down the staircase.

At this point, the information was slowly passing down his nervous system, up the brain stem, and into his information processor.  Seeing as how he was pretty slow in the morning, and he's hit his head alot recently, it took a few moments for this to process.

Basically the image/name/situation slowly registered with the half-asleep part of McDohl's brain that handled recognition and recollection.  It grabbed the memo, booted up the computer, and waited for the Windows 2000 screen to go away before calling up the files.

It passed the information over to the reaction center, which printed out a copy and slowly made the connection between the picture of Viki and the group shot of Viki, Krin, and Juppo that McDohl's been throwing darts at in his brain for years.

The reaction center punched a couple of buttons and this is basically what happened:

"VIKI?!"

Young Master McDohl did a double take and spun around to get a better glimpse.  As a result, he slipped on the stairs and tumbled down like a bad slinky, coming to a dusty mess at the bottom.

" . . . . . ow . . . . . "

Viki blinked as she saw McDohl tumble down the stairs.  What was he so surprised at?  Was she missing something?  After all, it's only been . . . what, a month since she last saw him?

It suddenly occurred to her that perhaps she should check on him to make sure he didn't break any bones or anything evil like that, so Viki quickly teleported herself down the stairs.

Well, she succeeded at that spell, though it ended up with her teleporting several feet above McDohl right before she came crashing down on top of him.

Viki got up, dusted herself off, and stared at McDohl.

"Lord McDohl, are you all right?"  She fumbled for her medicine but found she used it all yesterday.  So, remembering how Chef Antonio once told her how well-cooked food had healing properties, she decided to give McDohl some leftover tempura from Yoshino's instead.

"Here you go, Lord McDohl.  I think this might make you feel better."  Viki held the rotten tempura in front of McDohl's face hoping he wasn't too hurt to keep him from being able to eat it.

McDohl took one look at the bad looking food and shook his head.  Getting to his feet, Young Master McDohl took a look at Viki and wondered how she got here.  Of course, that thought didn't last too long.

He still remembered one time when she said "Oops!" and managed to teleport him, Lepant, Alen, Viktor, Mina, and Lorelai into the middle of the enemy camp by mistake.  There either had to be some kind of curse on her rune or she really WAS as dumb as she acted sometimes.

"I'm okay, Viki . . . "

Viki wiped her forehead.  "You are?  Oh, that's good to hear."

Viki smiled, then paused, then sighed.

"I haven't been doing that well, myself, though.  I think I'm about to give up searching for you.  I'm really really tired and it's been such a long time and I have all these bad people chasing me now for some wierd reason and I don't think I can wait for you any longer."

"Well, it's nice to know people are looking for me.  I've been spending the good part of two years walking back home and I'm almost there."

Young Master McDohl then registered the fact that Viki was being chased by some people.  It seemed like EVERYONE McDohl knew was being chased by someone. Karma, I guess.

"It's nice to see you again, but I got a boat to catch for Banner Village.  Where are you headed?"

Viki blinked again.  She was almost sure that she was missing something really important at that moment but she couldn't figure out what it was.  Still, it was rude to stare at McDohl like that without giving him an answer to his question.

"Um . . . . I . . . I really don't know where I'm going."

Viki thought to herself.  Now that she failed to find McDohl, what was she supposed to do, anyway?

"I . . . I never really had this happen to me. Usually, after I lose you, I'd accidentally teleport myself into some random forest path where I'd meet up with you again."

Viki suddenly realized what that important thing she was missing was.

"I know where I'll go, now!  I'll just keep teleporting around until I accidentally teleport myself into a forest and bump into you there!  That would work out fine, I think."

Young Master McDohl looked at Viki rather dumbfoundedly.  Good lord, she's gotten worse.  After thinking to himself for a moment, he realized that he'd have to resort to extreme measures for this situation.

He waved his hand in front of Viki's face until she was following along with the motions, then snapped his fingers.  He hoped to see that dawn of recognition she usually had when he tried this before.

At the snap of his fingers, something clicked in Viki's mind.  McDohl was trying to play a game of charades for some wierd reason.  Well, normally Viki wasn't into head pain games, but she didn't want to be mean to McDohl or anything like that.

Viki thought to herself.  McDohl waved his hand, then snapped his fingers.  What could that motion represent?  Hypnosis?  A fly and the process of swatting it with a fly swatter?  A drunken man who really needed to go to the bath house?  An annoyed McDohl trying to get her to realize that she finally found him?

"Oh!  Well, Lord McDohl, if you really need to know, the bath house is upstairs to the left and the third door on the right."

No wait!  If that were the answer, McDohl would have added in a hiccup motion or something like that!  

"Whoa!  I mean . . . . I finally found you, McDohl!  I'm so glad!  I had almost given up and was so tired and it's been such a long time and I had all these mean people chasing me for some reason and I had just about given up and I bumped into you upstairs then you fell down the stairs and . . . oh wait.  Um . . . . Good morning, Lord McDohl!"

Viki quickly shook McDohl's hand then wondered if she was supposed to hug him or not.  Figuring it was better to be safe than sorry, she did.

The Radat innkeeper, who had been watching all this time, raised an eyebrow.

"McDohl?  You mean LORD McDohl?  The leader of the Toran Republic!?  Great!  That means you can have him finally pay your bill!"

Argh!  Viki didn't pay her bill yet?

Young Master McDohl sighed to himself and payed the innkeeper for Viki and shook his head.  Not only was his presence more commonly known here, but he was out of money again.  Perhaps this is why no one liked the City-States back in Toran.  It's impossible to hold onto your money here.

He started to walk outside, but Viki followed suit.  This could prove to be a problem.  She attracted a lot of attention, even when she wasn't doing anything.  If there was some balance between looks and brains, she must have invested heavily in Stock A.

"You found me, I guess.  Now what?"

"Huh?  Now what?  Why, that's obvious!  I'll . . . . . um . . . . do stuff . . . . and stuff . . . like that, you know.  Stuff!"

Viki stopped following McDohl for a brief moment. Oh great.  There was another important thing she was missing now.  What was she talking about before?  Oh yes!  Some evil people were chasing her.   "Now I know!  You're supposed to protect me from those billions of evil people surrounding the inn waiting for me to come out!  Although... that still doesn't tell what I'M going to do now.  One thing's for sure, though, we'd better not leave the inn since it's surrounded by all those mean people and such."

Viki suddenly noticed she and McDohl were outside the inn.

"Hmm . . . . this can't be good."  Another quick look around made her realize that those evil people weren't around, either.

"Er . . . . well, Lord McDohl, I guess I'll teleport us back to Toran or something like that. Unless you want to go to Banner for some reason.  But why would you want to go there?"

"I was going to Banner because I wanted to travel back to the Toran Republic.  Well . . . I suppose travelling with you is faster.  But what evil people are you talking about?"

"Huh?  What?  Evil people?  Oh!  Just some people from some secret society that I used to belong to who want to kidnap me so they can use me in a blood sacrifice to gain the ability to time travel then take over the world and do mean things since absolute power corrupts but corrupt power absoluties."

Viki smiled.  "But I don't think it's a problem since you're here now.  Because you can use your Soul Muncher Rune to munch on their souls or something like that.  In fact, I think you already scared them all away or something, because they're not here and I'm sure they were all out here yesterday."

Viki looked around the town of Radat. "Hmm . . . looks like you scared away all the townspeople too because they're not outside, right now, either, except for that guy in the suit standing in the middle of town staring at us.  So . . . . ah, Lord McDohl, is there anywhere you need to go before we get back to Toran?"

Young Master McDohl looked at Viki for a moment. What was that all about?!  Shaking it off, he decided that now was not the time for thinking about it.  If there really was a secret society out for Viki, it would be in everyone's best interests if they got out of there and fast.

"Nothing really.  Let's go home."

"No debts to pay off or anything like that?  Okay! Let's go!"  Viki waved her wand.  "Shazzam!"

Nothing happened.

"Huh?"  Viki frantically looked around.  "Did I screw up?  I usually always teleport SOMEWHERE . . . unless I somehow managed to teleport us in the exact same spot that we were standing at moments before we teleported.  Shazzam!"

Nothing happened again.  Well, a couple crickets chirped.

"Allhakazam?  Abrakadabra?  Zoowakkamoo?"

Viki tapped her wand, then tapped her blinking rune.

"Hmm . . ."

The lone man in the streets that had been staring at her and McDohl was noticebly closer now.  Viki looked up from her wand and found him directly in front of her.

"Oh!  Hello!  Could you help me out?  I seem to have forgotten the spell and I don't have a clue as to what I'm doing wrong and . . ."

The man in the suit smiled.  Looking at his grin made Viki suddenly realize why she needed McDohl in the first place, even before the rest of the Esde Majika society decided to start making her life miserable.

"Excuse me, lady Viki."  The man bowed.  "I am Sir Dargrundgelius Perente.  I am here to take you back home as per your vocal contract.  I mean you no harm, and if you would please just hear me out before you make any rash moves and . . . "

"Look out, McDohl!  That's Grundge!  The guy with the stupid name that no one likes because if you piss him off he'll blow your head off!  And he's a lawyer, too, which solidifies his sheer evilness even further to an evilness beyond measure!  Or at least that's what I think Lawyers were about."

Grundge frowned.

"McDohl?  As in the wielder of the Soul Eater?  Hmm . . .  This would be quite a dilema.  Despite the fact that he had broken his contract with you long ago, it would appear that I would have no choice but to unleash the power of the Soul Crusher on him.  I have been searching twenty years for you, Viki, and for once I'm not going to let a silly little boy get in my way."

Grundge removed a sword from his briefcase (though how it fit in there in the first place was anyone's guess) and held it up.  "Soul Crusher sword, give me a beast!  Destroy all the living, and crush souls!"

Grundge dissappeared in a flash, and a large flying squirrel, wider than two stories wide, appeared.  It wasn't just squirrelzilla, it was squirrelzilla's evil overweight mother in-law!

The squirrel roared a squirrelly roar.

"Crush souls?  What's that supposed to mean?  Oh well."  Viki stared at the overly fat squirrel then turned to McDohl.  "Well, Lord McDohl, um . . . kill it or something."

"Eep!"

Thus came the legend of the fastest man on two legs.  The man in the green bandanna.  The man . . . running from the gigantic squirrel.

"YAAAAAAAAHHHH!!!!!!"

The chase was on!  It was McDohl in the lead, followed by big ugly squirrel.  It's McDohl by a good foot in a half, with big ugly squirrel closing fast. What a race, folks!

McDohl raced faster and faster.  But as he raced he noticed a large rock in the road up ahead.  With extreme effort, he scooped up the rock as he was running without slowing down!  And the crowd cheered.  

This was his only chance.  Twirling his arm like a baseball pitcher, he . . . . wrapped his writ around the rock and lobbed it through the window of Shu's mansion.  There was the crash of breaking glass with a a loud "OW!", followed by the thump of a body hitting the floor.  And again, the crowd cheered!

Up ahead was the sluice gate controls, which controlled the amount of water going from the big lake to the river.  Taking out his staff, McDohl whacked the gate controls as he passed it, irritating the worker.  As the gigantic water gates started to close, McDohl jumped over the side of the bridge and into the water.  The monster squirrel followed him with a roar.

Then, there was silence.  Many of the sailors stood far away from the bridge, afraid of what was going on.  The silence continued and one of the bravest ones went to check on what happened.

He was there just in time to help a soaking McDohl up onto dry land.  Everyone cheered and ran to the bridge.  It appeared that McDohl swam through the sluice gate as it was closing and the squirrel followed, only to get crushed by the shutting gates.

McDohl walked back over to Viki and the others, growled, grabbed Viki by the arm, and dragged her off.

Viki cheered along with the rest of the crowd as McDohl dragged her along.

"Wow, McDohl.  That was OW! great!  You sure showed that OW! furry thing . . . but ah . . . Ow ow ow ow, do you have to hold me by the arm that hard?  It's starting to hurt."

"Sorry," he said and let her go.  "Can we please go now?"

Viki rubbed her arm.

  "Oh yea.  I guess we should.  I'll see if the spell works with a quick test now.  Shazzam!"

McDohl dissappeared then came crashing down in front of Viki three seconds later.  Viki looked at her blinking rune.

"Hmm . . . I guess Grundge put up some sort of magic barrier to block my blinking magic.  Oh well, it seems to be working now.  Let's go!  Allhakazam!"

In a flash, McDohl and Viki dissappeared.

Granmeyer refilled his glass with Jowstweiser and gulped it down in one gulp, again.  Several empty bottles of Jowstweiser were lying around his office. Granmeyer put his head down on the table.

"Oh why?  How could I have let him get away?  Every single guard in South Window, and I couldn't even catch a young boy.  And once he gets back to Toran, he'll tell everyone and Toran may very well decide to get their revenge.  And right when war with Highland has started, too.  I should have trusted Freed and told him.  He might have stopped McDohl!  I should have asked Richmond to stop him . . . "

Viki and McDohl appeared inside Granmeyer's office.  Granmeyer stared at them as Viki looked around.

"Huh?  What?  This isn't Gregminster!  OH!  Lord Granmeyer!"

Viki walked up to Granmeyer and handed him a letter.

"I need to thank you for helping me find McDohl. After you sent me to Radat to wait for him, he appeared!  Isn't that nice?"

Granmeyer read the letter, which was basically a letter of thanks to Richmond.  He then slowly glared at McDohl.

"Aww . . . crap."

Minutes later, Young Master McDohl sat in a South Window cell, holding his head in his hands.  He bemoaned his fate and sat pretty much still.

"This can't be my life.  What am I?  Cursed?"

And for the slightest of moments, he could have sworn the Soul Eater rippled a tiny bit of laughter.

Viki walked up to the cell and looked inside.

"McDohl, you don't look so good.  Is everything all right?  I have to admit this is a rather smelly dirty place for a guest room.  Do we really have time to have dinner with Lord Granmeyer or should I just continue trying to teleport us to Gregminster?"

McDohl spend the next few minutes trying to strangle Viki through the bars of his cell.