Another gasp of water. Their arms thrashed as their body sank. Angry squirms of darkness bore in from the edge of their vision. Danny’s heart pounded, screaming for oxygen to power it. Their chest felt like it would explode. Allie could not remember such awful pain.

—Help us! Somebody help us!—

The living world closed in … then it went away … the pain faded … and for the second time, Allie Johnson died.

She felt herself leaving Danny’s body—not peeling out, but more like evaporating. She was herself again, back in Everlost, and sinking quickly through the bottom of the pool, into the earth, while Danny’s body settled against the blue-painted steel of the pool floor. The moment Danny came to rest, a circular patch spread out beneath his body, bright and solid. A deadspot was born. Quickly Allie grabbed for it, pulling herself onto it. She reached for Danny’s body, but now that she was an Afterlight again, her hand passed right through.

Suddenly there was commotion in the water. Bubbles, and a billowing flowered blouse. A woman in the water, frantically diving down, grabbing at the boy’s body. Danny’s mother!

Allie reached her hand toward the woman, and was immediately swept up, drawn inside her, skinjacking her.

The woman was crazed beyond belief, her body in a full panic state—which is exactly what was needed, for although she was not a strong woman, she could swim, and with all that adrenaline in her, she could swim for two. Allie took over her body completely, and set herself to the task of saving Danny.

She fought her way to the surface, pulling Danny with her. He was sandbag-heavy, a limp, dead weight. She broke surface to find that all hell had broken loose. Allie could instantly tell that Milos and Moose had left their hosts, because Curtis was on his knees screaming at the top of his lungs, and ripping his hair out of his head. Chainsaw was in enough control of his senses to leap into the pool to help her.

“I got him, Mrs. Rozelli!” With one hand he hurled Danny out of the pool, and climbed out after him.“I can do this! I know CPR!” Chainsaw began chest compressions on the boy as Allie, still within Mrs. Rozelli, climbed out of the water. Chainsaw valiantly fought to resuscitate the little boy, but it was no use. Danny was dead. His soul was long gone.

Or was it?

Allie peeled out of Mrs. Rozelli, and back into Everlost, where she could see Milos and Moose still standing there, observing everything.

“Welcome back to Everlost!” Milos said cheerfully. “I knew it would work!”

Allie could not believe he could be so casual about the terrible thing he had just done. Somehow Mary had changed him. Like everything else she touched, Mary had turned him rancid.