Chapter Text
“Hey Dr. L, is Jim home?”
Dr. Barbara Lake froze, her hand not yet touching the handle of her car door.
“He isn’t with you?” she asked in confusion.
“No.” Toby’s face scrunched with concern, which in turn made Barbara more concerned. She had never kept Jim on a tight leash, her parenting style and work schedule didn’t allow for it. But he was a good, reasonable kid, and most of the time he could be found with Toby if he wasn’t at home. Had he made new friends recently, or was something wrong?
Toby’s face cleared and he put on a carefree smile. “Ah, no worries, he’s probably at school then. He mentioned he was doing some extra credit for Mr. Strickler this week.”
Walt hadn’t mentioned that to Barbara, but the invocation of an authority figure calmed her enough to let it go for now. She really did have to get to work.
“Oh, alright. Have a good day Toby.”
“Bye Dr. L.”
--
“I can’t believe Señor Uhl isn’t a changeling,” Toby whined, stuffing the gaggletack back into his bag. “I was so sure his cruelty was inhuman!”
“It just goes to show you that humans are the real monsters,” Eli declared.
Steve shoved him playfully, which with their size difference threw Eli off of the sidewalk.
“Too bad we couldn’t get Strickler to touch it though,” Steve mourned. “If we could dust him, maybe we’d get a sub who grades on a curve.”
“Yeah, Strickler’s still a real possibility,” Toby agreed. “But at least we struck Jim off of the list, right?”
Eli and Steve traded glances. At their silence, Toby looked back at them.
“What?”
“Toby…” Eli began, “Jim never touched the gaggletack, not really.”
“Of course he did,” Toby argued, “he passed it back to me when you tried to bean Couch Lawrence with it.”
“He kicked it back to you,” Steve reminded him. “which doesn’t prove anything.”
Toby sagged as he realized Steve’s point. “So you’re saying that my best bud could still be an evil troll in disguise.”
“He’s probably not a changeling,” Eli comforted him. “Jim’s always been nice to me, he can’t be working for Bular!”
Steve groaned in frustration. “That’s what he wants you to think! If he was a jerk who hated everyone, his cover wouldn’t be as good! Think about it: we all suspected Uhl was a changeling, but who would think that ‘weak little chef Jim’ could be a deadly troll assassin?”
“So you’re saying that Jim must be a changeling...because he doesn't seem like he’s a changeling?” Toby asked, trying to follow Steve’s logic.
“Exactly!” Steve exclaimed.
---
“Hey Jimbo,” Toby greeted, sliding into the bench at the lunch table.
Jim looked up from his tupperware of Chicken Marsala with a smile. “Toby! Want to share some leftovers?”
“Do I!” Toby quickly made room on his lunch tray, and Jim gamely served him a generous helping of reheated food.
“So what have you been up to?” Jim asked, “You haven’t been riding home with me from school anymore. Did you sign up for an after-school activity?”
“Yeah,” Toby shoved a forkful of food into his mouth to give himself time to think. “I joined this fitness program. I’ve got a personal trainer and everything!”
“Really?” Jim asked with a mischievous smile. “How’s it going?”
“It’s amazing,” Toby gushed, happy to be able to share something of his new life with his oldest friend. “It was killer at first, and I’m sore all the time now, but I can run a mile in 8 minutes!” And swing a giant sword, Toby didn’t say.
“That’s fantastic,” Jim complimented, taking a bite of his own lunch.
“What’s up with you?” Toby inquired. Obviously he’d been busy with Trollhunting, himself, but Jim was rarely around and never called on the old walkie. Sure, Toby had Eli, Steve, Blinky, and Aarrrgh to keep him company now, but that didn’t explain what Jim was filling his time with.
“Uhh academics!” Jim answered, “With college applications coming up, Mom’s got me doing extra credit and SAT prep.” He smiled nervously, obviously lying.
“We’re sophomores,” Toby said, incredulous.
“It’s never too early to prepare!” Jim declared, doubling down.
“Right,” Toby allowed. “I see you with Strickler a lot. You spend a lot of time in his office.”
“He’s my career advisor,” Jim excused. Toby nodded, as if that made sense.
If Jim didn’t want to admit that Strickler was dating his mom, that hurt, but it was his business. Still, it was Toby’s duty as a friend to make sure Jim didn’t end up with a monster for a step-dad. Strickler was still at the top of the ‘potential-changeling” list, whatever Steve said.
“Strickler’s got a really nice office with big windows, right? Did you ever see anything… weird… in there?”
Jim frowned. “Weird how?”
“Like… I don’t know... sewer maps, weapons, anything that glows?”
Jim laughed awkwardly. “Tobes, you’ve got a big imagination. No, he doesn’t have anything like that. Mostly just knickknacks and decorative masks.”
Toby hummed in thought. It would have been too good to be true to expect Strickler to leave anything incriminating where Jim could see it, he supposed.
“Look, leave Strickler’s office alone,” Jim warned. “He’s got this… security system. You could get in real trouble if you set it off.”
“Pshhh, I’m not going to break into his office,” Toby laughed. “What do you take me for?”
---
“I can’t believe we’re breaking into his office!” Eli whispered as he opened the door for the rest of the group to enter the school. He vibrated with excitement.
“Well I can’t believe you can fit in a locker,” Toby replied. “How did you get yourself out, anyway?”
“Trade secret,” Eli answered proudly. “I figured it out at the end of the last school year, after I got stuck in there during a pep rally and no one heard me calling for help.”
Blinky stared in horror. “And you consider us trolls to be cruel.”
“Human teenagers don’t fight to the death,” Toby pointed out.
“And we do not imprison our young in boxes of iron,” Blinky responded. “Now then, where is the proposed changeling’s lair?” he looked up and down the hallway.
“Strickler’s office is this way,” Toby called, and led them quietly through the dark hallways. “Be quiet though, there could be goblins guarding it. Or the school janitor!”
The glass doors of the entryway allowed ambient light from the moon and nearby streetlamps to illuminate the area, but further inside the hallways were lined with lockers, without handy windows. Toby carefully navigated through the darkness and tried not to think of all of the horror movies set in highschools. He hummed a theme song to keep up his spirits instead.
A sudden light blinded him, and Toby reacted quickly, preparing for trouble.
“For the glory of Merlin, Daylight is mine to command!”
He spun around and pointed the massive sword toward the light source.
Eli smiled hesitantly and held up the flashlight.
Toby sighed, lowering the weapon. “I bet Steve’s having a better time.”
–
“So big guy…” Steve chattered, trying to fill the silence as they watched Mr. Strickler check his phone in the front seat of his car. “What do you lift? Like 500...600 pounds?”
Aarrrgh raised an eyebrow (or the nearest trollish approximate).
“Right, right,” Steve muttered to himself. “Uh, what do you do for fun?”
“Watch for danger,” Aarrrgh rumbled.
“You do that for fun?” Steve asked, confused.
“No,” Aarrrgh clarified. He pointed a large stone hand toward the car. “Now, we watch for danger.”
“Okay, no small talk. I respect that.”
–
“Why have we stopped?” Blinky whispered.
Toby bent down on one knee to investigate the doorknob to Strickler’s office (crouching in armor sucked, in his opinion).
“Jimbo said there was a security system,” he explained. “If I can find it, maybe we can disarm it before it alerts Strickler.”
“I don’t see anything,” Eli offered. “But I do hear something!”
Footsteps echoed down the hall.
“Hello? Who is there?” Called Señior Uhl’s voice.
“Quickly, we must not be seen!” Blinky urged.
Toby gave in and opened the door, allowing all three of them to pile into the office before Uhl turned the corner.
They pressed their backs against the door, holding it shut.
The footsteps got louder, closer.
They slowed to a stop right in front of the door. Toby held his breath. Eli began biting his fingernails.
The footsteps continued on and faded as Uhl continued his patrol of the building.
“Man, that guy is determined,” Toby complained.
“I would say he has troll-like persistence,” Eli agreed.
“He was not a changeling, as I recall,” Blinky interrupted. “So let us focus on the human who is still under suspicion.”
The boys nodded and fanned out, examining the room for anything incriminating.
–
“Shit, where is he going?” Steve pressed his hands to the side of his head as the car drove off.
“Follow,” Aarrrgh suggested.
“Right, good idea,” Steve replied, strapping his helmet onto his head. “Just let me get my Vespa-”
“Now,” Aarrrgh continued, and hoisted Steve up over his shoulder. He jogged off after Strickler’s car, trying to keep out of sight in the treeline.
Steve screamed.
“Shh,” Aarrrgh warned.
–
“There’s nothing here,” Toby exclaimed, leaning back in the desk chair. “I’ve searched every drawer, and all he has is student records, a sudoku book, and the vape pen he confiscated from Seamus in September.”
“I’m finding lots of cool old stuff,” Eli offered, holding up one of the masks that Strickler used for decoration. Blinky held up another to his face and attempted to look out of the eye holes with two of his adjacent eyes. “But no clues about where they moved the bridge.”
“Think Toby, think,” the Trollhunter said to himself. “If I was an evil changeling, where would I hide stuff?” he fiddled with Strickler’s pen as he thought.
There was a click, and instead of the cap coming off clean, a jagged piece of metal was revealed at the end of the pen.
“Oh ho ho!” Toby crowed. “What do we have here? Secret key! I found a secret key!”
There was a thud from elsewhere in the school.
“Quickly, find a lock!” Blinky advised, “Before we are discovered!”
They combed the room once more. Eli eyed an abstract statue with suspicion as Toby threw books off of the shelves, trying to find anything unusual.
“Like the key, it may be hidden in plain sight,” Blinky continued, running two of his hands along a piano keyboard. “A key in the keys, perhaps?”
“What’s this?” Toby asked in delight, uncovering a lock hidden behind the books.
“Guys?” Eli called.
“Greak Gorga, you’ve done it!” Blinky celebrated. “Try the key!”
Toby fumbled once, but readjusted his grip and thrust the key unto the lock.
Nothing happened.
“Whaaaaat?” Toby asked, disappointed.
“It is as I feared,” Blinky lamented, “A changeling lock can only be opened by the hand of a changeling.”
“Toby? Blinky?” Eli pleaded.
“Well we’re fresh out of those,” Toby complained. “Plus, they tend to explode.”
“Hmm,” Blinky observed, “I fear we have reached a dead end in our search.”
“GUYS!” Eli screamed. “I think I found the security system!”
Blinky and Toby whirled around to find Eli cowering on the carpet, with an ominous cloud of dark miasma hovering above him.
“An antramonstrum!” Blinky gasped. “RUN!”
Eli rolled to a standing position and launched himself at the door with surprising agility. He heaving it open and waved Blinky and Toby through. “Go, go, go!” he urged.
Toby didn’t need any encouragement to run like hell. Rule 1, he thought.
The smoke-like creature seeped under the door and crept after them.
“If we survive this, I’m going to get so many points on my chubby tracker,” Toby panted.
–
Aarrrgh skidded to a stop, and the momentum tossed Steve off his back and into a bush.
“Where are we?” Steve asked as he picked leaves from his jacket.
“Canals.” Aarrrgh pointed through the trees to a bare spot of dirt beside the road where Strickler’s car was now parked. The man (changeling?) himself was carefully picking his way down the concrete slope into the bottom of the canal. Toward the entrance to Trollmarket.
Steve cast about for a hiding place, but found nothing but a wide expanse of concrete. There was no cover from which to watch Strickler.
“What do we do?” Steve asked Aarrrgh. The huge troll looked around as well.
“Hold on,” he answered.
“Not again!”
Aarrrgh lifted Steve up gently this time, and placed him onto his green scruff. Steve wrapped the fur around his fists and clenched tightly in preparation for-
Aarrrgh launched himself in the air and swung his body up onto the underside of the bridge. He used the support beams like monkey bars and closed in on Strickler’s location.
Steve held on and tried not to cry.
---
Eli screamed.
The black smoke seemed to be impeded by closed doors, but unfortunately no barrier in the building was truly impenetrable. The antramonstrum pressed against the door to the gymnasium, shaking it against Eli’s weight.
“Any time, guys!” he called behind him.
“Just a minute!” Toby hedged.
“If I give you another minute, you’ll be sucking this thing out of my poor youthful body!”
“You talk to Steve too much,” Toby complained, finally in position. “NOW!”
Eli threw his body to the side, allowing the door to slam open, revealing the antramonstrum in all of its gaseous glory.
Blinky shoved a plug into a wall socket on the other side of the room, and Toby turned on the vaccum cleaner.
“I’d say nice knowing ya,” Toby quipped, “But this mission sucked!”
He braced himself for impact, his armor glowing to provide him with extra stability as the magical monster struggled against the suction power of an industrial vacuum.
“Take that, creeper!” Eli cheered as the last tendril disappeared into the mouth of the machine.
The silence in the unlit gym was broken only by the creak of the open door hanging off its hinge.
“Well that was a bust,” Toby complained.
“Not entirely,” Eli pointed out. “Now we know that Strickler’s definitely a changeling.”
“True,” Toby perked up. “But what about Jim? He warned me about a ‘security system’, does that mean he knew about this ana-monster-”
“Antramonstrum,” Blinky corrected.
“-or was he just repeating something Strickler told him?” Toby continued, unsettled.
Eli shrugged. “Inconclusive.”
“Indeed. And a problem for another day.”
“So what do we do with this?” Toby asked, waving the vacuum arm attachment.
“Leave that to me,” Blinky offered. “Now, let us check in with the rest of our party.”
–
“Strickler just stood there right under the bridge for over an hour,” Steve complained.
“Did he do anything suspicious?” Eli asked.
“He made a phone call, but I couldn’t hear anything he said,” Steve explained, disappointed.
“At least he didn’t catch you,” Toby offered. “And we know that he’s definitely working for Bular now.”
He patted Steve on the back in gratitude. Steve would never admit how hard it was not to be laid flat by the Trollhunter’s newfound strength.
“You did great, Steve,” Eli cheered.
“Tell that to my bruised tailbone,” he muttered.
Blinky ignored the humans and continued searching through his library, checking under tables and behind stacks of books.
“Uh, lost something, Blinky?” Toby asked.
“No. Yes. Possibly,” Blinky hesitated.
“What is it? I’ll help you find it!” Eli offered.
“Did any of you take an extra horngazel from my dwelling?” Blinky demanded, six eyes sweeping over the teenage humans.
They all shook their heads in unison.
“If you do not have it, and I have not misplaced it, then perhaps-”
“Blinkous Galadrigal!” a new voice thundered.
Vendal marched through the threshold, enraged. He slammed his staff onto the dusty floor.
“The human invasion of Trollmarket must cease!”
Blinky turned to glare at his three charges. Steve and Eli quickly hid their hands behind their backs and tried to look innocent. Toby just shrugged.
“I didn’t do anything.”
“You have allowed yet another human into our hallowed home,” Vendal accused. “And I say ‘no more!’ I have allowed too much already.” He gestured toward Toby’s friends in explanation.
“Wait, we didn’t let anyone new into Trollmarket,” Toby objected. “At least, I don’t think we did.”
Vendal looked unconvinced. “I have it on good authority that an unknown human was seen sneaking around the Heartstone last night,” he explained. “Given that none of the other trolls are known to associate with humans, thus must be your doing.”
“But Vendal-” Blinky objected.
“But nothing! No. More. Humans.” Vendal pointed at each of them individually, then turned and made his exit without waiting for a response.
“So that was weird, right?” Toby commented.
“Do you think he’s talking about Strickler?” Eli asked.
Steve shook his head. “No way, Aarrgh and I were watching the whole time. He never went in, and the only movement in or out all night was some troll with a wagon full of trash.”
“Hmm.” Blinky thought deeply. “I don’t mean to alarm you, but this may mean that there is a changeling here in Trollmarket.”
---
“Jim. JIM!”
“...Tobes?” Jim’s sleepy voice crackled from the old walkie-talkie.
“Look out your window!” Toby urged his friend.
He heard some background noises as Jim got out of bed. As his familiar head appeared in the window across the street, Toby waved and unfurled his banner. It was crumpled, and not as big as he’d planned (they’d had a busy week stalking Strickler), but it was the thought that counted, right?
Jim chuckled over the walkie.
“Thanks Tobes. You’re the best.”
“It’s not every day you turn sixteen,” Toby advised. “Enjoy it, okay?”
“I’ll try,” Jim promised.
Toby drummed his fingers on the windowsill. He’d planned out Jim’s birthday gift months ago. On the one hand, he still wanted to make his oldest friend’s birthday as awesome-sauce as possible. On the other hand, he was due to train with Blinky and Aarrgh in Trollmarket that evening. Also Jim had been acting really squirrely recently, would he even still appreciate the gift of a Vespa test drive?
Toby shook his head to clear it. Of course Jim would love it. He’d known the guy since they were five years old! Everything would be absolutely fine.
-
“I love it!” Jim gushed as Toby handed a bribe to the Vespa store attendant. “You’re the best, Tobes.”
“I love you too, Jimbo,” Toby said happily. He might not always make the right call as the Trollhunter, but at least he could as Jim’s friend.
Jim fitted the helmet on his head and looked out at the road. He hesitated.
“You’ll be okay without me, right?” he asked.
Toby chuckled. “I’ll be fine dude, what’s gonna happen to me in the middle of town in broad daylight?”
Jim muttered something.
“I didn’t catch that,” Toby told him.
“I said, ‘this is going to be awesome’,” Jim answered. His grin didn’t meet his eyes, but Toby didn’t take that personally. Birthdays were rough on Jim.
“Go, go, have a great-” Toby caught the attendant's eye. “-and safe- drive,” he added.
“I will,” Jim promised, watching the skies.
Toby squinted at the clouds as Jim drove off. Did it look like rain?
-
Jim was back in ten minutes, and the Vespa was in one piece. Toby told the Vespa employee ‘I told you so’ as politely as possible.
“As agreed upon, we have returned the vehicle to you in one piece,” Toby declared, trying to mimic Blinky’s speech patterns. Jim laughed. The guy working there did not.
“Thanks for this, Toby,” Jim said and he unbuckled the helmet. “Best birthday ever.”
As they walked their bikes to school, Jim hardly took his eyes off of the sky.
The forecast did call for a storm that night, though, so Toby left it at that.
–
Jim was waiting by the bikes after school, which was a nice surprise.
“Your mom’s not driving you home on your birthday?” Toby asked.
“She’s busy,” Jim shrugged off, “And biking home together is our thing, right?”
“It was our thing,” Toby acknowledged. “But we haven’t really done this in weeks. Are you okay Jim?”
His friend smiled nervously, a sure-fire sign that he was hiding something.
“Ohmygosh, are you dying?” Toby demanded. “Is this one of those ‘have a last perfect day’ things?”
“No!” Jim yelled. “Why would you think that? No one’s dying today.”
Well that was just super-suspicious, in Toby’s opinion. But it was Jim’s birthday, and he was entitled to act a little weird today. The weirdness all the other days still needed to be accounted for, though.
“Alright,” Toby allowed. “Any plans tonight?”
“Just dinner with Mom. Before that, I’ve got a planning session with my- uh- SAT study group,” Jim recounted.
“SAT study group, huh? Anyone I know?” It was so nice to be able to have a conversation while riding a bike, Toby reflected. Cardio really was worth it.
“Well you know Strickler,” Jim laughed. “And there’s also a guy from Arcadia Oaks Academy.”
It always came back to Strickler.
“Sounds like a pretty selective study group, if there’s only two of you.”
“Yeah,” Jim acknowledged. “but a high student-teacher ratio is the key to a quality education!”
“Right,” Toby said doubtfully. “Well be careful around Strickler, would you? He gives me weird vibes.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” Jim muttered under his breath.
Toby’s stomach sank.
“What did you say?” he asked with dread.
“Nothing,” Jim insisted as they coasted to a stop in front of Toby’s house. “Well, thanks for riding with me, we should do this more often.”
Toby stared at him, but Jim’s false smile would not crack. He watched Toby put his bike away and didn’t budge from the driveway until Toby was inside the house.
It was uncanny.
-
Between school, his Nana, and his various new friends (Troll and human), Toby was hardly ever truly alone. This is probably why the Stalkling didn’t strike until it was almost sundown.
Toby screamed and pumped his bike harder, praying he’d make it to Trollmarket before the demon-troll-bird killed him.
He skidded to a stop right in front of the canal wall and fumbled with the horngazel, glancing behind himself in fear.
“Come on, come on!”
--
“Blinky you’ve gotta help me!” Toby yelped, careening through the main path of Trollmarket on his bicycle. Bagdwella and several other trolls threw themselves out of his way to avoid collision.
Blinky laughed nervously excused himself from his conversation with Vendel.
“Important Trollhunter duties call,” he chuckled. “You understand.”
Vendel grunted, unconvinced. Blinky smiled one last time, and fled along Toby’s path of destruction.
--
“It was like a huge stone dragon,” Toby described. “Are dragons real?”
“Yes, dragons are real,” Blinky answered as he shuffled through his books. “-although I do not believe you have met one. Dragons are being of flesh and magic, but Stalklings are trolls – beings of living stone.” Blinky pushed an open book into Toby’s hands and pointed to an artist’s rendition of a winged troll with a sharp beak and talons.
“I dunno,” Toby said, turning the illustration around as he examined it. “It was definitely out in the sunlight, and it looked way scarier than this.”
“Yes, well not many people have seen a Stalkling up close and lived to tell the tale,” Blinky explained.
“And by ‘not many’, you mean…?”
“None, that I can think of,” Blinky clarified. “But we do know that, like changelings, Stalklings are immune to sunlight.”
“No fair!” Toby complained. “I thought Daylight was supposed to be mine to command!”
Blinky chuckled.
—
Toby peaked out from the entrance to Trollmarket. No sign of the stalkling yet, but it could be anywhere. Toby crept forward, rolling his bike out of the portal.
The canal was silent. The sky, overcast and dark.
He made a break for it, propelling his bike up the side of the canal at an angle.
A sharp cry rung in his ears, warning him of the incoming monster. He jerked his bike to the side, hoping to dodge an enemy he couldn’t yet see.
Toby took a chance and glanced backward. There is was, right on his tail: a huge dragon-like troll with a sharp beak and a taste for human flesh!
Toby screamed and petaled harder. He made a bee-line toward town, but the Stalkling swooped down and snapped at his helmet, causing Toby to swerve to stay upright.
He turned the bike away, leaving Arcadia and his hopes behind.
Wind from the incoming storm buffeted Toby’s face and filled the Stalkling’s wings, carrying it up into the clouds. Toby had no doubt that it was still following him.
Should he take a chance and turn around, back toward town and safety in numbers? Or should he continue his path, where there would be no witnesses or collateral damage in their inevitable confrontation?
“I’m the Trollhunter,” Toby told himself. “I can do this.”
He desperately combed his mind for any weakness he could think of. The stalkling was immune to sunlight, but it probably could still be hurt by Daylight- the goblins could, anyway. What kills birds? Windshields, rat poison, housecats? No, that was stupid. Electricity beats flying – and the forecast called for lightning tonight!
Toby looked down at his metal armor and discarded that idea as well. Who would be stupid enough to fly into a lightning storm wearing this getup?
What else, what else? Blinky had been talking about using your environment to your advantage… how could he do that? Maybe he could lure the Stalkling somewhere it couldn’t fly? Like a building or a ravine or- Toby looked around- like dense forest.
Toby summoned Daylight and stabbed it into a tree, using it to make a sharp turn without losing momentum.
“I hope this works, or I’m gonna die looking like an idiot,” Toby muttered to himself.
As the terrain became overgrown, Toby abandoned his bike and continued on foot. Luckily, his hunch was right, and the tree canopy impeded the Stalkling as well.
A sharp projectile flew past him and stabbed into a tree trunk, barely missing Toby’s head. He swerved and ran the other way.
What was that? Could stalklings shoot spines too?
It screamed again, and Toby began to pant as his stamina dwindled. He was done running.
“Here scary dragon thing,” he called, his sword held at the ready. “Here boy!”
A blue flash lit the sky.
That’s a weird color for lightning, Toby thought.
The woods shook as the monster crashed through trees in its frenzy to catch Toby. He squinted through the gloom, wondering why these confrontations always had to happen in darkness.
“Right, trolls,” he muttered.
Then the crashing stopped, and before Toby had time to move, the Stalkling burst out of the brush in front of him, snapping its beak at his face.
Toby responded quickly, kicking its wing as it brought a shoulder around to bludgeon him.
“Take this,” he yelled, and swung Daylight down toward the thing’s exposed neck.
Before the blade connected, the Stalkling swung it’s massive tail around and caught Toby in the midsection, sweeping him off of his feet and slamming him into a nearby tree.
Toby groaned and used his sword to prop himself up.
“Okay, Toothless, round 2!”
The troll-monster snarled, and blue light flashed behind it once more. Toby didn’t pay it any mind, concentrating on the deadly threat before him. He hoisted Daylight up just in time for the Stalkling to charge.
Toby squeezed his eyes shut and braced for impact. The Stalkling’s body barreled into him with the force and weight of a boulder. His armor creaked and glowed as it absorbed the impact, but Toby was still trapped between the thing’s body and a tree.
The Stalkling gave a choking scream, and Toby realized that Daylight had struck true – the sword was lodged in the beast’s chest, and its living stone was gradually turning into dead-stone.
-leaving Toby still trapped between a stone monster and a tree.
“Well this could be worse-“
It started to rain.
“Great.”
-
It wasn’t much later that Toby trudged down the side of the road, towing his abused bike through mud puddles and back toward civilization. As Toby approached the bridge over the canals, the streetlights illuminated a figure with an umbrella waiting there.
Who would be out here at night in this weather? Toby wondered.
“Tobes!” the figure called.
“Jim?”
Jim waved him over happily. “What are you doing out here?” Jim asked. “You’re soaked!”
“It’s a long story,” Toby told him, unable to think of a good lie. “How about you?”
Jim accepted Toby’s excuse without comment or apparent curiosity. “I was on my way home from SAT prep and got caught in the rain,” he explained. “I’m just waiting for mom to pick me up.”
Toby grunted in understanding, too tired to form words.
Jim eyed Toby’s muddy bike and exhausted expression. “Want a ride?”
“Absolutely,” Toby groaned. “You’re the best, Jim.”
Jim just smiled and patted him on the back.
A feeling of wrongness and suspicion crept up on Toby, but he pushed it ruthlessly away.
Jim was his best friend, and that’s all there was to it.
--
–
“Hey Jimbo, long time no see!” Toby greeted, scurrying across the sidewalk to stand next to his best friend.
Jim smiled. Life may be weird and frustrating now, and he missed the pleasant simplicity f his friendship with Toby. He propped his bike up on its kickstand, waiting for Toby to unlock his own bicycle from the rack.
“I saw you this morning in class,” Jim teased.
“Yeah but we never hang out anymore,” Toby complained. “We haven’t even talked since you gave me a ride home the other night!”
As the crowd of students thinned around them, a body barreled forward. Steve Palchuck shoulder-checked Toby, but despite his surprise, the Trollhunter held his ground. Steve frowned and smacked Toby’s backpack out of his hands instead.
“Oops!” Steve said happily. “better watch out!”
“Steve!” Toby complained. Jim immediately knelt down and helped to gather Toby’s scattered supplies.
“Here,” Toby handed Jim the bookbag. “I gather, you stuff?”
“Sure.”
“So you’ve seemed really busy lately,” Toby chattered. He found a rhythm passing Jim handfuls of loose-leaf paper, pencils, and folders.
“Yeah, I’ve got a lot going on this year,” Jim agreed as he tried to fit wads of crumpled paper back into Toby’s bag. He cast about for a neutral, believable excuse. “Did you know Strickler has me in a mentorship program?”
“Yeah? You have always been his favorite student,” Toby answered. He handed Jim another discarded object.
A jolt of electricity ran up Jim’s arm as soon as his fingers made contact.
“Wha-” he gasped. His tongue felt too big in his mouth, pushing against his teeth and making his words slur strangely. His fingers clutched cold metal. He gazed down, uncomprehending. It was a rounded, greyish shape made of iron-
“A gaggletack?” he realized. He looked up and met Toby’s wide, horrified eyes.
“I was right!” Steve Palchuck punched the air, vindicated.
“Take this, evil shapeshifter!” Jim had only enough time to wonder what Eli Pepperjack was talking about, before a heavy blunt object struck the back of his head, and his vision went black.