I think you should take a look at this. My computer says while I'm trying to fix a stubborn quantum flux gate.

I look at the video display. Uh oh.

Is he a threat?

"Yeah, I think so. We'll have to do something about this."

I suggest that he be eliminated.

"That's your answer to everything. I think I'll just have to visit the genetic lab and work on the garden." I pause to take another bite from my yummy vine-ripened purple orange. "Sure he might have a bunch of portals to different climates, but he won't win the Sang Sacre gardening club's garden of the month award without a fight."

So, he should be killed?

"No, no killing. Start doing some calculations to see if I can improve on my royal blue roses."

But no killing?

"No." Again I resolve to find the bloodthirsty bug in the AI software. Probably forgot a break in a switch statement somewhere. Oh well, no time now, I have a gardening award to defend.

"Ho there? Who talks like that? I don't talk like that."

I turn to Aimee and the others. "I don't, do I?"

"Occassionally," Aimee mutters.

"Huh. Well. Nice red goatee, too."

"'Nice red goatee'," a voice sneers mockingly. It sounds damnedly familiar.

"Oh. Shit."

My double steps from the mirror. Where my longcoat is grey, his is deepest black. My staff from nice solid oak is darkly mirrored in something that appears to be iron. My Captain Marvel t-shirt and khakis has become...a rather nice suit, actually.

"Evil has more style," he says.

"Yeah, but good...good has...good, you see..."

"Oh, shut up," he sneers. "You and your 'I'm on the side of good'. 'I'm only using my powers for good'. 'I can't do that...it wouldn't be good'! Well FUCK good!"

I see the shift in his aura and react. Before he can launch his no doubt devastating curse I bend space/time and transport him away.

Well, that's what I meant to do...

A psychic force entangles me and drags me into the bend with my evil twin. We hover over Sang Sacre, a few feet apart, brandishing our staves.

"You're gonna get it, Goody Two-Shoes," he snarls. "You're the good Miracleman. You have to play by the rules. I'm the bad Miracleman. I don't have any rules." He raises his staff.

I turn him into a chicken. Squawking he begins the long plummet to Earth trailing feathers.

"Good...bad...I'm the guy with the mojo."

Free! Free at last! Free to--hm. Must ask Miracleman who installed his tile. After I DESTROY him! Erm. This giggling thing is getting out of hand.

Quick mental calculations: Wizard, Other Wizard, Golem manufacturer, Psychic wild card, Bogeyman, Good Me. I'd quote that bit about discretion and valor, but it doesn't really apply. I just want to get my pretty little butt out of here before it gets smoked.

I'll take the window. These curtains . . . nice valence, too. I must get the number of this designer.

"Well FUCK good!"

The Miraclemen both blink out of the room, and I look around at the others.

"Such vulgarity," I sniff. "Does not this fair city have a Department of Standards and Practices?"

"Fuck that," says Hector. "Where's the boss?"

"Are you feeling all right?" Penny whispers to me.

I take a deep breath. "Yes, fair one, I am well, though I am itching to smote someone. I am still unclear on who is behind all this devilry."

"Um . . . guys?" Aimee is standing at the window, looking up. "I think I found Miracleman."

I finish grounding myself, and blow out the candles. The house and shop wards seem fine, which is a relief.

The air shimmers. I feel like my ears need to pop. The pressure mounts, and then goes away without a warning. Standing across the room is a reflection of myself. Same clothes (black silk frock coat, black and white stripey full skirt, Victorian blouse, top hat), same perplexed look that I just know is on my face.

Clovis, sitting by the cauldron, looks back and forth between the two of us.

”TWO gothygirls?”

“Who or what are you?” I ask my reflection.

“I think I’m the bad twin”, she replies.

“Huh. So, do you have any urge to destroy me?”

“Not really. I think you should be a lot bitchier to people sometimes, but that’s not worth destroying you over.”

“So we don’t have to fight."

“Nope.”

My evil twin and I turn to face Clovis, who has not suddenly gone binary.

“I wonder why his evil twin didn’t show up”, I muse.

“Prolly because his good and evil sides are pretty similar.”

“But I have an evil twin.”

“Well sure. When I said ‘a lot bitchier’, I meant it. Oh, and thumping clueless baby Goths with the parasol.”

“Right.”

“So, wanna go shopping?”

“Okay.” I look at Clovis. “Go keep Pete company.”

Clovis toddles off, looking even more round-eyed that usual.

“Honey! I’m going to run some errands!” I shout, as my evil twin and I leave the ritual room.

Pete stands in the studio doorway, his eyes as big as Clovis’.

“Jilli?”

“Yes?” we answer in harmony.

“Why are there two of you?”

“Evil twin. She just materialized.”

“But since I don’t have any need to fight her, we’re going shopping.”

Pete eyes us speculatively. “I don’t suppose …”

“Nope.”

“Just because I’m the bad twin doesn’t mean my sexual orientation’s changed. Sorry.”

He shrugs. “It was worth asking. But you’re going shopping.”

“Uh-huh.”

He looks down at Clovis clinging to his pant leg. “You’ve traumatized the rabbit.”

“have not. just not sure about TWO gothygirls. might mean double baths.”

We wave to my (our?) husband and Devilbunny, then head out the door.

“This should be interesting”, I say.

“Maybe we’ll have twice the luck finding things”, my evil twin responds.

With a vicious squawk/unearthly howl, the bad Miracleman transmutes into a sort of pterodactyl thing. With chicken feathers. His massive wings catch the air and he begins to swing around and up.

I fly off north at a rapid pace. Behind me, the Miracledactyl screams and launches a stream of white hot flame from its mouth. Crap.

I have to think, I have to think. Can I kill this guy? If I do, what happens to me? Is this a part of me, an alternate dimension me, a magical construct that has almost nothing to do with me aside from, y'know, being me?

I fly faster, firing lightning wildly from my staff over my shoulder. I don't know if it hits or not.

The beating of wings sounds closer...

Two Knuts, two Miracleman's (Miraclemen?). I look down. Only one of me- thank goodness I was seperated from my twin at birth. The porny, silly me is the only one Blood's going to have to deal with.

Aimee is at the window. Our Miracleman- the good one- is outside. He seems a little panicked. I shrug, make a quick request, and the house moves six feet sideways, bringing MiraclemanG and a pterodactyl inside, and leaving poor Hector halfway into the wall.

Making friends with the houses can be worth doing- and they're getting scared. //A shop in the center says it's got two gothygirls,// Dagfari reports. //I've got a very bad feeling here.//

'Go shave a Wookie,' I tell my Lucas-loving house, and help Hector out of the wall.

and help Hector out of the wall.

I don't know...he kinda looks funny with his leg and arm waving frantically.

I feel the guy's better out. He can't help eat Jell-O monsters with his face in the wall. So what? I have a soft spot for misunderstood bogerts.

Yeah, you're right. It just reminds me of my childhood. Our older sister was constantly doing that to him.