You can find the MAX PLUSH right here! We're down to the last hours of the Max Plush campaign, and we need 30 more sold to hit 200, or the Max Plush won't get made! I know we can hit that number, so if you're able, please consider hopping on!

To speak frankly: I know this campaign has had less momentum than the last ones, and that's completely understandable. People are tapped, myself included! I'm extremely grateful for the support you all have shown for these. They've been a vital lifeline while my partner was out of work. Moving forward, I'll be trying out new angles for merch and support, but right now my goal is to get everybody who was excited about the Max Plush what they pledged for. Thank you for your help, and for keeping Paranatural going!

As ever, you can support Paranatural on Patreon and Ko-fi!

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[Transcript]

        Dimitri, lost in fog, walked the unfamiliar halls of Bayview Biddle School.

        Every so often, he'd reach a stretch that felt familiar, a windowless corridor lined with classrooms of the teachers he knew well, filled with classmates he knew well. Then he'd take a turn, or climb a staircase, and emerge beside a bright view of the islands that his hometown had become. 

        Dimitri didn't understand. It was like the world had shifted underneath his feet specifically. The move that he'd been dreading... it had happened in reverse! Port Paradise had made its way to Mayview, and, with everyone else accepting their new normal overnight, Dimitri had become the only person left behind.

        How could that be? Was this all a strange dream? He wouldn't dream about Ed becoming a skirt-wearing scientist... would he? UGH! Why did that have to be his first weird thought?! EVERYTHING had changed, and NOTHING made sense... and yet the nightmare felt no different than reality! Was it Boss Leader playing a prank on him? Some spirit-fueled shift to another dimension? The whole town had turned, and he felt like the axis... but WHY? Dimitri was nobody special... and if he was, why did that mean that only HE wasn't allowed to—to be different??

        "PEEKABOO!!"

        Dimitri said a swear word as the jumpscare made him whirl and smack the window like a bird. He turned to face his spirit, a motion that evoked a horror movie's slow reveal that a swivel chair contained a sagging corpse.

        "...Hello. Peekaboo," Dimitri hissed through gritted teeth. "How. Can I. Help you?"

        "Peekaboo-hoo-HEE hee HEE!" the sheet ghost spirit giggled. It had filled the hallway with its Halloween-themed toys and blocks and puppets, and dark curtains had descended to conceal the view outside. "This time, Peekaboo helped YOU! And that helps PEEKABOO!" The spirit slugged its way to its host's leg, then hugged him as it beamed up at Dimitri's weary grimace. "Didi is SMILING! Didi is HAPPY! HOORAY, HOORAY, HOORAY!"

        "What are you talking about, Peekaboo?" Dimitri sighed. He was eager to end this spirit trance about as soon as it had started. Peekaboo had followed their rule, and waited for its host to be alone before they spoke, but there was no telling when a classmate would come waltzing around the corner in slow motion, then see Dimitri trapped in time lapse with his eyes aglow like headlights. "You helped me? What do you mean?"

        His spirit smugly slid away, drifting and then twirling like an ice skater.

        "Peekaboo made Didi's wish come true!" it said, stretching taller so that it could take a bow.

        "...What wish?"

        Peekaboo paused, as if in thought. 

        "The big, bright one in Didi's heart! Peekaboo is pretty sure!" The spirit jiggled like a flan flicked with a spoon. "Didi doesn't want to leave! Didi wants his friends to be SO happy—for THEIR wishes to come true! That must be what Didi's la-la light is, since Didi said what Didi wants and Didi doesn't lie!" Peekaboo melted to the floor in a soft-serve heap, like a cat rolling around in hopes that its owner would pet it. "Peekaboo was good, too! Peekaboo played by the rules, just like we Peeka-promised! Didi's Peeka-PROUD! Didi Peeka-PRAISE ME!"

        A knot of dread was slowly tightening in the pit of Dimitri's stomach.

        "...What are you saying, Peekaboo?" he asked. "What did you do? Everything is—" He trailed off. "Did you... did you mess with my head??"

        His spirit wilted sideways in confusion.

        "Peekaboo isn't allowed to change Didi like that. Didi said it wasn't funny."

        Dimitri blinked. Peekaboo wasn't allowed to...? Did it mean after the incident with Isaac, the terrifying trick that it had pulled while they were in the Slanted Manse? Peekaboo must have absorbed some rule he'd told it, then, in the aftermath of its tantrum, more orders than just the frightened "leave me alone" that had earned Dimitri a year of reprieve from its pestering. The exact terms of his demands back then were a blur. That was the day that Dimitri had discovered that Peekaboo could shapeshift him against his will, without him even noticing...

        "Did you... take me somewhere, Peekaboo??" he asked, stepping backwards. His eyes darted to the window and the curtains that concealed the town outside.

        "Peekaboo can't do that," sulked the spirit. "Peekaboo can't leave. Peekaboo is trapped."

        "You can leave... whenever you want," Dimitri whispered, clutching his chest. He wished it would. He was tired of dealing with an imaginary friend that he'd outgrown, that hadn't healed despite a lifetime as a parasite inside him... and now, still worse, with dawning horror, Dimitri had begun to wrap his thoughts around his spirit's strange confession. Dimitri was already reeling from a truth he hadn't yet fully exhumed, buried as it was beneath a dune of ashen doubt.

        "Didi said it wasn't time. Didi said go back to sleep," Peekaboo pouted, clearly pained by a reaction that it hadn't been anticipating. "Peekaboo can't leave. Didi doesn't WANT to leave. So Peekaboo moved everything like toys and blocks so Didi doesn't HAVE to!"

        Dimitri's next step back caused him to bump into a nest of dangling draculas and witches. He flinched and jerked away... but it was Peekaboo that truly scared him now.

        "You're saying... YOU did this to Mayview? YOU?" The spectral scoffed. "You're joking. You're lying."

        "Peekaboooo...!" his spirit sniffed. "Lies are bad! And Peekaboo's been good! P-Peeka-pinky-promise!" it said, growing a hand, and then a finger, and then four more to prove it wasn't tricking him with some less honest digit.

        "Change it back," a mystified Dimitri muttered. It was a ridiculous request; just as ridiculous as thinking that his spirit could have been the source of Mayview's transformation.

        "Boohoo... Peekaboo can't do that. Peekaboo's asleep again. Peekaboo's alone again." The shadows of the hallway seemed to follow the sorrowful spirit as it drifted in the wake of its dear friend's rattled retreat. "Didi doesn't like it...? Peekaboo worked extra hard..."

        "...No," Dimitri heard himself reply. "No, Peekaboo, I don't like it."

        "It's not Peekaboo's fault...!" his spirit whimpered. "The scary shiny heart man... he made Peekaboo play Peekaboo!" The creature's empty features quivered strangely. "Peekaboo used to be different. Peekaboo is upside-down. Before, when nobody was peeking, a Peekaboo was anything it wanted. But now a Peekaboo needs somebody to LOOK AT ME"—a different voice burbled out from beneath the spirit's sheet, and the Great Unknown's persona briefly swelled up like a cell about to burst—"or Peekaboo is nothing!" The spirit's lurching form slowly deflated. "Peekaboo wants to be something. Peekaboo wants to be everything you want. Doesn't that make Didi smile? Didi's at the boo-boo-beach! Didi's friends got all the happy things they wished for!"

        "No. No! They didn't. That's not true," Dimitri stammered. None of it was. It couldn't be!

        Peekaboo slowed to a stop. It stared at him dejectedly, with vacant, void-black eyes.

        "...Didi lies?" it asked at last.

        "No, I... I've never lied to—"

        "Didi said he wasn't scared of Peekaboo anymore," the spirit muttered softly, drifting back into the shadows of the hallway. "Didi lied..." Peekaboo's faint voice echoed like the whistling of wind from every direction, and Dimitri's spirit trance dissolved away. 

        The spectral stumbled back in disbelief, into a lightless classroom just behind him. Dimitri's heart was pounding his chest. What had just happened? Could that—could any of that possibly be true?!

        "Hello, Dimitri," chuckled Bishop, Chess Club savant and Number Four of the Twelve Black Saint Councilor-Generals. He gestured towards a chessboard set up on the desk in front of him. "I would like to play a game."

        Dimitri turned to face him like the Tin Man, starved of oil, creaking as his neck achieved an owl's uncanny range of motion through sheer force of will alone.