Episode Five (1/26/01)

Everything past Lily Sloan's elbow somehow changed in an instant from flesh and bone, blood and fluids--into pure silver. Her fingers all but fused into sharp pickets and the further she stretched they continued to fuse until their points became a single, silvery javelin. As this appendage of Lily's shot forth, Father Mario Garibaldi had the foresight, be it divine or otherwise, to duck out of its path.

The silver spear, which was once Lily's forearm, then fell to the floor as if it were ice that had suddenly melted. Lily screamed. Someone from the other side of the locked basement door in Garibaldi's church knocked and asked if everything was all right. He in turn bellowed assuredly from the foot of the stairs that everything was.

"Wh-What's happening to me...?" Lily trembled as she stared in shock at the silvery puddle on the floor before her. "Is this because I tried to hit a preacher?"

"Hardly," Garibaldi almost smiled. "I had to provoke you into using your newfound gift. As I said, you're a silver being now, a Christian soldier in this holy war against these creatures of the night."

"I don't want to be a silver anything," Lily cried. "Change me back!"

"Change yourself back," Garibaldi said simply. "Will it to be. It's your power, you can use it or keep it from ever being used." He then laid a hand on her shoulder and said consolingly, "Pull yourself together--I'm serious--concentrate, mentally command your hand to return to you as it was."

Lily closed her eyes, took a breath and made a wish. And with that, the small pool of pewter leapt upwards as if it were being vacuumed and filled the space in midair where Lily's forearm and hand once were. It remained wholly silver for a long moment and then became comprised of brown skin again.

"You see." Garibaldi's smile bore teeth as he clasped his hands together. "You can do it. You can even be completely silver from head to toe, solid or liquid."

There was a mirror nearby, albeit a cracked one. Lily stepped toward it cautiously and felt at the side of her face. Looking her reflection directly in the eye, she willed her whole head to become silver. It did. And all at once, everything from her flat facial features to her short-cut dyed blond afro took on a metallic look, much like a robot or a mannequin. This caused her to gasp and take a step back. Lily blinked, and when she opened her eyes again, the reflection was suddenly as familiar as it had always been, as though she had just awakened from a dream. "I envy you," Garibaldi confessed. "You've been chosen to be God's utensil."

"Well, I don't want to be anyone's silverware," Lily quipped. "You envy me, you can take my place. I quit."

TO BE CONTINUED