The bus makes a stop in ] and the children flee when it appears the bus driver and station attendant intend to capture them. On the bus they are accosted by a man named Tinshoe Jones who seems to see the doll as a real person and warns them that the bus driver talks with aliens who 'change people's faces'. The three kids leave notes for their parents and take a night bus to ] (a few hour's bus ride away) hoping to return the following evening to avoid discovery. At first, Zach doesn’t believe them but after being shown evidence, he decides to tag along. Zach is awakened in the middle of the night by Alice and Poppy who tell him that Poppy has had a dream about the 'Great Queen' (an antique doll her mother keeps locked in a glass cabinet that the kids use for the game) and that the doll is made from the bones and ashes of a dead girl named Eleanor Kerchner who is now a ghost and wants to be returned to her proper grave. Furious at his father, and embarrassed that he cares so much about a 'kid's game', Zach decides not to tell Alice and Poppy what happened and instead says he just does not want to play anymore.

One day Zach discovers that his father has thrown out all of his action figures including William, effectively ending the game. Poppy runs the game which involves Zach's character 'William the Blade' and Alice's character 'Lady Jaye' on a quest for the Great Queen aboard William's sailing ship, Neptune's Pearl. Zach, Alice, and Poppy play a role-playing game with Horrific action figures and metal cut-outs. Doll Bones is the story of Zachary 'Zach' Barlow, Alice Magnaye, and Poppy Bell's quest to return a haunted doll to its proper grave site in another town.

Bones and doll