《An ordinary novel but every 10,000 words the audience kills the least interesting character》


 0.1

    6:00: TURN OFF ALARM  ¨C CHECK.


    6:01: DRINK CUP OF WATER ¨C CHECK.


    6:02: DO MORNING STRETCHES ¨C CHECK.


    6:07: BRUSH TEETH ¨C


    For the first time in 3,285 days, Haralda couldn''t tick every box off her morning checklist. Holding the clipboard between her teeth, she pushed against the wall with her foot and yanked hard on the bedroom door. She''d been pulling on it for about five minutes, and the muscles in her arms were wobbling under the stress. Her black pyjama sleeves kept sticking to her skin. For the moment, at least, she ignored the fact that a blue number was radiating out from her palm ¨C it wasn''t exactly going to help her get that door open.


    Satan himself must have superglued it to the wall. Haralda''s cheeks burned like she''d showered in hot sauce. What the hell was her life going to amount to if she broke her nine-year streak today? She blushed furiously as she thought of the most important authority figure of the school ¨C the deputy head ¨C arriving late to work. How could anyone expect to trust her with forging the latest generation into upstanding citizens if she herself made mistakes? Losing her job would only be the start of it. Once the press got involved and it worked its way up to national news, she could pretty much forget about ever being allowed near children again. After that, a career at McDonalds, and after that ¨C suicide.


    Haralda wasn''t going to let that happen. She surveyed her bedroom for a solution. Unfortunately, her minimalism was working against her here, and she was starting to regret following that Marie Kondo program last month. This inner city flat had rooms the size of a shoebox. It prioritised floorspace over furniture, leaving her with a bed rammed under paper-thin curtains and a sagging fabric wardrobe rammed into the bit where the bed wasn''t. There wasn''t even wallpaper, just that community centre shade of magnolia that smelled like old people. She kept her loose items ¨C phone, clipboard, and pencil pot ¨C on the windowsill.


    Good thing Haralda''d made a fire escape plan when she moved in. All she had to do was heft up the mattress, drop it out the window, try to land on it, and then depending on how many bones she''d broken, drive or limp to work. First, she changed out of her ironed pyjamas into an outfit that screamed authority, pairing a gunmetal cardigan with a floral ankle-length skirt. Then she fished the key to the bedroom window out the pencil pot ¨C always kept it locked just to be safe ¨C and drew open the curtains, making the room imperceptibly brighter.This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.


    Haralda gasped, and then she said, "Bother."


    Outside the window, she''d expected to see a rundown Italian restaurant that would completely change colour if you pressure-washed it. Instead, she saw a blinding carpet of fluffy clouds stretching out towards the horizon, and she saw the sun high in the sky. How the hell was her flat on an aeroplane?


    Slotting the key into the window, she pushed it open, and thin, icy air rushed into the room. It was like inhaling a snowball. For a moment, her flushed face felt refreshed, before little pricks of pain sprung up. She covered her mouth with her hand to stop the brain freeze until the tips of her fingers went numb as well. Supporting her window, and presumably the room, was a wall of carved marble bricks that rolled on down through the clouds. So, she was in a tower.


    After debating whether or not it would be prudent to turn on her heating whilst it was still morning, Haralda shut the window and dug another cardigan out of her wardrobe.


    It was then that she decided to truly register, for the first time, the number shining out of her palm. It read 651. Then it climbed, steadily, as if counting time, resting briefly at 663. When she shook her hand, the number dispersed into a cloud of particles before regrouping at an ever higher number.


    She allowed herself one minute to panic. Generally, she only liked to panic by rolling around on her bed late at night, but every authority figure knows that sometimes exceptions have to be made.


    After she''d thoroughly messed up her hair and clothes from wiggling around like some crazy worm, she sat up and grabbed her clipboard. The weight felt good in her hands. She''d tried all sorts of religions, homeopathy, and healing crystals, but nothing absorbed negative energy like her productivity enhancer. It cleared her mind out, good and proper. The first thing to do in any unknown situation was obvious: make a checklist. She exhaled and put pen to paper.


    CHECK PHONE SIGNAL ¨C


    ? CALL WORK ¨C


    ?? FIND ANOTHER WAY TO REPORT ABSENCE ¨C


    ? DISCERN LOCATION ¨C


    BREAK DOWN DOOR ¨C


    ? BRUSH TEETH ¨C


    ? HAVE SHOWER ¨C


    FIGURE OUT WHAT THE NUMBERS MEAN ¨C


    WRITE NEW CHECKLIST ¨C


    There were a lot of unknown variables. If there was anything that Haralda hated, it was unknown variables. She picked up her old second-hand phone and hoped there was still credit left on it ¨C generally, she preferred everyone used landlines because of the improved call quality, but the rest of the world disagreed.


    The phone had signal. Shaking, she navigated her address book with its clumsy buttons, stopping upon Barden City School, and pressed call. She found herself blushing again as it rang. If there was anything Haralda hated more than unknown variables, it was being in trouble.


    Click. Silence.


    "Hello?" said Haralda.


    A French man with a low, crackly voice replied.


    He said, "You''re number one of nine, Haralda. When the count on your hand hits ten thousand, the person who interests my audience the least will die."


    "Is this one of the parents?" she barked. "How dare you address me in such a manner?"


    "If you want to live, be interesting."


    The man hung up, and somebody knocked on the door.

 0.2

    If Tarquin had known that when he woke up in the summerhouse it would be suspended at an approximate altitude of a million feet, he never would''ve slept in it. But his wife had moaned at him for snoring and it had been a hot spring night, so he''d grabbed a sleeping bag and plopped it over sawdust in the shed he privately thought of as his life''s work.


    Sure, Tarquin had got it from IKEA, but he liked to think he''d put his own special touch on the thing by draping the walls with all manner of cards: christmas cards, birthday cards, the get well cards from when he''d fought cancer a couple years back, etc. Three of the four corners were piled high with children''s toys, teenage projects, and his son''s woodworking abominations. Every square inch in the summerhouse was an invitation to remember a life spent with family. Tarquin''s shrine to Tarquin.


    Right now, it didn''t feel much like a summerhouse. A bitter wind whipped through the cracks, and Tarquin¡¯s breath turned to vapour as he exhaled. He wrapped the sleeping bag tighter around himself ¨C it was the sole, thin barrier between his skin and the biting air. He''d slept in his boxers. It was becoming difficult not to think about how the floor was the sole, thin barrier between him and the sky. The summerhouse was shuddering, but


    First things first. He''d rung his mum''s hospice ¨C time was running out for her and they needed to schedule a visit before ¨C well. Before she recovered. Inside the warm depths of the sleeping bag, Tarquin gripped the phone tight.


    The hospice hadn''t answered. Instead, this Italian woman had picked up and said something odd. Probably a problem with the line. He held up the phone to try again, the freezing air sliced at his bare arm, and then he noticed a number on his hand. It hadn''t been there earlier.


    The number was glowing, and it was going up. Three unknowns, then: the location of his summerhouse, the Italian woman, and now the appearance of a number. That woman ¨C what had she said about a count? He dialed his mum.


    "Mum?" he whispered. He wouldn''t let himself hope.


    It was the woman who spoke. Maybe it was the temperature of the room, but her voice seemed to creep over the line like frost over grass.The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    She said, "You''re number two of nine, Tarquin. When the count on your hand hits ten thousand¨C"


    "I heard you the first time, didn''t I?" Tarquin said. "Listen, I''m happy to give you anything you want, whether it''s money... or more money, but I need to get through to my mother, she''s very¨C"


    "¨CIf you want to live, be interesting."


    Click. The exact same words, in the exact same order. There was no easy way out, then. He tried to get through to his wife, then his sister, then his niece, then his son, then his daughter-in-law... but got sick of hearing the recording around the time he got to his grandkids.


    Plan A, bartering for his freedom, had failed. Which left him Plan B, escape. The kidnappers seemed to have bolted the door to his summerhouse shut, and while he couldn''t be sure that it led anywhere, it did seem to line up with the marble tower. He got out of the sleeping bag, shaking like an olympic hula hooper. Careful steps brought him to a pile of wood carvings at the far end of the shed, which began to sag as he walked away from the tower. The floor creaked. On the way, he swiped a pair of muddy gardening gloves and trousers that he found strewn among various novelty editions of Monopoly, but he didn¡¯t have the courage to put them on with the shed slowly angling downward.


    Quickly, but not too quickly, he set about chucking the wood carvings back at the door in order to offset the imbalance of weight . They were heavy, and his back wasn''t what it used to be, but the cold stopped him sweating and kept him moving. Then he pulled out what he was looking for: a fire ax. It was just like Tarquin to leave the solution to a fire underneath a fire hazard. He had to hurry now, because he could barely make an OK sign with his fingers, even with the gloves on. A sure sign of frostbite.


    The door split handily after a few blows of the ax and revealed a slabbed marble hallway that was lit by oil lanterns. He stepped inside and breathed out, his stomach glad to feel like he wasn''t about plummet, then pressed his gloves on a lantern to warm them. On went the trousers. For as long as he could bear it, he waited at a bend in the hallway, ax raised high above his head in case one of his kidnappers came to check on him.


    Yeah, he dropped the ax and nearly decapitated himself. It clattered to the floor, and when no guards came running, he pressed on around the bend and down a set of slabbed stairs. The architecture was smooth and formless in a way that didn''t draw attention to itself, and it reminded Tarquin of a blank canvas. His daughter-in-law would have suggested putting a carpet down, or something. As it was, he kept nearly slipping over, and he didn''t like the way his ingrown toenails clinked against the stone.


    At the end of the stairs, he came to a chamber where there stood an ostrich the size of an elephant. It was sleeping in front of ¨C blocking off, to be precise ¨C a wide tunnel that led further down the tower. Tarquin crept out and nearly bumped into a woman who had just walked down a similar set of stairs.


    Everything about her was short ¨C she came up to his chest, but she also had a buzz cut and a sleeveless t-shirt.


    She took one look at the ostrich and pointed to a third stairway.


    "Coffee?" she whispered, beaming.

 0.3

    <div>


    Connie loved meeting new people for the simple reason that, as a pathological liar, she never had to tell anyone that she was a pathological liar. This new person was some wiry, topless, shivering granddad, the kind of guy that got confused and ended up sending money to imaginary princes. He had an innocent doey-eyedness about him that reminded her of her dad. Ugh.


    If Connie was going to be a big player in this ''democratisation of reality'', as the letter on her fridge had put it, she''d have to suck it up and go full-on charm offensive. She took him back up that weird set of marble slabs to her flat and typed in the PIN to her automatic door magnanimously.


    He left his ax outside.


    "So this is chez-moi," she said. "Ain''t much, mind you, but it''s mine."


    Connie never looked at her flat when she had visitors. She much preferred to look at their faces.


    This guy''s eyes widened, and he smiled like a stupid donkey. "Wow, this is all yours, is it? Fantastic."


    "Yeah, come on in! I work pretty hard for it." She laughed. Mostly, the credit cards worked for it, but taking out new ones could charitably be interpreted as a job in itself. She caught herself frowning, then quickly wiped the look off her face. Only happy thoughts for Connie today. After all, this experiment thing meant she didn''t have to pull a twelve hour shift tonight.


    She snapped back to reality and followed the guy into her studio penthouse, waiting for him to rush over to the floor-length windows and praise her endlessly. That was always the best bit, and made her feel like she was really somebody.


    See, her flat had a higher ceiling than every hotel room she''d ever checked into. A system piped the soft scent of lavender throughout the ducts. She''d painted a roadmap of Barden along an entire wall, from memory no less. Instead of being astonished by any of this, however, the grandad sauntered over to the kitchenette and filled up her kettle.


    "Huh?" she said. "What are you up to?"


    "Please, go and make yourself comfortable. I''m your guest, so let me do this to thank you for having me over, okay?"


    "No, grand-- uh, what''s your name, sorry?"


    He flicked the kettle on, took off his muddy gloves, then extended a hand.Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.


    "It''s Tarquin. Please--"


    "Connie." She shook his hand, inwardly wincing after noticing that his nails had been bitten down to stubs.


    "Please, Connie, it would be an absolute pleasure to make you coffee. I wouldn''t feel right as a guest otherwise. Oh, that''s okay by you, isn''t it? I''m not making you uncomfortable, am I?"


    "Nah." She watched the kettle boil. Damn it, the thing was caked in limescale to the point of no longer being shiny. That shouldn¡¯t have got past her ¡ª she¡¯d been working way too many hours recently, even though it had only resulted from a logical succession of needing to add on an extra hour every week to keep up with the outgoings.


    Easy come, easy go, she guessed.


    "What''s wrong?" He smiled in a way that he probably thought looked warm.


    "Uh... I just usually slap a pod into the ExPressoMaker over there." She gestured to the counter in an offhanded fashion, as if she didn''t really care either way. She figured that was how super rich people who could actually afford to put pods into their ExPressoMaker gestured.


    "Oh, look, the number''s on your hand now," said Tarquin.


    It read 2629.


    "Yeah... Mad... Probably more of that ''democratisation of reality'' stuff. Fancy us lot being picked for a government trial, eh?" Connie frowned. Maybe she just wasn''t flaunting hard enough in front of him. He hadn''t even mentioned her designer shirt.


    Spooning some instant coffee into a pair of dishwashed cups while raising his voice above the din of the kettle, he said, "Did I hear that right? Democratisation of reality?"


    "Check my fridge!"


    That was sure to prompt a comment. Her fridge was a top of the line model, and it was plastered in racy photos of her posing with her black cab ¡ª what could she say, she''d done a calendar once. But Tarquin went straight to the note and read it. Then he had to catch his balance on this counter, and for a time he stood there just clutching his heart.


    CONSTANCE, YOU ARE THREE OF NINE. PLEASE SHARE THE FOLLOWING KNOWLEDGE WITH TEAM SHAME.


    THE DEMOCRATISATION OF REALITY:


    IF ALL NINE AGREE ON A PREMISE, THEY MAY VOTE TO PERMANENTLY ALTER REALITY.


    "Oh my god," he said. "This changes everything, doesn''t it?"


    The kettle boiled, and clicked.


    She went to look out the window, hoping to draw him over, and mumbled, "You mean you didn''t know?"


    "Thank you very much for having me," he said, pouring and then instantly downing his cup of coffee. Steam came from his mouth as he spoke. "But we need to find the others now, don''t you think?"


    That was the last straw. The plan had been to charm them one at a time, in private -- no way was she letting this geezer get away from her. She dragged him by the hand to the white leather sofa and plopped him down, even though it would take forever to get the mud off it.


    "Nah, man," she said. "Take a few deep breaths, or something. Make yourself at home. Geez, I can see your heart beating out your chest. Let me get you a jacket."


    He pushed himself onto his feet.


    "I''ll take the jacket, Connie, but we don''t have any time to waste, do we? The number''s nearly at 3,000."


    "What does the number matter? We can just change it later. Chill, we''ve got all the time in the world."


    He froze, despite the coffee racing around his body.


    "You don''t know, do you," he murmured. ¡°No wonder you¡¯re so bloody calm.¡±


    "Huh?" She passed him a faux-fur coat. It barely fit him, but at least it spared her the sight of old man nipples.


    "I don''t know how to say this," he said.


    She just stared at him until he continued. The guy looked like age itself.


    He said, "Since you got here, have you tried calling anyone?"

 0.4

    Right as Faust was sewing up the cadaver¡¯s mouth, somebody hammered furiously on the door of the antechamber.


    "Hey, goddamnit!'''' the somebody shouted. It was that woman with the gravelly voice, back to pester him. "We know you''re in there, so open up, already!"


    Faust stifled a yawn. It had gotten deathly cold in the church overnight, so he''d undone his ponytail and swaddled himself in his own hair as he prepped the body. When he pulled the graveyard shift, he always ended up feeling like the corpses he treated.


    Oh, look, there was a number shining out of his hand now. If the hallucinations were starting to kick in, then it must be past dawn. He couldn''t wait to clock out.


    "We don''t have time to fuck around here!" shouted the woman. God, what an unpleasant voice. Like the only thing she drank was cigarettes.


    A man who sounded like he only smiled with his teeth said, "I''ll break it down, shall I?"


    "Well, yeah! What are you waiting for, Tarquin?"


    Tarquin cleared his throat and rapped on the door with all the force of a dormouse.


    "Um... do excuse me," he said, "I will have to do a small amount of damage to your property, is that alright?"


    "What''s the point of asking for permission? Give me that."


    There was a deafening smash on the door. Not that Faust cared much about money or anything, but any damage to the church would probably come out of his pocket. It was time to reign these weirdos in.


    "Cut it out," he mumbled, before remembering that he had to project his voice when he spoke.


    There was another blow to the door. An oppressive cloud of dust wafted over him, making him cough. How... how absolutely inconsiderate. He shuffled to the entrance.


    "Stop that at once, you lunatics," said Faust. "If you really want to come in, well -- welcome to my humble workplace."


    He lifted the wooden bar that kept precisely these kinds of degenerates out and tried to open the door. The thing held firmly in place.This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    Tarquin rapped lightly on the knocker. "...Are you going to let us in, then?"


    "I did say... welcome... to my... humble..." Faust''s face strained with effort. "Why isn''t it cooperating? Am I actually getting bullied by a door?"


    "I''m running out of patience here," said the woman. "Sounds like you''re not up to speed, and I''m not gonna drag my feet like SOMEBODY here. Look, what''s your name?"


    Faust rolled his eyes, still tugging away at the little iron ring on the door. "I have the most embarrassing name on the planet."


    "I''m sorry to hear that," said Tarquin. God, Faust would murder an orphanage to have a name like Tarquin.


    The woman said, "We don''t need your life story, man. Just give me something I can call you."


    He mumbled, "...Faust."


    "What?"


    "Faust! Now go and laugh it up, like the rest of them!" He stepped away from and went back to look at the cadaver. Unlike most people, cadavers were good listeners, and they never ever judged. For all intents and purposes, he''d brought this granny back to life for one last hoorah at an open casket funeral.


    "That''s quite a nice name," said Tarquin. "It''s very unique."


    "Oh, fuck off with your ''unique''," said Faust, smoothing out the granny''s wig. "Nobody can understand the level of harassment I''ve endured! Nobody!"


    "Well that''s quite rude, isn''t it?"


    "I''m Connie," said the woman, panic lacing her voice. "Look, how quickly do you adapt to having your worldview shattered? We don''t have much time."


    "Speaking of shattering, shall I get the door?" said Tarquin, followed by another crash.


    Connie said, "Yeah. Okay, Faust. Mind blowing fact number one -- everybodys'' doors have been glued shut."


    She paused, and for a time all was still. Then Tarquin hit the door and more dust cycloned through the antechamber.


    "Well?" she barked. "Are you listening?"


    "Yes," said Faust. "Sorry, I was waiting for my mind to be blown."


    "Oh my god. You''re supposed to say, ''There''s no way!'', or ''How can that be possible?''!"


    "There''s no way." Faust said in a tone with more bite than a rattlesnake. "How can that be possible, etc."


    "Alright, dickhead! How about the fact that you''re no longer in your bedroom, but actually high up in a tower in the middle of nowhere?"


    Faust shrugged. That''s why it was so cold, he guessed. "There''s no way... how can that be possible..."


    "Can you please stop being such a sarcy prick and react properly to these bombshells?"


    Tarquin said, between heavy gasps, "Calm down, Connie. There''s no need to talk to people like that, is there?"


    "Yes?" she spat. "Okay, how about the fact that there''s a count slowly ticking up and when that number hits 10,000, one of us is going to die?"


    "Huh," said Faust, holding up his hand. "THAT number."


    "...That''s all you have to say?"


    "Let me think," said Faust. He thought about it for a bit. Even stroked his beard for a while. "Yep."


    Connie sighed like a deflating balloon. "Alright, so there''s nine of us up this tower, and if we all get together, we can all vote with something called the ''Democratisation of Reality'' which lets us change the situation to anything we want it to be."


    "So...?"


    "Aaargh," screamed Connie. It sounded like she was punching the wall.


    "So," panted Tarquin, "We need to get everybody together and vote to make it so that nobody has to die, don''t we?"


    "Ah, yeah," said Faust. "Good work guys, that''s a solid plan."


    At last, the door gave way and shattered into a million splinters. A short punk and an old guy wearing a fur coat ran in.


    Two things then happened:


    Connie said, "What the fuck, is that a DEAD BODY?"


    And an ostrich the size of an elephant charged up the stairs.

 0.5

    For Eirlys, a lot of the puzzle pieces slotted together when a number sprang out of her hand. She was spinning around in Saheel''s desk chair while they waited for Greer to change into her mountain climbing gear.


    "Oh. I think this is the count," said Eirlys. "Hmm. It¡¯s going up quickly."


    "Give us a look?" Saheel leapt off the waterbed and adjusted his glasses.


    She studied him. The man dressed in a black priest''s gown, and had somehow mastered the art of never flashing his bits when he moved around in it. Admirable, but the climbing harness she''d put him in was leaving very little to the imagination around the crotch.


    "Here." Eirlys waved. "It just jumped up again, even though nothing happened. But when I speak, it goes up with every word I say."


    "So it''s sort of a word count, but only when we speak." Saheel bent down onto his hands and knees in an apparent gesture of prayer. He''d done this enough for it to start being annoying. "Looks like actions make it go up as well."


    "Then we need to be economical," said Eirlys. "Next test. Don''t distract me."


    She shut her eyes and thought of blackness.


    "It''s stopped going u¡ª oh, sorry," said Saheel. He clasped his hands together, which seemed to be a nervous tick. The way he kept moving around, even with the best of intentions ¡ª it was like sending someone with Parkinsons to disarm a bomb.


    She shrugged and shut her eyes again. Despite his behaviour, this was correcting a lot of assumptions. The most difficult thing was accounting for the number jumping up in massive leaps.


    "It just went up, even though I didn''t say anything," Saheel said. "We were wrong. It''s looking more and more like the currency we''re working with here is thought."


    Eirlys frowned. "Probably correct. But Saheel, you''re being redundant. You don''t need to say ''more and more''. I can''t waste words correcting you."


    "Right, sorry." Saheel bowed deeply ¡ª why couldn''t he have just bowed normally? "Don''t look at me so scathingly, sister. The count is only half of the problem. Our main problem is still being interesting."Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.


    "Then Greer needs to hurry," she shouted down the corridor. "We''ll wait for her as passively as possible."


    "You could have just said ''passively''... yeah, yeah, alright, whatever."


    They waited, passively. A veteran of many mindfulness apps, Eirlys was easily able to focus on her breathing, but Saheel was not so adept. He was so... loud. Hard to believe he led a congregation of thousands.


    He said, "So was the count 4,000 when you got it?"


    She nodded.


    "So assuming that the first person started at 0, do you think that I''m likely to get it next?"


    She nodded, furiously, to try and shut him up.


    "I know we talked about this, but do you think it''s worth trying to explain¡ª"


    "¡ªCan you just go and check on Greer?" she snapped. If he let slip to the audience about their strategy to find and kill the showrunners before the count ran out, then their plan was dead in the water. That ''democratisation of reality'' was obviously bait to keep the participants working against their best interests. The only surefire way to have nobody die was a quick and decisive pre-emptive strike.


    Greer''s footsteps echoed through the marble corridor, speeding up and getting louder until she crashed into the room. She looked chubby crammed into Eirlys'' climbing gear, but she was otherwise a rosy and pleasant woman. If in an ideal world Saheel could be persuaded to be economical in his speech, then Greer was a lost cause. Complete and total windbag.


    "Guuuuuuuuuys!" Greer bellowed. "Hey, Eirlys, I thought we already nattered on and on about you needing to turn that frown upside down. Come on, let''s see you cheering up sometime soon, love! We''re off on an adventure!"


    Oh god. Appeasement really was the only option with Greer. Now that Team Fear had possession of the wordcount, they couldn''t squander it by arguing. Eirlys forced her teeth into the appropriate position.


    "That''s better," Greer beamed. "You''re a comely lass when you smile like that! Who knows, maybe you¡¯ll meet a sweetheart here? Ooooooh, you got the number! Are we live? Helloooo, ladies and gents in the audience, any takers for this lovely single lass?"


    Saheel placed a patient hand on her shoulder as he radiated saintliness. "Let''s rewind a little bit, sister. Why did you come here screaming and crashing about?"


    A gigantic caw rumbled through the tower, shaking Saheel''s tomes free of his shelves. They crashed to the ground.


    "Oh, that''s right!" Greer held up her finger. "Mr. Crowy friend has woken up! We need to get out now, or we''re as good as worms!"


    Eirlys'' eyes widened, and her heart hammered in her chest. She wanted so badly to have the time to berate Greer, to question why she hadn''t just said that in the first place ¡ª wait, no. She had to stop wasting words thinking about things that didn''t matter.


    "But how are we going to get to Eirlys'' tent if¡ª" began Saheel, before Eirlys shoved her hand down his throat.


    "There''s no time to think; no time to talk!" she snapped. "From now on, only action!"


    She kicked open what was once the door to Saheel''s ensuite and had to stop herself crashing forward into the empty drop.


    "Ropes there!" She pointed at a support strut in the middle of the bedroom, stepping back to try and observe them working dispassionately. Deep breaths, in and out, in and out. Could she... could she think in bullet points?


    ¡ª Probably?


    ¡ª Greer and Saheel secured the ropes on their harnesses around the strut.


    ¡ª Greer yodelled as she threw herself onto the side of the tower.


    ¡ª Greer started abseiling down it.


    ¡ª Deep within the tower, the giga-raven thrashed its way towards them.


    ¡ª  Harnessless, Eirlys jumped onto the wall, easily finding handholds between the slabs.


    ¡ª Saheel didn''t jump.


    ¡ª Saheel swayed there, sweating.


    ¡ª He whimpered.

 0.6

    Saheel peered down at the endless abyss beneath him. A drop of perspiration rolled off his face and plummeted into the swirling clouds. He hadn¡¯t decided whether he was panicking or just being cautious.


    "Come on," shouted Eirlys, clinging to the marble like a lanky monkey. The woman looked like her limbs had been stretched out on a medieval torture rack. Her angular body, while perfect for climbing, was apparently incapable of empathy. She shook her head and took off down the tower.


    Indeed, she''d railroaded them onto her plan, pulling a face when Saheel pointed out that he''d never abseiled before in his life.


    "We''re called Team Fear for a reason," she''d said.


    She over-rided his every objection with a frown. The more she panicked, the more she adhered doggedly to her plan, which was probably why she''d just thrown herself out of the door that used to lead to his ensuite in order to evade a creature that could fly. At least Greer had done it because she thought it would be fun.


    The question now was... did he continue to go along with the plan, or did he follow his gut?


    Saheel didn''t get time to answer. The Giga-Raven quite literally exploded up the stairs. The corridor pressed in on it from every side, but every time it got stuck its feathers glowed a bright white and let out a blast that obliterated the marble.


    The shockwave boomed deep in Saheel''s chest. Shrapnel sailed towards him just as he ducked for cover behind the support strut, and it continued on to burst the water-cooler on his desk. Water flew in every direction, soaking Saheel from head to toe, and the Giga-Raven jumped backwards, startled, sheltering behind its wing.


    He had to hide. His PhD study-cum-bedroom was admittedly spartan, and as much as he''d tried to liven up the place, he lived in perpetual fear of invalidating his deposit. Right now, he could crawl into the foot space of his desk or duck behind the water bed, but which option would save his life? Oh, cruel indecision!


    CAW, said the Giga-Raven, quite definitively. Its eyes wobbled around in its sockets as it searched the room. The beast barrelled into the support strut and speared it with a machete-like talon that jutted two metres out the other side. With a twang, Greer''s safety rope snapped, all fifty meters of it slipping straight out the doorway.This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.


    Having bolted under the desk, Saheel muttered a prayer of protection for her as quietly as possible, but he feared the worst.


    "Woaaaaah, woah, this just got a little outside my comfort zone, lass!" Greer''s voice came screaming out from under Eirlys. "I can''t say ''look ma, no hands'' if I actually have to use them!"


    And Eirlys shouted back, "Then don¡¯t use your mouth! Keep climbing down."


    "Saheeeeeeeeel! I''m clinging on for dear life here and by gigabirds do I have sweaty palms! Help me if you''re the man of god you say you are! I... I''ll even mull over the idea of popping my head into a church in the next decade!"


    Saheel winced. What could he possibly do against such a terrible creature? Could he afford to wait, to hope it would just move off and get distracted, or should he throw himself at it now to cross dying off his bucket list? Under his priest''s gown, he was a mass of perspiration. He wasn''t up to this. He needed what every religious person needed. He needed a sign.


    CAW, said the Giga-Raven, tilting its head in the uncanny manner of birds who seem to know too much. Its eyes followed Saheel''s rope from the pillar to his desk. It hopped towards him, punching holes through the ceiling tiles with its head.


    Saheel soiled his robes.


    "Saheeeeeeeeel!" wailed Greer, still holding on for dear life. "I''m begging you! My hands are getting slipperier than a greasy pig!"


    "If you''re going to cry, cry silently," said Eirlys.


    There was a sharp jab of pain in Saheel''s back, and after nearly hyperventilating at the thought of being stuck by one of those talons, he felt around to find Eirlys'' ice pick prodding into him. She must have dropped it when she was spinning in his chair.


    He looked from the weapon to the encroaching bird. Although it felt like an obvious thing to think, it really did look a lot bigger the closer up it got. He couldn''t fight it off with this thing, could he?


    CAW, said the Giga-Raven, rearing up with its talons like a warhorse of the apocalypse. It was going to spike him through the head with all its body weight.


    No. There had to be another way. That was what Eirlys didn''t get about committing so dogmatically to one set of plans and assumptions. She was twenty years his junior, and she hadn''t gone through such an extensive search for the truth behind the creation of the world. Just now, he''d assumed the ice pick to be a weapon. But an ice pick wasn''t a weapon, it was a tool for piercing. And, a little gleefully at the amount of words he was spending on his thought processes, he realised he was right next to something he could pierce.


    Saheel launched himself out of the way just as the Giga-Raven crashed down behind him. It banged its head against the wall, momentarily dazed. His desk was crushed flat.


    "Oh, brother, this is going to lose me my deposit," he said.


    And he shunted the ice pick straight through his water bed. The resulting blast felt like he''d stuck his head into a washing machine, and he fell flat on his arse, completely deafened.


    The Giga-Raven reeled and screeched as it struggled to get away from the incoming torrent. It slammed its body against the wall, once, twice, and only on the third time broke through, dropping under the clouds like a stone.


    Straight towards Eirlys.

 0.7

    Given her size, Greer had a lot of room to accommodate feelings, and every nerve in her body radiated with pride for her teammate. Icy droplets from the waterbed trickled onto her like champagne. She hadn''t been this happy since last Tuesday when she''d discovered that her local pie shop did deliveries.


    "Get in there, my son," she roared, "Saheel, Saheel, Saheel! Come on Eirlys, chant it! We showed Mr. Crowy friend what worms like US do to early birds, didn''t we?"


    "You''re slipping," shouted Eirlys, now a good twenty meters below her. She was almost at cloud level. "And the raven is coming back."


    Indeed, Mr. Crowy Friend, a rapidly growing dot on the horizon, was back for more. But if Saheel could unearth such incredible inner strength -- and she''d just known he had it in him, she''d believed in him from the moment he let her peck him on the cheek -- then she was sure Eirlys could too. Eirlys was such a good person, and so clever. All she needed to do was stop hiding her smile and she''d have no end of suitors.


    "I need to speed up," said Eirlys. "Can you follow?"


    "Eiiirlyyys, noooooooo! The thing I love most about rollercoasters and bungee jumps is the lad whose job it is to make sure you don''t die! Basically, I''m offering a volunteering opportunity to the nearest priest!" Greer jammed her fingers into the cracks between the slabs. The way the rope dangled from the harness on her bum made her feel like a monkey with an extremely heavy tail.


    "Get out of the way, Eirlys!" shouted Saheel. His voice was so rich and sweet, like god himself was assuring her everything would be okay. Greer was so lucky to have such a great team.


    Below, Mr. Crowy Friend landed over Eirlys, trapping her with talons on either side. It raised its beak like it was going to skewer a flesh-and-tower kebab, but it was okay. Eirlys definitely had a plan. She was so cool about it, she wouldn''t even move until the last moment.


    "What are you doing?" shouted Saheel. "Move!"


    CAW, said Mr. Crowy Friend. Maybe Eirlys was admiring the majestic animal, same as Greer. He had beautiful black feathers and manicured claws to die for. Maybe when all of this was over she could get a pet like him.


    "Grab on!" Saheel unbuckled his rope and chucked it down to them.Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    Right as Mr. Crowy Friend didn''t attack, Eirlys snapped back to reality and jumped under the bird to catch the tail end of the rope, dangling free with her two hands above her head. She pushed against the monster to get some leverage and managed to scramble up to a position where she could hold the rope between her knees to stop herself from slipping.


    Greer chortled. Her teammate sure had dodged that one!


    The Giga-Raven turned, calmly. It opened its beak and clamped down on the section of the rope above her. Eirlys could climb no further.


    "Oh no you don''t!" screamed Greer. "I''m powering up! Take this... boot attack!"


    Above, Greer kicked off Eirlys'' ill-fitting climbing shoe with enough force to break a Newton Meter. It bounced off the raven''s head.


    "Hell''s bells, tougher than I thought," said Greer. "Well, there''s more where that came from, you munter! Get ready for my second--"


    "Greer," said Eirlys. "Don''t waste your words, okay?"


    Mr. Crowy Friend snapped the rope, and Eirlys fell out of sight, along with the bird.


    But it was okay. She definitely had a plan. She was going to come back up above those clouds any moment now. There was even a trope about it. Greer had read hundreds of books with that exact plot device while passing quiet hours as a small town librarian. The hero appears to disappear, then reappears, reckoned Greer.


    Any minute now.


    "Greer," said Saheel. "I... I can''t help you if you don''t grab on."


    The stones on the tower vibrated with the distant sound of shouting and then, explosions. Perhaps the other teams were in trouble. Unlucky for them!


    "Not until Eirlys comes back," she said. "Just you wait, it''s going to be so triumphant! I have to be able to say I was there!"


    Saheel kneeled down and muttered a prayer before cutting it off abruptly with a gesture.


    "Sister, she--"


    "She what? She''s a headstrong lass with a brain the size of China! You think she''s gonna get caught out by some crow thing? Just you wait, Saheel! She''ll prove you wrong!"


    Wind crashed against the tower like waves crash against cliffs. It was so bitingly cold in the sun that Greer was shaking uncontrollably as she hugged the slabs. Why were those damned rays suddenly so bright in her eyes? It was stopping her from seeing Eirlys!


    She sighed as the sun went away, glad to be in the shade until she looked up and saw what was casting the shadow.


    CAW CAW, said the Giga-Raven, spreading its wings. A shred of Eirlys'' hoodie was stuck on one of its talons.


    Greer couldn¡¯t look away. Going by feel alone, she grabbed onto Saheer''s rope, and he pulled her up until she was at eye level with Mr. Crowy Enemy.


    "Ice pick," she growled.


    "What?" said Saheel, grunting under the strain of her numerous fat deposits.


    "Ice pick! Now!"


    Mr. Crowy Enemy swiped his talon to attack, and like before sliced the rope in two, but Greer wasn¡¯t getting caught out, oh no. She clambered up the monsters'' leg, tearing out big tufts of feathers until she found purchase on top of its back. It twisted its head to try and shake her off, cawing madly.


    Saheel tossed her the ice pick. She caught it by its handle.


    "Crowy Boy!" she said. "You''re about to find out why we''re called Team Fear!"


    She wrapped one arm around the bird¡¯s neck and used the other one to gouge open a slit along its throat. Blood rushed from the Giga-Raven like water from a burst pipe. Greer wasted no time in scaling the head and grabbing hold of Saheel¡¯s greatly shortened rope.


    CAW, it said, not unkindly, before crashing down like the Hindenburg, for good this time.


    Saheel pulled her up, mouth agape. They were both so shaken up they didn¡¯t notice Greer¡¯s phone vibrating in her back pocket.

 0.8

    His dead wife had spoken on the phone.


    "You are number eight of nine, Beck ... if you want to live, be interesting."


    He wasn''t sure what could be more interesting than putting a bullet through the head of a gigantic seagull. He''d had to put down a few feral animals in his time as a conservationist, but none that had been able to multiply their own blood cells. As it stood, the bird had forced the three members of Team Rage to tread water as a tsunami of blood rose and rose, their heads pressed up against the ceiling like they were trapped in a capsized boat. But Beck and Haralda had managed, with a joint barrage of tranq darts and bullets, to send the gull back to whatever hell it came from.


    The blood drained out of a plughole in the floor, and slowly the three of them were able to stand. Haralda shook her soggy clipboard out and tried to tick off a box on it, but her pencil pierced through about fifty sheets of soaked paper.


    She said, "Good. I expect you to wait here while I retrieve my backup personal planner."


    She squelched up the stairs to her room before Beck could spit enough blood out of his mouth to give her lip.


    He turned to Kari. The kid had been in a bad state when he''d first found them in a prison cell, but now on top of their matted mane of hair and bruises and burn marks, the entirety of their skin had turned a muddy crimson, making those wide white irises pop out even more.


    He''d seen eyes like that before when the nature reserve rescued a bear that had spent its whole life in a storage container. When they let it out into the open air, it just laid down under a boulder until it died (what a waste of grant money). But to see those same eyes on a kid that couldn''t be older than ten...


    "You okay, kid?" he asked while wringing out his socks.


    Kari looked down, blankly, then beat their sack to get the blood out. The only thing Beck could get out of them was their name.


    "You did good back there, you know," said Beck. "Especially when it came for me and you stabbed it away with that... shivvy doodad."


    Kari clutched their pocket (where the shiv was) and backed away until they hit the wall.


    "What, you think I give a shit about your little toy?" He held up his rifle, the metal of which was already starting to rust. "This right here is a grownup''s weapon. You wanna have a go sometime? I''ve got some cans in my lodge we could stack into a pyramid. Looks real cool when they all fall down."If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    The little shit didn''t even hesitate in shaking their head.


    "Well fuck you too," he said. "Don''t know why I even offered. See, kid, you''re gonna see in a little bit that the best way to use a gun is to never have to fire it. Oh, look, the productivity freak''s back."


    Kari snorted. Could have been a laugh, could have been nasal blockage.


    Haralda stormed down the stairs, every part of her dripping with bird gore save her hands and the clipboard in them.


    She said, "Did I just hear you loosing profanity around a child, Beck? I would prefer you to behave in a more appropriate manner. For all you know, there could be parents in our audience."


    "I''m humoring you already with the clipboard shit. Just tell me what''s next on the agenda, because you seem to think I¡¯m a dumbass who needs some husbandless spinster to order me around."


    Haralda narrated as she scratched onto the paper, "Create a swear box to fine Beck for his outrageous behaviour and unpleasant mannerisms..."


    "Okay, you do that. I''m going with Kari to see where the gigantic set of stairs leads to."


    Kari reluctantly followed him about ten paces behind, and Haralda followed even more reluctantly behind Kari while telling the kid to "disregard the impure speech of that horrid man."


    They came to a chamber with a strange symbol etched into the floor. Nine numbered podiums circled it, with embedded screens that buzzed with static. The podium named Beck was currently illuminated. On the far side of the room stood a door marked 70,000 in big blue letters, and on the other end of the room sat an elevator.


    "We really are up to our elbows in weird fucking shit today," said Beck, walking up to the lift. "You wanna press the button, kid?"


    Haralda said, "¡ê2. What do you think you''re doing? We agreed specifically to free the other six before exploring more of the tower."


    "Well, that''s an awfully kind thought, but we don''t really need freeing, do we?" came the voice of an older gentleman, followed by footsteps down the stairs.


    Beck smelt them before he saw them. The stench attacked his nose with a mix of formaldehyde and... rotten flesh. Behind him, Kari called the lift and stepped inside. There were only two buttons, P and G, so the kid pressed G. A message flashed up on all of the screens:


    NO TERRESTRIAL LAYER EXISTS


    Three people staggered into the room, and boy, Beck''s nose would have found it more pleasant if he''d stuck his head in a compost bin. He archetyped them quickly: old miser, punk instagrammer, scruffy metalhead. The miser had an axe. Beck gripped his gun tighter.


    The scruffy one, who had a bandage wrapped over his eye, said, "...Jesus christ, a kid. It looks like this lot took a bath in an abattoir."


    "Read it and weep, stinky," said Beck. "What does your team use for cologne, fucking corpse sweat?"


    "¡ê3," said Haralda, pinching her nose.


    The punk instagrammer charged up to Beck and tried grabbing his hand, seemingly unconcerned about his gun.


    She said, "Sorry, man, it was the only way to repel a fucking exploding ostrich? Now stop squirming and let me see the number!"


    Haralda sighed into her elbow and said, "¡ê1 for the lady. I can see I''ve got my work cut out for me."


    "Oh no," said the punk. "This is just great. Just fabulous. We''ve got less than 2000 words left and no sign of the others."


    "Get off me, you rancid bitch!" said Beck, before vomiting into the corner of the elevator. Kari soon followed suit.


    "Oh, we''re here," said a saintly voice from the stairs, the richest Beck had ever heard, even if it was gagging. "We''d just rather you clean up before we come down."

 0.9

    The djinn lived in Kari''s chest, deep among the ribs. After the events that led to Kari being sent to this tower, they had sworn a vow of silence so the djinn might never escape by riding on their words. Everybody here deserved to and should have been hoping to die. It irritated Kari that Haralda and Beck felt differently.


    When the time came, Kari would tell the group why they were here.


    Presently, the stench was unbearable. Acid burnt the back of Kari''s throat, and the familiar taste of bile encased their tongue. While Beck and the punk were riling each other up, somebody placed a hand on Kari''s shoulder ¡ª right on top of a burn mark, too ¡ª and they looked up to see the old man who wore a fur coat over his bare chest. There was an odd expression on his face. Kari had never seen anyone look concerned before.


    He said, "Hello there, little one, my name''s Tarquin, are you okay there? Would you like some water?"


    BEGONE, whispered the djinn. Kari bit down on their lip and shook their head before ducking around Tarquin to stand at podium number nine next to Haralda, who was continuously updating a leaderboard for the swear box. Kari just wanted not to exist, why couldn''t anyone here respect that?


    "Aww, he''s a shy one, isn''t he?" said Tarquin, raising his voice above the argument.


    "All I''m saying is, Becky boy," said Connie, jamming her tattooed finger into Beck''s face, "There''s nothing interesting about just shooting down a bird. Look at Faust, he doesn''t know if he''ll ever regain sight in that eye, and Tarquin lost his summerhouse! You just haven''t suffered like we have!"


    "My life has been a neverending procession of suffering," added Faust. "And today is the icing on the shit cake."


    "Girlie," said Beck, "You don¡¯t know sweet dick about how close things got for us. If you really can''t get your dumbass head around it, I''d be happy to hold it under a bucket of water so you can see what it was like."


    "Um, excuse me?" called the man from up the stairs. "We did say we were here, but you just ignored us and started an argument."


    "Are you actually trying to start shit with me? Me?" said Connie, shadow boxing in front of Beck. "Man, you wouldn''t go two rounds."


    "Connie," said Tarquin, "I think we should listen to the reasonable gentleman around the corner, don''t you? Weren''t you just saying we needed to act quickly?"You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.


    "He''s right, of course," said Haralda. "I will not tolerate any further disruptions, Beck. You''re already ¡ê15 down."


    Beck smirked. "Alright, alright, cool it. Just trying to be interesting, right, Connie?"


    "We''re just taking certain precautions." Connie shrugged.


    The upstairs man walked downstairs, revealing himself to be a priest, and alongside him came a woman who looked like she''d always been an aunt.


    "Oh, Eirlys, how wrong you were," muttered the priest, covering his nose with his robe. "Good evening, brothers and sisters. I propose that we get straight to testing the democracy of reality."


    "Let''s all have a spa day and get squeaky clean! I love the music in those places," said the fat aunt, taking her place at the podium named Greer.


    The fifth podium lay absent.


    Faust stepped back from his screen to look at the group.


    He said, "Wait, can we rewind just a tad? What was it you both meant by being interesting and taking precautions? Why did everyone just nod at that?"


    "Oh my GOD," exploded Connie. "We got you up to speed, you fucking snail! Which bit still don''t you understand?"


    "...The bit about being interesting and taking precautions."


    "If you want to live, be iiiiiinteeeereeeestiiiing," sang Greer.


    "Oh," said Faust. "Oh. THAT bit about being interesting and taking precautions. Excuse me for an instant."


    Faust walked over to Tarquin, and gently prised the axe out of his hands. Then he raised it skyward before bringing it down onto his own skull ¡ª or attempting to, anyway. Tarquin caught his arm before he could finish the blow. The two were locked in a brief struggle until Connie came to wrest it away.


    "Faust, what''s come over you?" said Tarquin. "Are you quite alright?"


    Tears streamed down Faust''s cheeks. "I''m cursed, I say, cursed! Inevitable death once a counter hits a number ¡ª sure, sign me up, the time comes for us all, who gives a fuck ¡ª but rejection by an audience? I''m a less likable person than that fucking ostrich, so give that back and let me off myself! Nobody''s going to break my heart but me!"


    "There, there," said Tarquin, hugging him tight. "Shhhh, shhhhh..."


    Beck whistled. "Wowee, what a freak show. Where the hell did they get these people?"


    "No, Beck!" snapped Haralda. "And Constance, I will not permit any more retorts. I''m stepping up as leader here, because none of you seem to have any respect for the democratic process ¡ª apart from of course, Saheel and Greer. Thank you for being so patient. Might I ask where the third member of your team is?"


    The pair hung their heads and studied their feet.


    "She''s... well, she..." said Saheel.


    "I''m terribly sorry," said Tarquin. "Goodness, we''ve been awfully insensitive, haven''t we?"


    "Please," said Saheel, "Let''s just get on with a vote. Perhaps a motion like ''Return everyone to a state of cleanliness''."


    "Spa day, spa day," crowed Greer.


    "An excellent and productive suggestion," said Haralda, raising her pen. "All those in favour of the motion ''Return everyone to a state of cleanliness?"


    Everybody''s thumb suddenly emitted a bright amber light.


    DENY THEM, whispered the Djinn.


    Straining under the effort, Kari twisted their hand until their thumb was pointing up and began to shine green ¡ª the others did the same. A count popped up on Kari''s screen:


    8 ?? 1 ?? ¡ª INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY


    "That''s impossible," said Saheel. "Could she be..."


    "I saw everyone vote yes," said Beck, resting his gun over his shoulder. "What the fuck is your team playing at? What are you not telling us?"


    Greer fished her phone out of her pocket and yelped.


    "Jumping giggerybirds!" she cried. "I''ve got fifteen missed calls from Eirlys!"


    Only Kari noticed the number tick over to 9000 and turn red.

 &#x1F480; 1 &#x1F480;

    Greer''s eyes widened at the number pulsing out of her hand. Everybody in the room looked at her with varying degrees of pity and relief, but Saheel''s expression had to be the darkest of all ¡ª his normally patient smile crumpled up like a plastic bag.


    "Ohhhhh boy," she said, dripping with sweat. "Somebody just welded a nail bomb to my hand. Can we... can we disarm it, pretty please?"


    "That was always the plan, dear," said Tarquin, letting Faust go. "Don''t worry, everything''s going to be just fine."


    Haralda tore a sheet of paper off her clipboard. "It doesn''t look like we can pass any motions without a quorum. You need to get your team member here."


    "Yes ma''am." Greer saluted. "Consider it better done than your favourite steak."


    "As for everyone else," said Haralda, "I''d like us to pool together ideas for how to save Greer''s life. I have pens and paper ¡ª if we have everything written down beforehand, we can rapidly pass motions in the hope that one of them works."


    Greer''s non-teammates gathered by the door labelled 70,000 and muttered while Haralda transcribed what they said. In reality, Beck and Kari hung back while the stinky team came out with idea after idea.


    Saheel put an arm around Greer as she rang Eirlys on speaker phone ¡ª he couldn¡¯t keep himself steady. As soon as she picked up, the phone let out a cacophony of windy noises, the kind Greer always got when she tried to film birds on the beach.Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.


    Practically inhaling the phone, Greer said, "Hellooo? Eiiiiiirlys? Where did you get to? I have a volunteering opportunity for you!"


    Only distortion replied. Greer tried again, then jammed the speaker of her phone right up in her ear and began to make out words.


    She heard "...so cold...", and then "...still falling...".


    "Eirlys," pleaded Saheel. "Can you hear us? Can you vote?"


    "Help..."


    "Attention, company," shouted Greer, turning several heads, "Eirlys fell off the tower in our valiant battle against the beast, just like Gandalf or maybe the dad in The Lion King! Can we vote her back to headquarters, stat?"


    "She fell off the tower?" said Beck. "Heh, we could nominate that one for a Darwin¡ª OW! What the fuck was that for?"


    "Now is not the time," growled Haralda, clipboard ready for another whack. "All those in favour of the motion ''Bring Eirlys to the central chamber?"


    "Vote yes to this one, Eirlys!" Greer shouted into the phone. "Put your thumb up!"


    The thumbs did their glowy thing again. The group put them up.


    9 ??


    Eirlys popped into the centre of the circle and immediately collapsed. Her skin had turned pale to the point of being blue. Greer rushed to her and held her ¡ª it was like plunging her hands into an ice box. Eirlys struggled away and awkwardly brought her hoodie over her head before peeling it away from her skin.


    "Too hot," mumbled Eirlys, her eyes narrowing, before trying to take off her DnD t-shirt.


    "This is not an appropriate moment for fanservice," wailed Greer, shoving her back in her hoodie.


    "It looks severe," said Faust, taking off his leather jacket and draping it over her. "She needs CPR, and we need to get her warm as soon as possible."


    "...Stinks," said Eirlys.


    "Nice," said Connie, clapping. "I''m impressed, Fausty."


    Faust cringed at her pronunciation. "Of course, we could just vote everybody back to perfect health and cleanliness."


    "There''s no time," said Saheel, pointing to the number ¡ª less than 100 words. "Look, she can vote. Greer¡¯s the priority."


    "All those in favour of abolishing the rule that one of us dies at 10,000 words?" asked Haralda.


    Greer was shaking, heart pumping blood through her body on overdrive. She launched her thumb towards the ceiling.


    8 ?? 1 ?? ¡ª INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY


    "Nani?" she gasped, and her heart gave out, and she doubled over, spasming on the floor next to Eirlys.


    "What?" cried Saheel. "Who?"


    Beck cocked his rifle, taking the safety off.


    The last thing Greer ever heard was him saying "Every interesting story needs a villain."

 Interlude

    A: Hello and welcome to ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die¡¯, the talk show for dead people, by dead people! I¡¯m your host Alexa Despacito, and no, I don¡¯t celebrate Mother¡¯s Day. Here with me tonight is Greer Phillips! How are you feeling, Greer?


    G: It¡¯s so dark! Why can¡¯t I feel my body? What¡¯s going on?


    A: Well Greer, I¡¯m afraid you¡¯re dead.


    G: Oh balderdash and biscuit crumbs! Really?


    A: Yes. It¡¯s not all that bad. But if you like breathing, eating, or sex, well, you¡¯re going to have to get used to fantasising.


    G: Are you propositioning me, lass?


    A: No, I¡¯m interviewing you. On with the questions! How do you feel about being the first to die?


    G: A bit put out, if I¡¯m being totally honest with you, Alexa Despacito. Is that really your name, lass? I mean, if it¡¯s a stage name then I question your taste, but otherwise your mum must have been really prophetic!


    A: Well, simply put, I¡¯m a recent stillborn. When I caught wind of what my mother was going to call me, I put the brakes on it. But this isn¡¯t about me. Why do you feel put out?


    G: Wow, you¡¯re a really clever foetus! Anyway, I did some really badass things while I had the number, like slit the throat of a gigantesque raven, saving my and Saheel¡¯s life. It was the climax of the arc! I found the power within me and went Super Saiyan! Are you telling me people weren¡¯t choking on their popcorn reading that?


    A: Funnily enough, we had some reader mail about that. Would you like to hear it?


    G: Oh, I don¡¯t know. Do they say a lot of mean things?


    A: Your call, Greer. Either you hear it now or spend a silent eternity wondering what it could have been.


    G: An eternity, eeeeeeeh? And you said there wouldn¡¯t be any pastry?


    A: I¡¯m afraid pastry is a privilege reserved for those still breathing. One of my personal regrets is never having eaten a sausage roll.


    G: You¡¯ve never eaten a sausage roll? Lass, you¡¯ve never lived! Wait¡­ you¡¯ve never lived.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.


    A: I¡¯d appreciate it if you didn¡¯t rub it in. Would you like me to read the mail?


    G: Oh, go on then. I¡¯ve got bucketloads of self-esteem!


    A: We¡¯ll see about that. The first letter is short, and it reads: Should have been more interesting.


    G: Excuse me?


    A: That¡¯s all they wrote. What do you make of that?


    G: I suppose I don¡¯t have any braincells left, seeing as I don¡¯t have a body, but even then I have enough intelligence to work out that I died because people didn¡¯t find me interesting. So for someone to just write, ¡®should have been more interesting¡¯, frankly, makes them seem like a big dumb dumb.


    A: What¡¯s a big dumb dumb?


    G: Someone who¡¯s stupid enough to think that everyone else is as stupid as them. ¡®Should have been more interesting¡¯ ¨C that¡¯s a big dumb dumb, alright!


    A: Your self-esteem remains intact, then?


    G: I don¡¯t cry because of stupid babies. Uh, no offense to you, of course.


    A: We¡¯ve established that I¡¯m a smart baby, so I¡¯m not sure what offense I could take from that. Okay, here¡¯s the second piece of mail, and boy, it¡¯s a long one: ¡°It''s like everyone else has some sort of mystery, some backstory that might be lost through their premature death. You, Greer, may have had an interesting start, but it doesn''t seem like you have much more to show than your strength and your boots - which you already threw away! You''re literally a waste of perfectly good words. Literally. *chuckle* (Maybe we can get a spin-off story of what happened to the poor boots you sacrificed on a whim, though?)¡±


    G: Wow, uh¡­ what a stupid dumb dumb! They were Eirlys¡¯ boots!


    A: Is that different from a big dumb dumb? Can you really refute this person¡¯s opinion?


    G: Yeah, because they¡¯re dumb, and they don¡¯t think before they write, and they should do something like work for charity instead of spending their time hating on someone who was forced to fight a gigantic bird at the exact moment the audience was watching! I¡¯m sorry I couldn¡¯t mope about my room like all the others, but I was too busy focusing on not dying!


    A: Would you say that focus worked out in your favour?


    G: No!


    A: Okay, we¡¯re running out of time here, so before we go, I¡¯d like to ask you a couple of questions. Who do you want to see die next?


    G: Beck! What an absolute meanie ¨C it¡¯s like he killed me himself! I hope the others take him down! Painting yourself as the antagonist is a risky move that we already decided against in, you know, the Team Fear strategy meeting the AUDIENCE WASN¡¯T WATCHING, because if you make the audience angry enough, they¡¯ll just kill you outright!


    A: Good reasoning. You have to admit though, it seems to be working in his favour so far. And who would you like to see ultimately win the challenge?


    G: Saheel! Not only is he a dreamboat and a man with the patience of a saint, he always makes the right choice in dangerous situations! It¡¯s going to be difficult for the others to take him off guard, that¡¯s for sure!


    A: I can reveal that Saheel had 11% of the vote share to your 28%, so he¡¯s not in immediate trouble. However, the character the audience currently finds the most interesting is¡­ Kari, with a 0% vote share.


    G: The grotty young¡¯un? They didn¡¯t DO anything! Oh, the injustice! Why wouldn¡¯t they pick them, of all people?


    A: What do I know? I¡¯m just a foetus. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, that¡¯s all we¡¯ve got time for tonight. I¡¯ve been Alexa Despacito, this was my guest Greer Phillips, and this has been ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die¡¯! See you in a week!

 1.1

    SAVE GREER ¡ª X


    HEAL EIRLYS ¡ª


    DISCIPLINE BECK ¡ª


    They paused, but the number wouldn''t. From stillness came Haralda''s pen to scratch away at her clipboard. The chamber flickered with shadows cast by lanterns and screens all while Greer lay dead in the centre, pain on her face. What had Beck done?


    Faust pressed a finger to her temple and hung his head, letting his metre-long hair mask his expression. That was all the room needed to know, yet still they froze. Some vice-like sentiment gripped Haralda, a dread that locked up her muscles and kept her eyes fixed on the reality of the corpse before her, an unquestionable proof that the game they were playing was very, very real. Eight of them would die.


    Beck. Haralda''s stomach lurched. It was her fault for not being firm enough. Her experience with children taught her that if you didn''t stamp down on little weeds that refused to show respect, they''d soon spread to become unmanageable, and she''d find them smashing windows or assaulting staff. The only language those miscreants understood was power ¡ª an adult to stand up, tower over them, say ''Yes, I''m bigger than you'', and administer a caning. The deputy head.


    "I know what you''re thinking." Beck sported a shit-eating grin as he backed into the elevator and kneeled to brace against the rifle. "How could you possibly do that? Are you even human? Yadda, yadda. Am I right or am I right?"


    "Beck," snarled Haralda, reaching around to pull the dart gun free from her skirt.


    "Beck. That was your name, wasn''t it?" Saheel uncurled Greer''s hand to claim the ice pick, then stood up, glowering at him.


    "You look like you want to fuck me up real bad," said Beck. "Let me tell you why that''s a dumbass idea. See, all I have to do is pull this here trigger and I put you on your ass like your friend."


    "Think you can get all seven of us?" asked Connie, hefting the axe onto her shoulder.


    Beck laughed a hollow laugh. It was pitch dark in the elevator, and all Haralda could make out were his eyes and his smile. "Yes, why don''t you just rush me? I can pump, let''s see now, five of you full of lead before you get to me (assuming Kari lifts a finger to help). So let''s say there''s five of you bleeding out, full of holes but not quite dead ¡ª who''s going to heal you? Cause I''m not voting to heal anyone."


    "What''s happening?" mumbled Eirlys. "It''s so bright..."If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    Tarquin cleared his throat, and held his hands up in a dithering, sheepish manner. "I''m sorry to butt in, but if we''re not going to heal the young lady, I think we should take her to Connie''s bed and try to warm her up, don''t you? Faust, could you get her legs?"


    Faust''s voice cracked as he tried to say something, so he simply nodded and hefted her up with the old man.


    "Feel free," said Beck, mock shooing them off. "Run off to play house while the grown-ups talk about real shit."


    "Guys!" Connie dragged the axe along the marble, leaving a trail of sparks. "Where do you think you''re going? I can''t let a remark like that go unanswered. What fucking planet are you on right now? That guy just murdered someone!"


    "Ah, yes, Connie," said Tarquin, expression unreadable as granite. "I suppose this young lady would highly appreciate getting CPR from another young lady like yourself rather than one of us two, wouldn''t you?"


    "So I should just run away?" she said. "Act the coward?"


    "Yeah!" jeered Beck from his fortified position in the elevator. "Fuck off with your tail between your legs, yellowbellies!"


    "How can you just sit there and take that, man?" demanded Connie. "Don''t you have any shame? Don''t you want to show him who''s boss?"


    Tarquin smiled. It was the first time his eyes sparkled as he did so. "He''s dead set on being the most interesting, isn''t he? Rather starved for attention, I find. Ask yourself ¡ª what''s the one thing he doesn''t want anyone to do right now?"


    "I..." said Connie, "Fuck him right up in the face before he can explain himself?"


    "Not quite. He doesn''t want anyone to walk away, because that would make him less important to the story. He needs a platform to be interesting, so we''ll just take away his platform, won''t we? Now ¡ª I don''t think you''ve shown Faust your flat. Did you know Connie does just the best coffee? She''s got an ExPressoMaker and everything ¡ª doesn''t that sound nice, Faust?"


    Faust nodded.


    At the same time, Connie was tearing up. "Tarquin... Faust... man, you did notice! Okay, let''s go and heal up this ¡®young lady¡¯."


    And they strolled towards the stairs as a team.


    "Wait, you fuckers, come back!" shouted Beck. "The moment you turn your back on me is the moment you get a bullet in the brain!"


    "No, it isn''t," said Haralda. "How many stories have you read where the villain randomly kills the heroes? That doesn''t make you interesting, Beck, that makes you a brash, uncouth, ruffian!"


    "Are you sure? Huh? Are you really gonna bet your life on it?"


    Faust turned his head briefly, and just about let out a word that sounded like "Yes."


    Haralda fired a dart above Beck''s head to force him to duck and keep him pinned down while they left the room.


    HEAL EIRLYS ¡ª CHECK


    "Oh, you still have that little peashooter, do you?" said Beck, training his gun at her. "Is that how you''re going to treat a fellow member of Team Rage, you husbandless spinster? As for you, priesty boy, hasn''t all this been enough to make you realise god doesn''t exist? Why aren''t you running away with the others?"


    "Brother," said Saheel. The way he was shaking, Haralda wouldn''t have been surprised if he''d straight up rush him now. "We have a score to settle."


    "I can tell you''re not the smart one," said Beck. "The smart ones are thinking now ¡ª why is he doing this? And once they''ve realised, they''re kicking themselves for not doing the same thing!"


    "You probably think," said Saheel, "That the audience would get bored if there wasn''t a constant trickle of tension and threat of dying. You think they''d stop reading, and we''d all cease to exist. This is basic undergraduate Idealism and brother, it is flawed. If you think a story can only be interesting if people are dying, let me tell you something."


    He smashed his ice pick into Beck''s podium, shattering the glass and sending it flying. The screen sparked and gave off a thin stream of acidic smoke.


    "People don''t root for villains. They root for the heroes who know better than to kill.¡±

 1.2

    Tarquin noted with some alarm how heavily he had to breathe while carrying Eirlys up the stairs, and after his arms nearly gave out and dropped her, he swapped with Connie. He wasn''t exactly prone to exercise, and lugging that axe around for the past hour was taking its toll.


    They headed through the ruined hall where they''d fought the ostrich. It looked like a construction site now, with the upturned barrel of formaldehyde, and the finely chiselled marble scattered around a gaping hole that used to lead to Tarquin''s summerhouse. It was such a shame ¡ª he was going to miss it dearly.


    "So this is chez-moi," Connie said when they got to her flat, backing through the doorway. "Not much, but hell, it''s mine."


    She was so busy trying to study Faust''s expression she forgot to turn and bumped into the kitchen counter, promptly knocking the ExPressoMaker onto the floor where it shattered.


    "Oh goodness, mind your feet," exclaimed Tarquin. He rushed to grab a dustpan and brush, prostrating himself as he scooped up the glass machine that was so expensive it came with a mortgage.


    "Whoops," said Connie, nonchalantly, setting Eirlys down on the king-size bed. "Don''t bother cleaning it, man, we can vote it back together later. For now... damn... I guess we''ll just have to drink the bog standard stuff. Is that alright, Faust?"


    Faust nodded, his face still matted over with hair like that Japanese horror film where the girl came out of the TV. The bandage over his eye had gone bloody. He was busy trying to force Eirlys to stay under the duvet. She kept wriggling back out of it until Faust hefted up a giant cuddly tiger and dropped it on her, whereupon she took to hugging it instead.


    "Cute," said Faust, stroking an ear the size of his head. "What''s its name?"


    "Dunno." Connie lined four mugs up on the counter and tipped in the powder from a jar.


    "You don''t know?" asked Faust.


    "No, it''s called Dunno."


    "Hardly an imaginative name, is it?" Tarquin poured the water. "Do either of you take milk or sugar?"


    "I''ll sort myself out, thanks," said Connie, as she tipped half a bag of sugar into a mug. "The tiger''s name is the answer to the question ''Why the fuck did my ex buy me that?''"


    Tarquin was the only one to laugh. Of course, he was just being polite, but if he hadn''t laughed, it would have been awkward. The most important thing for them right now was to come together as a team. The other teams were fractured ¡ª if Team Shame could reach an understanding, they¡¯d have a much stronger footing.


    "Faust?" asked Tarquin.Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.


    The guy just shrugged, still stroking the fake tiger. It reminded Tarquin of how his son used to latch onto cuddly toys in gift shops and cry if they wouldn''t buy it for him. There was something heartfelt in the attachment to an inanimate object. Obviously, he wasn''t doing okay.


    Tarquin made eye contact with Connie, pointing his head towards their teammate. She nodded.


    "I hope you guys don''t mind if I take a shower before the audience latches onto me," asked Connie. "I want to get that fucking stink off."


    She sauntered over to a door and opened it, then had to stop herself from screaming as her foot fell out into empty air. Recovering, she closed the door and tiptoed back into the corner of the flat, putting a finger to her lips and motioning at Tarquin.


    "Seriously?" he mouthed.


    She shrugged and pulled a weird face, nothing if not committed.


    Approaching Faust, Tarquin spotted a diamond-studded hairbrush sitting at a vanity. Why did Connie even need one? He took it with him and held it out.


    "Looks like that hair of yours has got pretty matted since the fight, hasn''t it?" said Tarquin. "Here."


    Faust took it wordlessly and began brushing his hair in broad strokes, causing a cascade of horrible little clicks every time he broke open a knot. He kept one hand on the tiger. For the first time, Tarquin glimpsed his face, and on it, he saw an oddly torn-up melancholy.


    Not to be perturbed, he said, "Hey, do you think Eirlys is going to be okay?"


    Faust shrugged. "Might need CPR, but I know about as much as a toddler. Most people who come to the morgue with hypothermia also have cracked ribs and bruises around the throat."


    "It¡¯s possible they could have died equally from last-resort CPR attempts, isn¡¯t it? Do you think it''s best not to risk it?"


    He shook his head.


    Tarquin sat down and sank about a meter into Connie''s bed. "Are you okay, Faust? I don''t want to invade your personal space, but it seems to me you... well, you look quite upset."


    "Just thinking," he mumbled, bringing his arms closer to his chest.


    Tarquin said, "Here''s your coffee. Go on, drink up, won''t you? If there''s anything you want to talk about, I''m here for you, you know? We''re teammates, aren''t we?"


    That made Faust pause. With wobbly hands, he set the cup down on the bedside table and said, "I just... what makes us teammates?"


    Around the corner, Connie furrowed her eyebrows and held out her hands in a questioning gesture.


    "What do you mean?" said Tarquin. "I''m not sure what reasoning they used to assemble the members of ''Team Shame'', but I reckon we''ve been working quite well together, don''t you?"


    "But why?" Faust buried his head in the tiger. "Back then, when I pushed the ostrich back with the barrel of formaldehyde. It got me good in the eye, and I fell down. I waited for my consciousness to cut out, to return to absolute zero, but when I looked up, you two were there. You grabbed the barrel and drove the bird straight into the summerhouse. Why? Why risk yourselves to save me?  Why didn''t the audience vote me dead? What the fuck is going on here? I don''t deserve this... this hope. Cause when you hope that people stand by you, when you hope that people like you ¡ª that''s when it gets crushed. I can''t let that hope into my heart, Tarquin, I just can''t."


    "There, there," said Tarquin, patting him on the back. "Why did we help you? Well it''s a silly question, isn''t it? Because you needed help."


    "I''m so fucking exhausted." He sobbed into Dunno. "I''m not worthy of being in this team."


    "Look at me, Faust. Come on, get your head out of that tiger and look at me!"


    "What?"


    "Look into my eyes, right now! You see this determined gaze? You see my resolve? That ostrich would have got us if you hadn''t acted so quickly in grabbing that barrel, in fact, it would have got us if you had been anybody except Faust the Undertaker. And that¡¯s my teammate! You saved us, and we saved you. Agreed?"


    Faust''s brown eyes watered. "Okay."


    "Now come here," said Tarquin, trapping the undertaker in a hug. "Feels better than a soft toy, doesn''t it? You listen to me. I''m going to promise you right now. We''re going to win this, and we''ll do it as a team ¡ª Team Shame! Alright?"


    "...Alright."


    "Louder! Alright?"


    "Alright!"


    "Who''s going to win this?"


    "Team Shame."


    ¡°I want to hear you scream it! Open up those lungs! Who¡¯s going to win?¡±


    And together they shouted ¡°TEAM SHAME!¡±

 1.3

    Even though Connie had spent so much time acquiring the perfect flat, whenever she invited people over she couldn''t stop wondering if they disliked it. She hadn''t had a moment to apply enough makeup to hide her blush. Sure, Faust was enjoying the tiger as he awkwardly shared it with Eirlys, and he seemed grateful for the cup of coffee, but would it have killed him to comment on it? There was only one thing for it. She needed to become the ultimate host. Happy thoughts.


    Round the corner she came, feet caressed by fluffy carpet as she said, "Wow! Looks like you two are making friends. That''s the second time you''ve hugged today."


    "Nobody respects my personal space," said Faust, rubbing his eyes. "I thought you were showering."


    "That, my dear Fausty, can wait. What I want right now is for you two to relax. Feel at home. Forget about the words for the moment and get to know each other." Connie buzzed around the flat, idly tidying up by shoving loose items into drawers before pausing in front of her record player. What kind of music did these guys like? Would they think she was too boring if she played RnB?


    "How can I relax when you''re calling me things like Fausty, or a ''fucking snail''?" he said. "If you''re really my teammate, why must you make a mockery of me?"


    "I''m just trying to be endearing, man," she said, going bright red as she set the needle onto an ambient nineties beat. "I''m sorry for calling you a snail. I was stressing out."


    The music rang out, her subwoofer humming deep bass under smooth yamaha strings from seven wall-mounted speakers around the flat. It froze her up completely, and a drop of sweat rolled down her arm. Why did this make her feel so anxious? She was sharing something she liked!


    "Interesting music," commented Tarquin. When he saw her expression crumple, he added, "It''s quite pleasant, isn''t it? Especially with all the cracks and pops from the record."


    She felt like a starved dog chained to a kennel waiting for passersby to chuck her scraps. It was embarrassing to admit, but she''d had nowhere near this level of adrenaline coursing through her when they faced down the ostrich.


    "Thanks," she beamed, "You guys look a bit awkward perched on my bed. Why don''t you come over and sit on the sofa?"


    Faust might have whispered "I''ll miss you" to the tiger before he went to plop himself down on the sofa. She showed him the button he could press to put up his legs.


    "Thanks," he said. "Nice view."


    "It''s not quite the Barden skyline, but it''s not bad. I could get used to it." Connie went to the fridge to get some bottles of lager out. They felt refreshingly cool as she held them, and the way they hissed as she popped off the caps made her mouth water.If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    "Isn''t it a bit early to be drinking?" asked Tarquin, twisting around to undoubtedly see if he could help with anything.


    She passed them round and shrugged. "Faust''s just done a night shift and you and I have been through some shit. Please, let''s just kick back and relax for awhile. I¡¯ll get some nuts on the table, too."


    Faust sipped the beer, frowning. "Look, it''s nice and all, the hugs and the hospitality, but do you actually want me to feel at ease? Then stop glossing over everything and keep me in the loop. Having to glean everything from context doesn''t really smell like team spirit."


    Tarquin nodded his thanks to Connie then said, "Our apologies, Faust. We anticipated the audience would get bored of hearing the same rules repeated over and over ¡ª who knows how many times they''ve seen the other teams say it?"


    "But I''m not the audience, I¡¯m supposed to be your teammate. Tell me how you even figured this stuff out. Who told you we were going to die if we weren''t interesting?"


    "Some Italian woman, I think?" said Tarquin.


    "No, it was a drunk Scotsman," said Connie. "Man, we listened to the same call, didn''t we?"


    They looked at each other. A woman had started singing on the track, meaning they kept having to raise their voice, but Connie didn''t want to suffer the indignity of turning the music off. It would be like admitting her taste was bad ¡ª instead she took a big swig of lager.


    "My god," said Faust, reclining in his seat to stare at the ceiling. "It''s almost like when we take the time to properly explain things, we don''t misunderstand each other!


    Tarquin got his phone out. "Sorry, Connie, would you mind just turning the music down a tad so we can hear?"


    "No," cried Connie, sprinting to the record player and yanking the needle up.


    "Oh, you didn''t have to turn it off! It was rather pleasant."


    "Not to me," shrugged Connie. "I decided I don''t really like it, anyway."


    "Who was the artist?" asked Faust. "Sounded good to me."


    "What does it matter?" she spat, launching herself onto the sofa between them. "Let''s listen to this phone call."


    Tarquin shrugged, and dialed his wife as he had before, putting it on speakerphone.


    As before, the drunk scotsman basically chanted at her through the tinny speakers.


    "Yer three of nine, Conneh! If ye want tae live, be interestin!"


    "As I said." Tarquin reclined back into the deep nest of scatter cushions. "An Italian woman."


    "No!" said Connie. "I heard a Scottish lout. I guess it makes sense that we each hear different recordings, but who are these fuckers? The writers? The audience?"


    They sat for a while, idly sipping their drinks. Faust got up and put the record back on, an action that flooded Connie''s body with dopamine. Then he properly settled down into the sofa. He looked to be nodding off. Seriously ¡ª she might be dead within the next hour, and she was worried about her taste in music being validated?


    "I have an idea for what we could next achieve with the democratisation of reality, then," said Tarquin. "Why don''t we try to meet these people?"


    "Like, create a portal to them?" asked Connie. "Man, that''s a neat idea. We could finally be free of this boring tower. It has literally no style, and I¡¯d love to see a more interesting setting."


    "You want to meet the people who made the recordings on the phone?" mumbled Faust, necking the bottle and letting it roll out of his hand onto the carpet. Kind of a dick move, but whatever, Connie would allow it. The dark recesses under his eyes seemed to set themselves back even further.


    "Heh," he continued. "What the fuck. You''ve already made acquaintance."


    "What do you mean?" asked Connie.


    "I heard me, you lunatics. I heard my own fucking voice."


    They stared at him, mouth agape, waiting for further explanation. But after that outburst, he lay back, resting his head on the sofa, closed his eyes, and went to sleep.


    Connie turned to see Tarquin settling down himself, tucking his head under his arm.


    "May as well get a little bit of shut eye, too," he mumbled. "I never get brilliant sleep in the summerhouse, do I..."


    "Feel free," she said. "Do like you''re at home."


    ¡°Thank you for the drinks. You have a great flat, Connie,¡± he said, before entombing himself under the cushions.


    And she sat there, sipping beer while they napped, feeling like the best host in the world.

 1.4

    Faust decided against having a dream sequence, because everybody just skips those anyway. Instead, he lay back and enjoyed the odd sensation of heat that always rose from his body when he was incredibly tired. When he got like this, an hour could pass in a blink, and his brain shut out all light and sound.


    Gunshots woke him.


    First came one, the sound racketing through the narrow passageways of the tower. Then another, and another, the rumble crescendoing until it became so distortingly loud that even when Faust covered his ears the shots still thumped him in the chest.


    Connie jumped in front of the sofa, slinging the axe as if to defend him. Faust felt a pang of envy rising in his gut as he took in the sight of her apartment ¡ª it reminded him of how little he had to his name. Why would someone successful even tolerate being on a team with a pauper like him?


    "What should we do?" she shouted above the noise. "Is he coming?"


    "I doubt it," said Faust.


    "What?"


    Oh, right. The mumbling. Projection seemed to come so naturally to other people.


    "I doubt it," he shouted. "It''s more likely that their standoff just turned into a shootout."


    Tarquin erupted from underneath the pile of cushions, launching them throughout the room as he said, "But we should go and help them, right? We haven''t got much time! Let''s be off before they¡ª"


    As abruptly as it began, the shooting gave way to silence, which gave way to tinnitus. Outside, the wind howled and the three team members looked at one another, dread on their faces.


    "I sure hope I don''t have to prep any more bodies today," said Faust. "Especially the child."


    "Depending on who just won down there, you might be prepping ours, man," said Connie. "What are the chances it was Beck?"


    "I counted twelve shots," said a woman.


    Faust turned to the voice, feeling like his privacy had been somehow violated , and saw Eirlys sitting up on the bed, adjusting her glasses, one arm draped over the tiger.


    "Eirlys!" beamed Connie. "Glad to see you''re up. Can I get you a drink?"


    But Tarquin had already rushed forward with a steaming thermos, saying, "Careful, young miss. You''ve just been through a bad case of hypothermia ¡ª you were completely delirious, weren''t you? Don''t you think you should be taking it easy for now?"


    Eirlys looked past him to stare at Faust joylessly. Smiling at her was like smiling at a spider. She had an air about her that instantly made him feel insecure, like nothing that he did would ever be enough to make her acknowledge him.This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    "Thank you for looking after me," she said, shaking her head at Tarquin''s coffee. "But if you insist on continuing with these pleasantries, I would rather talk to the moody one."


    "Pleasantries?" asked Tarquin, taken aback, while Connie''s face fell.


    "Moody one?" exploded Faust. "I''m not moody! I''m just¡­ eh¡­  it doesn''t look like you''d know an emotion if it stabbed you in the heart!"


    "Uh uh," she tutted. "Before we argue, somebody should barricade the door."


    "Alright, man, Jesus, I''ll do it," said Connie, storming over to the entrance. "Oh wait, it''s an automatic door! What do you propose I do to stop it from sliding open, you fucking boffin?"


    "Is it locked?"


    Connie silently pressed a button on the panel. "Yeah! Who do you take me for?"


    "Sorry. I''m more of a situation than a people person." Eirlys stood up and stretched, effortlessly towering over Tarquin. "Can I know the names of my saviours?"


    Connie stuck her tongue out. Tarquin politely looked to Faust.


    "Faust," said Faust. "The moody one who tells himself he''s going to die on the phone."


    "Thank you, Faust," said Eirlys, strolling up to him and inspecting him from head to toe, paying particular attention to his ropelike beard. God, she probably thought he was an absolute loser for never shaving. "Do you remember recording your own phone message?"


    "No." Hearing himself speak on Tarquin''s phone had been the last big nope of the morning, and Faust had forced himself to nap before he could think too hard about it. Just... ugh.


    "Hang on now," said Connie, disrespectfully pulling Faust closer to her, "We haven''t even had a chance to discuss this as a team! Where do you get off butting in?"


    Eirlys trained her eyes on Connie''s t-shirt and said, without a trace of emotion, "That''s an exceptionally expensive shirt..."


    "... It¡¯s Connie!" she beamed, smoothing back her hair. "And thank you! Your hoodie is pretty cool too!"


    Eirlys nodded. "I will thank your team for saving me by pledging my support for a vote of your choice. I was just thinking that Faust here is... lucky... to have found himself in such an interesting situation."


    "Who spoke on the phone for you?" asked Connie.


    "For me, an Australian woman. For Saheel, an Irish man. For Greer... Greer. What happened to Greer?"


    And there Faust saw it, for the briefest of moments ¡ª a tense mouth, water in her eyes, and then as if nothing had happened, back to granite. Faust got the impression that smoothing it over with pleasantries would probably break her down even more, so he was quick to reply.


    "We couldn''t save her in time," said Faust. "Some wanker wants to be a megalomaniacal antagonist, and he filibustered until the count hit 10,000."


    "Oh." Eirlys tucked her hands into her hoodie pouch. "And Saheel?"


    "We don''t know, do we?" said Tarquin, oddly harshly. "After those shots, we just don''t know."


    Eirlys walked over to the floor-length windows, Connie hovering around her to study her reaction, making Faust radiate with envy. Was this really an appropriate moment to revel in the success of her career? What the hell did stuff like status matter now that they were all going to die anyway?


    Eirlys stared long and hard out into the clouds, before saying, "He''ll come through."


    "Are you sure?" asked Connie, leaning on the glass. "Did he have a gun, or something?"


    "We agreed ¡ª the three of us, that is ¡ª that if somebody insisted on voting no to everything to appear to be interesting, then we''d have to force their hand."


    Faust shuddered at her intonation. It made her stoicism sound like barely contained malice. He nearly jumped out of his skin when somebody broke the silence by rapping their knuckles on the locked front door.


    They looked at each other, and after pointing back and forth silently, nominated Connie to tiptoe over to the entrance with the axe. At the same time, Tarquin crept to the knife block and passed around kitchen knives. The metal felt dead cold in Faust''s hands.


    They gathered around the door, heartbeats in their ears, spreading out so that they could leap out from different angles to attack. Connie sliced the axe through the air a couple of times, making a whooshing sound, then jammed her elbow into the door button, quickly bringing her weapon above her head¡ª


    "Shit fuck!" she cried, dropping the axe with a thud. "It''s... it''s the kid."


    Kari poked their bloodstained head through the door, made eye contact with every one of them, and beckoned.

 1.5

    <main>


    <div>


    <div>


    As they followed the skipping child back to the democracy chamber, the number zipped from Faust to Eirlys, glowing out of her hand. She had a splitting headache stemming from her ears, probably a remnant of the sub-zero wind. Even looking at the lanterns on the walls set it off.


    Welcome back, she thought. I''m busy. Get used to bullet points.


    ¡ª It was all Eirlys'' fault.


    ¡ª She hadn''t been strong enough.


    ¡ª She hadn''t been clever enough.


    ¡ª She''d thought that freefalling for the rest of her life would be punishment enough, but now she was back she had to carry the burden of Greer''s death.


    ¡ª A lump in her throat; slight blurring of vision. Tremors in her voicebox. All this was unhelpful. She had to get strong. She had to get clever. She had to be competent enough that something like this would never happen again.


    ¡ª Tarquin, the man skipping alongside the child to try and make friends: exploitable. If he''d helped her with no expectation of a reward, then he''d do it again. He''d actually looked uncomfortable when she offered to vote on a reform of their choice.


    ¡ª Kari, the child with a big grin: dangerous. Aside from the fact that Eirlys distrusted happy people, as well as silent people, the child must have seen what happened down there. It was possible they were being led into a trap. In response, Eirlys drifted to the back of the line.


    ¡ª Connie, the woman fighting back imaginary enemies with her axe: exploitable. Prone to vanity. She would probably go along with anything if she thought she were manipulating Eirlys.


    ¡ª Faust, the man shuffling behind with his hands in his pockets: not a threat. He didn''t look assertive enough to stand up to serious criticism, and she''d already put him on the back foot with a comment about him being moody.


    ¡ª The democratisation of reality: a real thing. Saheel had been right to consider other strategies. She would have to apologise. Unfortunately, she wouldn''t be able to apologise to Greer.


    ¡ª It was Eirlys'' fault.


    ¡ª Eirlys had forced Greer into an uninteresting situation, condemning her.


    Eirlys slapped herself, loud as a whip crack, and Faust turned back to squint at her. She shrugged, so he shook his head and kept walking, bowed over under the weight of his own damn problems. Now her face stung in multiple places. A red mark formed on her cheek.


    ¡ª Unhelpful thoughts wouldn''t fix the situation, but competence would.


    ¡ª Analyse to understand.


    ¡ª The first motion they needed to pass, then: majority rule. Saheel had wanted to minimise the chance of bad actors before anybody could completely derail the process. Had he been too pressed for time to debate it, or had the others rejected it out of hand?Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    She tapped Faust on the shoulder, the least patronising of the three. "Excuse me, Faust."


    Even though all she said was his name, he physically recoiled, holding his arms out in a cross to shield him. Did she think he was a vampire?


    "Who invokes the name of the moody one?" he said. "What are you after? A vial of tears?"


    "Ha," said Eirlys, trying to smile.


    Faust frowned. "Go ahead, poke your fun like the rest of them. What''s one more insult on a pile of thousands?"


    "I''m sorry," said Eirlys.


    "No you''re not."


    She shrugged. "Did Saheel say anything about changing the democratisation of reality to a majority rule?"


    "Considering he was there for all of two minutes, after which Greer dropped dead? I''m surprised I even remember his name. They were going on about having a spa day, or something."


    "Thank you," said Eirlys. "Watch your step."


    Because he was walking backwards, Faust nearly tumbled down the gigantic set of stairs, and Eirlys absentmindedly used her climbing reflexes to catch him. He brushed himself off and kept walking.


    ¡ª Nearly there. The child hadn''t changed behaviour. Still, she needed to be careful. Let the others go in first.


    "Hey." Eirlys grabbed Faust by the arm, pulling him back into a fork on the staircase that presumably led to another team''s rooms.


    "WHAT?" he said, shoving her into the wall. "That makes three people, now! Why does everyone think they can just push me around?"


    "Sorry." She tried not to fall over, but her legs bent backwards, slipping on the smooth marble and she quickly found herself on the ground. It smelt dusty. Her glasses bounced down the steps.


    "Oh, shit, sorry," said Faust, chasing after them, then passing them back to her. "Uh, you look a lot stronger than you are."


    She yanked on his hand, hard, bringing him down to her level, and said, "I am strong, you just caught me off guard."


    ¡ª Eirlys had to stop getting caught off guard.


    "God, of course you are," cried Faust, nursing the arm she''d yanked. "I was almost feeling a little bit of remorse, but instead you had to double down on your campaign of harassment! Were your cutting words not enough? Must you thirst so for my blood? I swear, everywhere I go people just give me nothing but shit!"


    ¡ª Maybe he actually believed she was a vampire.


    "I''m sorry," said Eirlys. "I''m bad at being a people person. I just wanted to a) wait to see whether Connie and Tarquin were about to spring a trap, and b) ask your opinion on changing the democratisation of reality to a majority rule."


    "You''re saying my team might be in TROUBLE?" Faust spat at her feet, then dashed back down the stairs.


    Eirlys lay there, listening for gunshots. None came, so she picked herself back up, dusted herself down, and crept into the central chamber past a stunned, shellshocked Team Shame. The kid was... doing some kind of jig next to a park ranger who had an ice pick ¡ª Eirlys'' ice pick ¡ª lodged in his windpipe.


    ¡ª He''s still alive.


    Indeed, the ranger was gargling, wide eyed, and letting out a horrible wheeze that sounded like somebody blowing through a vacuum tube.


    ¡ª Saheel?


    She found him a couple of paces from the ranger, choking on a puddle of his own blood. His priest''s robe was torn ragged by bullets. Eirlys counted eleven holes. Somehow, he was still breathing. But then they all were.


    "The twelfth bullet?" she asked.


    Tarquin motioned to a schoolteacher slumped in front of a door labelled 70,000, a streak of blood running down it. Her cardigan was stained by a wound spreading out from her chest. She was clutching, white-knuckled, a clipboard. Alive.


    ¡ª Greer. Don¡¯t look at her body.


    "We need to heal them, now," said Tarquin. "I can¡¯t stand just watching them suffer. All those in favour?"


    ¡ª Thumbs down.


    7?? 1?? ¡ª INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY


    Eirlys stepped over to the park ranger, bent down, picked up his gun, rested it square on his forehead, and pulled the trigger.


    Click.


    ¡ª He must have emptied everything he had into Saheel.


    "What the fuck, Eirlys?" shouted Connie.


    "You might want to look away," said Eirlys, grabbing hold of the pick, pushing against the body with her foot to shunt it free.


    "What do you think you''re doing?" said Tarquin.


    "First things first," she said, swinging down the ice pick.


    ¡ª Force his hand.


    </main>

 1.6

    Saheel had never been shot before, so getting riddled with bullets made for quite the induction.


    He''d expected it to hurt. What he hadn''t expected was for it to hurt so badly that he swam adrift in the pain, his brain shutting him off from the outside world. Blood pooled into his lungs, choking him, and he couldn''t cough it up because moving even a little piped agony through the holes in his smashed ribcage.


    Something nearby crunched down with a wet splash. And somebody let out a high pitched, desperate whine, their rapid breathing sounding like they were wheezing through bagpipes.


    "Stop it!" cried Connie, and she ran behind his head towards the sound.


    ¡°Don¡¯t come a single step closer,¡± said Eirlys.


    Drenched in delirium, his ears ringing uselessly after the pounding barrage of gunshots, Saheel felt himself sinking through the floor.


    It was a stifling summer''s afternoon in his tutor Mary''s office, which was little more than a converted cupboard under the university''s main staircase. A fan heaved air through the room, flapping around the blind when it turned towards it. Saheel lingered in front of it, enjoying how the wind wicked away the sweat under his shirt.


    He looked down at himself. How thin were his arms! His beer belly had shrunk, and he''d forced himself into his old pair of skinny jeans, the ones that always got so itchy on the upper thigh. His hand felt oddly light without a ring. Oh, how full of potential he¡¯d felt during those undergraduate days.


    "Do come in, Saheel," said Mary, a woman with a hooked nose that made her genuinely warm smile look like the grimace of a witch.


    "Right, thank you." Saheel didn''t know if he should leave the door open to preserve what little breeze there was or close it to stop the corridor noise from crowding out their conversation.


    "Oh, that''s alright, just leave it open," she said.


    He sat at her desk, bathed in light, the blinds failing to hold back the onslaught of the sun¡¯s rays. She got out a folder from an overflowing shelf labelled PLACEMENTS.


    Mary grimaced. "Have you thought about what sort of placement you''d like since last month''s tutorial?"


    "Well, there''s so much to consider. Size of congregation, location, denomination... I still haven''t figured out what''s most important to my career."


    She took him in with her eyes, then gently glanced at her Chinese calendar, which was labelled JULY.


    "I believe our first tutorial was in September?"Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    "I''m sorry," he said. "I know I need to make up my mind."


    Saheel''s stomach sank when he realised what memory this was going to be. He didn''t want to see this. He didn''t want to think about this. He''d rather feel the bullets.


    "Well, let me make it easier for you." She took the two remaining sheets of paper from the folder and laid them on the desk. "The other students have snapped up most of them: here''s what''s left."


    "You know what," he said. "That actually does make it easier."


    "You can''t let god decide everything for you, Saheel," she chided.


    Saheel picked up the first.


    BARDEN CITY CATHEDRAL


    The hall in the picture was massive, pews stacked on top of pews, full of expectant, greying faces. He imagined his voice echoing off those high walls, booming out from every speaker in the PA. He imagined making house calls to thousands of people who knew him but he didn''t ¡ª how would he separate his Deirdres from his Esmeraldas? He imagined the success of it, the career progression. Getting the word out to thousands.


    Then he glanced at the second.


    SANDBANK CHAPEL


    It looked like a cosy wooden beach hut, with just a few community centre chairs in rows before the lectern. He imagined the laid back locals nodding at his sermons, really taking them in because they knew him personally. He imagined the slow pace of life, with ample time for meditating in the sunshine and holding community events that livened up unpolluted streets. He imagined his career making a nosedive, crashing and burning into obscurity.


    "So?" Mary smiled. "Which one would you like to take?"


    "I... I..."


    "You?"


    "...I''m not sure." Saheel rested his sweaty head on the desk.


    "Saheel," said Mary, leaping out of her chair. "I can''t make this decision for you. Look, I''ve had back-to-back tutorials today, so I¡¯m going to pop to the loo. If you still aren''t sure when I come back... well, I don''t know what we¡¯re going to do with you."


    She sped out the room, apparently more desperate than she''d been letting on. He sat restlessly in thought, unable to stop fidgeting.


    "Hey, Mary, I know it''s late but I still need to choose a¡ª" Sean, an ex-friend of Saheel''s, strolled into the office. His voice was distinctly tinged with an Irish aggression. "Oh, hi, Saheel. Have you seen Mary?"


    Saheel scowled. "No."


    His classmate shrugged. He always complained of feeling cold, even in summer, which was probably why he was currently wearing a sweater and scarf.


    "Can I wait here with you?" Sean asked. "How have you been, anyway, man?"


    "I''d really rather you didn''t," said Saheel, turning up his nose. "As for how I''ve been? Yes, Sean, how have I been? I''ve been *single*. That''s how I''ve been."


    Sean guiltily fingered his engagement ring. "This is getting ridiculous with you. Can''t we leave all that back in first year?"


    "I called dibs. Some mate you were."


    "She approached me. And that was months after you''d said anything about her¡ª"


    "I was working up the courage!" Saheel spat. He really thought he had been, anyway.


    "A priest needs to be able to forgive," said Sean. "I''m asking you here to forgive me. Dove and I are really happy together, man."


    "Good for you," said Saheel, flushing hot with rage.


    He turned his attention back to the two sheets of paper, and imagined himself standing before each congregation. What he wanted more than anything else right now was to feel powerful, to have people listening to him and making him feel like he was worth something. So he decided on Barden City Cathedral.


    "Sorry about that, Saheel," said Mary, walking in through the door. "Oh, Sean! Looks like I don''t have to chase you down, then. You still need to choose your placement."


    "I''d like this one," said Sean, holding up the Barden City Cathedral. "Sorry, is that alright with you, Saheel? You were here first and all."


    "Don''t worry." She grimaced. "Saheel was letting God decide. I''m sure you''ll be happy with Sandbank all the same, won''t you?"


    "Of course!" snapped Saheel. "Of course!"


    And he stormed out of the office, shoving the fan to the floor, holding his thumb up.


    8?? ¡ª MAJORITY REACHED


    Just like that, he was back in his stocky body, clothed in the Sandbank robe, stuck in a cruel democratic chamber high above the clouds of some hell.


    His wounds were gone, but he wasn¡¯t quite sure the pain would ever go away.

 1.8

    <div>


    Beck traced a finger along the walls and frowned ¨C the mass of gore he was smudging off had come from him. Now that they¡¯d voted to heal him up, a new batch of the stuff coursed through him, and he could feel it pulsing in his neck.


    Beck looked into the democracy chamber, and seven pairs of eyes stared back. He allowed himself to exhale when he saw the fat aunt still lying stiff on the floor (it hadn¡¯t all been for nothing).


    He spread out his arms and made a ta-da noise, adding to the effect by swirling the wordcount around in a blur.


    ¡°For all you pussies who just up and walked out, I¡¯ve appointed myself the audience representative,¡± he announced, more to the audience than the characters. ¡°If I catch you fuckers trying to do anything uninteresting like that again, you best believe I¡¯m gonna do something about it.¡±


    They just kept staring. A couple of them sighed, while others rolled their eyes. What would it take to motivate these people to act like goddamn characters in a goddamn story?


    ¡°Which one of you took my gun?¡± he asked.


    Haralda stepped forward, hands on hips. The dark circles under her eyes had completely receded. She looked about twenty years younger, shining like that.


    She said, ¡°Right, you. Come with me.¡±


    Beck inspected the floor for a weapon, but he didn¡¯t fancy his chances with a blunted ice pick. Power didn¡¯t mean very much when everybody just got back up when you shot them! Anybody would freeze up if they emptied a clip into a guy who just kept walking, so it wasn¡¯t exactly Beck¡¯s fault they got the better of him.


    He smirked and said, ¡°As long as you¡¯re sure that¡¯s the most interesting thing we could be doing right now.¡±


    In reply, she grabbed him by the collar of his polo and dragged him across the room, stopping to haul along Saheel and Eirlys as well. This steamroller of a woman brought them into an alcove round the corner, rudely ignoring his protests.


    The alcove¡¯s curved roof forced Beck and Eirlys to hunch over, the lantern between them flickering funny shapes onto the wall. The air here was warmly stagnant.


    ¡°Sit down,¡± barked Haralda.


    Saheel plonked himself straight on the stone, while Eirlys leaned against the wall until she¡¯d levered herself to the floor.


    ¡°Beck,¡± said Haralda.


    ¡°What?¡± He held out his hands. ¡°I just got these all clean and you want me to get them dirty again?¡±


    ¡°Do not talk back to me, young man,¡± she boomed, raising her clipboard. It activated some primal fear of middle-aged women that had been instilled in him during nursery.


    ¡°Alright, you kissless spinster,¡± he said, dropping. Ugh, now his hands were covered in dust.This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    Suddenly, she whacked him on the head.


    ¡°Hey, what the--¡±


    WHACK. Fuck, he thought he heard his skull crack!


    ¡°You will only speak when spoken to,¡± said Haralda. ¡°Do you understand?¡±


    ¡°Yes, miss,¡± chorused the three, and then they looked at each other in shock. How was she calling back all of these long-forgotten behaviours? What a witch!


    ¡°Now why have I brought you here?¡± she asked.


    ¡°Because--¡± Beck started.


    WHACK. Jesus Christ, when she thumped him like that, it sounded like a cannon going off. He could handle the weird glasses bitch spooning out his guts with an ice pick, but this? This was torture.


    ¡°Raise your hand for permission to speak,¡± she barked. ¡°Those are the new rules for our democracy meetings. I expect you to learn them.¡±


    Beck raised his hand, and when she nodded, he said, ¡°How in the fuck did you decide that? Who appointed you, Stalin?¡±


    WHACK.


    ¡°Under that authority,¡± she said. ¡°And under the authority of the audience representative.¡±


    ¡°Oi!¡± he raised his hand. ¡°Get your own goddamn role!¡±


    ¡°Do you think an audience can keep track of eight people constantly jostling each other about? Need I remind you of your disorderly conduct prior to Greer¡¯s death?¡±


    Beck shook his head. Alright, maybe it would be easier for the audience to read. He¡¯d just have to put his hand up when people got too derailed talking about silly feelings (and other bullshit).


    Saheel put his hand up. ¡°I understand why he¡¯s here, miss¡­ did I seriously just say miss¡­ but why me and Eirlys?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s Madame Gunmetal to you. You know perfectly well why you¡¯re here, Saheel! Really now, after all you spouted off about ¡®being a hero¡¯ and ¡®knowing better than to kill¡¯? We had quite a lot of fun with that ice pick, didn¡¯t we?¡±


    Saheel frowned.


    Eirlys swung one of her arms up, long enough to almost scrape the ceiling with her fingertips. ¡°But Madame Gunmetal, miss, Saheel was just acting in self-defense.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t care who started it!¡± she boomed. ¡°By your logic, I¡¯d have an excuse to kill you, seeing as you had a bit of an episode on my teammate!¡±


    ¡°I¡­¡± she stammered.


    WHACK. Eirlys curled up, nursing the bump on her head.


    ¡°I expect you to treat your fellow characters with respect,¡± said Haralda. ¡°That means no shooting, no maiming, and absolutely no shovelling of intestines! Is that clear?¡±


    Team Fear raised their hands and snivelled, ¡°Yes, Madame Gunmetal.¡±


    What fucking suck-ups.


    Beck shot his hand up. Just because he¡¯d been scared of his teachers in Nursery didn¡¯t mean he hadn¡¯t put them through hell for the rest of his schooling life.


    ¡°Madame Cun(t)metal?¡± he piped up.


    She folded her arms, shadows from the lantern painting murder on her face.


    She said, ¡°I hope you¡¯re not about to tell me that I wasn¡¯t clear, Beck.¡±


    ¡°Mr. Miller, please. And yeah, I¡¯m still a little unclear about one tiny fucking detail. It¡¯s probably not important.¡±


    She leaned down, stooping over him to the point that he was extremely glad she was wearing a cardigan. She raised her clipboard like artillery.


    ¡°Enlighten me, Mr. Miller,¡± she hissed.


    He erected his arm like the neck of an angry swan. ¡°How is it respectable for you to whack us around with a clipboard, Madame Gunmetal?¡±


    She stepped backwards, filling up the corridor, and posed menacingly, like a bouncer in a dark alley.


    ¡°If you don¡¯t think that¡¯s fair,¡± she said, ¡°Then you¡¯re welcome to try and whack me back. Just remember, you¡¯ve already shot me once.¡±


    Saheel whimpered, huddling up to Eirlys, who refused to take her gaze off this JCB of a schoolteacher. The stone seemed to drop twenty degrees, freezing Beck¡¯s bum. He shivered. He¡¯d only felt like this before when he accidentally locked himself in a cage with a tiger. This was real staring death in the face shit.


    He raised his hand, and said, ¡°Nah, we¡¯re good. Audience wouldn¡¯t wanna see a guy fight a woman.¡±


    ¡°Good,¡± said Haralda, ticking a chain of boxes off her clipboard. ¡°Before we go back, I want to see some apologies, alright?¡±


    ¡°Yes, Miss,¡± they chorused.


    ¡°Sorry for emptying my rifle in you, priesty boy,¡± said Beck, extending his hand. ¡°I actually¡­ I kinda like your style.¡±


    ¡°I forgive you.¡± Saheel gripped him. ¡°I apologise for lodging an ice pick in your throat. It did make me somewhat of a hypocrite.¡±


    Eirlys awkwardly planted her hand over the two of them. ¡°I¡¯m sorry for torturing you, Beck. I¡¯m not really a people person.¡±


    Beck shrugged. ¡°I¡¯m sure you dipshits were just trying to be interesting. Don¡¯t sweat it.¡±


    Haralda clapped her hands together just once, and said,


    ¡°Good. Now that everyone¡¯s on the same page, we can get down to democracy.¡±

 1.9 — VOTING OPEN

    Kari felt wrong to be clean. To see their skin under their fingernails. To have soft, flowing hair instead of a tangled mess of knots. The condemned had no business trying to wash hands of their past, yet here Kari was, transfixed by the dirtless space between their toes.


    Tarquin, that pest of a man, kept trying to obligate Kari into some kind of alliance. At least he smelled like cologne now instead of corpses.


    "You must have some proposals you want to put forward, no?" he asked.


    DEATH TO ALL, whispered the Djinn.


    Kari clutched their head, trying to shut the thoughts out. The wanton violence of this place made it difficult to suppress them.


    "Goodness, are you quite alright?" said Tarquin, reaching out his hand¡ª


    BEGONE.


    And Kari blacked out for a second. When they came to, they saw Tarquin had stepped well back, clutching his hand behind his back where red bite marks had set in.


    "Huh?" Connie was quick to rush over, Faust in tow.


    "Sounded like a hyena," said Faust. "You okay?"


    "Of course." Tarquin grimaced while he turned to hide the dripping wound. "Kari seems enthusiastic about our proposals, now isn''t that wonderful?"


    Where before Connie had sounded like her lungs were drowning in ash, her voice now resembled honey.


    She said, "I just wish I could say the same, man. I don''t trust Eirlys to not cross us."


    Faust shrugged. "What is democracy except poor compromises and broken promises?"


    "Co-operation," said Tarquin. "Hope!"


    They laughed.


    A procession of footsteps announced the return of Haralda and her troops, who were hunched over in a way intensely familiar to Kari. Make yourself small. Stay out the way, and you won''t get slugged.


    STAND TALL, said the Djinn. REPEL THEM.


    "To your podiums," instructed Haralda, her back straight as a lightning rod.


    While they got into position, she asked, "Have you finalised the agenda, Tarquin?"


    Tarquin picked up a clipboard from his podium and handed it to her. "The meeting will cover four proposals, shall we say? Proposed by Eirlys, Saheel, Haralda, and Connie."If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    "Good," said Haralda. "I expect everybody to follow the agreed methodology. Time-outs will be administered to those who fail to stick to the topic."


    ¡ª MOTION ONE


    Eirlys glanced at the others, fiddling with something in the pouch of her hoodie. She promptly found herself blushing.


    She said, "I propose that in future motions, we implement a majority rule. We''ve already seen what happens when a rogue agent has the power to stop everything ¡ª we wasted almost 10,000 words on a diversion, as well as losing Greer. I will not let that happen again."


    "Thank you," everybody chorused.


    FOOL, whispered the Djinn, and Kari grinned. The way she talked as if she could stop any of this. Herding together wouldn''t change anything, and Kari couldn''t wait to see the look on her face when everything fell apart.


    Haralda nodded. "Would those against the motion please exchange your arguments and nominate a speaker?"


    Connie, Faust, and Beck grouped up near the 70,000 door and whispered furiously at each other. Faust ended up having to hold them at arm''s length before it came to blows. After the most intense game of rock-paper-scissors in history, wherein rock was thrown dangerously close to faces, Beck came out on top.


    "Suck it, you fucking losers," he jeered, rolling up his sleeves. "Alright, first, as the audience representative, I''d like to correct something. We didn''t waste those words, we spent them resolving conflicts and developing character ¡ª exactly what those bloodthirsty fuckers behind the screen wanted to see. If you think more than one of us is walking out here alive, then you need to get your head out the clouds and stop being such a fucking space cadet."


    "That is not the subject of discussion here," barked Haralda. "Do you have a specific objection to the motion or not?"


    "Uh, yeah, because I''m not a dumbass?" he said. "Eirlys'' plan is gonna be something like: ''Beck is a douchebag, why don''t we just turn him into a blind, deaf, mute paraplegic and make him have the IQ of a vegetable. Not like he can say no, and the audience will kill him next!''"


    "Hear, hear," said Faust. "Except me instead of Beck."


    Beck slapped him on the back. "That''s right, buddy. Once they do me off, they''ll pick and choose somebody else. I can''t allow that, because the people who are meant to choose who dies and lives ¡ª that''s the audience! Booyah!"


    "Thank you," chorused everyone, though much more quietly.


    Haralda clapped just once, pushing the air through her hands with all the quietude of a sonic boom.


    She said, "Can anyone in support of the motion overcome this objection? What is to stop us from turning this tool into a weapon?"


    Eirlys raised her hand, and, when given permission, said, "That''s not a good enough objection. That''s paranoia. The fact that they have the power to reject an obviously good motion proves that we need it."


    "You''re just preaching to the choir!" shouted Connie. "You know you''re supposed to be convincing us, right?"


    "You''re inconvincible," declared Eirlys, folding her arms. "You''re acting in bad faith."


    Haralda slammed her fist onto her podium, causing a shockwave of biblical proportions.


    "Order," she ordered. "Although speaking out of turn, Connie was right. If you resort to ad-hominem once more then I will see this motion thrown out."


    "Alright," said Saheel, raising his hand. "What if we were to allow individuals to opt-out of motions that are passed? In Beck''s example, we could pass an inhumane motion as a majority, but he would be able to reject the parts that affect him. It would put pressure on us as policy-makers to only pass motions that benefit everybody."


    "Hear, hear," said Tarquin. "It would still mean bad actors couldn''t stop us from passing motions to help people who need it, wouldn''t it?"


    "Alright," said Connie.


    "Sure," shrugged Faust.


    "...Fine," spat Beck.


    8 Y ¡ª MOTION PASSED


    ¡ª MOTION TWO


    Saheel leaned on the podium naturally, projecting his voice with practised authority.


    "Mine is a timely proposal, considering how few words we are from losing another one of us. I ask simply that we abolish the wordcount altogether. It should be clear enough why that would benefit all of us."


    "Thank you," an enthusiastic room repeated.


    Haralda nodded. "Although we are now under majority rule, I would still like to give the opportunity for anyone against this motion to speak out."


    The word count was close enough, now. Kari climbed on top of their podium, even as Beck raced over to the 70,000 door alone. They couldn''t keep the Djinn down any longer.


    DISGUSTING, they said. IT IS TIME TO EXPLAIN WHY YOU ARE CONDEMNED.

 &#x1F480; 2 &#x1F480;

    <div>


    The number pulsed red like a dying star. As soon as Beck saw it, his stomach dropped. A feeling crept over his head, jolting the hairs bolt upright, a feeling unfelt since the day he''d torn apart another kid''s jigsaw in Kindergarten. A feeling that said justice was currently homing in on him like a missile.


    "Well, shit," he said.


    Nobody paid him any mind as he slunk out of the chamber and up the stairs, because they were busy watching Kari. The kid perched on the podium, voice crackling with menace. It wasn''t a voice that a ten-year old had any business using.If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    THEY CAME BEFORE I WAS OLD ENOUGH TO SPEAK, Kari was croaking. I KNOW NOT MY MOTHER TONGUE.


    Yeah, yeah, thought Beck. Come out with your life story just before the audience votes. If it had been anyone else, Beck would have knocked them down, but who hits a kid?


    He came to his lodge and almost prised the door off the liquor cabinet. Poured himself a nice whiskey in a plastic cup. The bitterness soothed his throat, and he didn''t so much mind his cheeks going rosy. He sat in his camp chair by the window, staring at the clouds.


    Some kind of view, Beck thought. He felt like he''d just finished running a marathon.


    Behind him, boots clanked on wood. It was Haralda, clutching her clipboard with white knuckles. She''d put on another cardigan.


    "Come to gloat, I bet," said Beck.


    "No, Beck." Haralda extended her hand. "Your methods were questionable, but I appreciate what you were trying to do."


    He stared at her awhile, then slapped her hand away and got her a whiskey.


    "Alright," he said. "See you on the other side, Madame Gunmetal."


    "Mr. Miller." She nodded, raised her cup.


    "Only, I''m not going how those fuckers want me to," he said.


    And he opted out of being healed.

 Interlude

    Voting results</a>


    A: Hello and welcome to ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die¡¯, the talk show for dead people, by dead people! I¡¯m your host Alexa Despacito, and no, I still haven¡¯t heard back from the deed poll office. Here with me tonight is Beck Miller! How are you feeling, Beck?


    B: Huh? What¡¯s going on here?


    A: Well Beck, I¡¯m afraid you¡¯re dead.


    B: I know that, you dumbass. What I want to know is why I¡¯m on a talk show.


    A: It¡¯s called an exit interview. We like to catch people on the way out, if you follow my drift.


    B: Fuck you, fuck your name, and fuck everything you stand for. Let me die, already. The audience is bored enough of my shtick.


    A: Dying? Oh, that reminds me! How do you feel about being the second to die?


    B: No comment. Suck my incorporeal dick.


    A: Sounds like you¡¯re pretty upset.


    B: I have a question.


    A: I¡¯m the one asking the questions here. Okay, seeing as everybody is quite clear on how you feel about the situation, let¡¯s get on to the reader mail. Do you want to hear why the readers voted for you?


    B: Not until you answer my question.


    A: If you want to ask a question, then why don¡¯t you just go ahead and ask it? We¡¯ve got a limited timeslot here.


    B: Good. Do you want to hear my question?


    A: Alright. I suppose we can fit it in.


    B: Are you sure you want to hear my question?


    A: Shit or get off the pot, Beck.


    B: I just want to know if you¡¯re ready to hear my question.


    A: I¡¯m ready. Go ahead.


    B: Okay. So, why are you such a¡ª


    A: Now it¡¯s time for the reader mail! Boy, did people get worked up writing essays about you. In fact, our 25 respondents wrote nearly 1,000 words between them! Isn¡¯t that impressive, Beck?


    B: Don¡¯t these people have day jobs? They must lead such sad little lives, if all they do for fun is wank themselves silly over killing some guy they barely know. Alright. I wanna know everything they said about me.


    A: Wow, that¡¯s awfully co-operative! Why the sudden change of heart?


    B: I can¡¯t cuss them out if I don¡¯t know what they said. See, they¡¯re going to be getting some very personalised insults.


    A: Alright. Response 5 said ¡®you were off on your own the whole time and didn''t really develop much more personality than just being an asshole who swears a lot, not very interesting¡¯.This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.


    B: Good going, response 5, you absolute dumbass. Both times I had the wordcount, I had so little personal space I was practically tripping over the fuckers I was stuck with! And once they¡¯d had their fun, they just fucked off somewhere and left me with no time to shine. I was there making things interesting; they just didn¡¯t want any part in it. In conclusion: go back to school and learn how to read, dickwad!


    A: He doesn¡¯t mean that, response 5. He¡¯s just venting his frustration. After all, I didn¡¯t go to school and here I am reading and writing like a champ.


    B: You¡¯re a presenter. You¡¯re not expected to be intelligent.


    A: Thanks for the reassurance, I was starting to feel the pressure. Response 7 said ¡®you''re mostly kind of a dick. No particular redeeming qualities. Other people become more interesting by their association with you, the ways they interact with your dickitude¡¯.


    B: Nice work, 7! Did you paste that in from your autobiography? Furthermore, what kind of moron thinks ¡®wow, this guy is slightly different from the others and creates interesting interactions, let¡¯s remove him and homogenise the story because all I want to see is hand-holding and, eventually, unrestrained fucking?¡¯ Wait, I know. This kind of moron!


    A: Erotica is actually one of the most popular genres out there at the moment.


    B: Well, yeah. I bet Haralda reads it, the spinster. Don¡¯t worry, 7, now that I¡¯m out of the way, nobody can stand in the way of the 10,000 word orgies!


    A: Response 20 simply wrote ¡®antagonists are overrated¡¯.


    B: A lazy message gets a lazy response. 20, your mom is overrated.


    A: Don¡¯t worry, audience, this joke isn¡¯t in bad taste. If 20¡¯s mother was dead, I¡¯d know about it.


    B: And I¡¯d have fucked her.


    A: Easy there, Beck. Think about the implications of what you just said.


    B: Oh yeah, I¡¯m thinking about it, alright.


    A: ...


    A: Anyway, Response 21 wrote ¡®Man, come on, if you think that being interesting just boils down to shooting people and being an asshole, then I¡¯m sorry to tell you that you are mistaken.¡¯


    B: How many more of these are there?


    A: Just the one after this.


    B: I¡¯m getting tired of wading through such bullshit. Should have packed my waders. Because I¡¯m seriously tired. Of these dipshits.


    A: Why¡¯s that? Have they made you lose your nerve?


    B: No, but come on. Look at all the films coming out in the cinema nowadays. Doesn¡¯t matter whether it¡¯s a superhero flick, some banal action shit, hell, they¡¯ve even turned sci-fi into banal action shit now. Let me tell you the plot of those films: one or multiple people shoot other people while being assholes and saying asshole things. Shit like, ¡®dodge this!¡¯, or ¡®Remember me?¡¯. People can¡¯t get enough of that! You think they¡¯re not assholes just because you see them get a cat out of a tree in the opening sequence? I¡¯m the only one conforming to genre expectations here.


    A: I wouldn¡¯t know. I get turned away from cinemas on account of having no ID.


    B: You¡¯re not missing out. Next?


    A: Finally (and mercifully), response 23 wrote ¡°You¡¯re a one-dimensional character with extremely simple motivations. If you¡¯re going to be a villain, at least be an interesting villain.¡±


    B: Give me a break. I had big plans, motherfucker. It¡¯s pretty hard to act on your plans when people keep walking off while you¡¯re speaking. But why should I waste time trying to convince some dickwad who never sets a foot outside?


    A: Uh¡­ do you keep up with current events, much, Beck?


    B: People who have time to read the news have time to do something productive. If you read the news every day, you¡¯re getting your mind poisoned.


    A: Okay, we¡¯ll just let that irony hang over your head, then. Who would you like to ultimately see win the challenge?


    B: Me.


    A: I¡­ don¡¯t think that¡¯s possible. Could you choose someone else?


    B: I don¡¯t know. Haralda. She¡¯s a bitch, but like, a good one. A good old bitch. I can see her taking on my legacy of stopping people from doing boring shit.


    A: Right. I can reveal that Haralda was actually second in line to be killed, with 16% of the vote share to your 28%. It doesn¡¯t seem like she¡¯s a fan favourite.


    B: What do you want me to fucking say? I hope she pulls through? I don¡¯t really care, Alexa Despacito.


    A: The character the audience currently finds the most interesting is¡­ Faust, with a 0% vote share.


    B: The one that always looks like he¡¯s about to cry? Yeah, from having read these responses, I can see why the audience would relate to him. Enjoy your beta male, dipshits! Try not to jizz too hard when he spends a whole chapter writing poetry! Are they actually serious here?


    A: What do I know? I¡¯m just a foetus. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, that¡¯s all we¡¯ve got time for tonight. I¡¯ve been Alexa Despacito, this was my guest Beck Miller, and this has been ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die!¡¯ See you in a week!

 2.1

    <div>


    SEE BECK OUT ¨C CHECK


    What was left of Beck slumped in the camping chair, the colour completely drained from his skin. The plastic cup tumbled unceremoniously into the armrest.


    Haralda took a sip of what he¡¯d given her, then screwed up her face as it attacked her tongue with cheap, bitter fire. She poured the rest out the window. Seeing Beck off had been the proper thing to do ¨C a professional deputy head had to treat those under her with respect, no matter how she felt privately. Indeed, Haralda took great pride in writing scathing report cards for the troublemakers under her jurisdiction, but even she had to smile when she saw the little tykes at parent¡¯s evening, or worse, in the supermarket. It came with the job.


    She flicked off the crackling halogen bulb that hung from a stripped cable in the ceiling and closed the door behind her as she left.


    THE CAST OF THIS SORDID RECOUNT IS THUS, Kari croaked. JURE, THE PATRIARCH. AKIA, THE MATRIARCH. THEIR THREE CHILDREN: EDUARD, GERSON, AND JOE. THE SCULLERY MAID...


    Faust nudged Connie with his elbow as Haralda came up behind him.


    He was saying, ¡°...But seriously, what¡¯s up with that voice? It¡¯s like a dog trying to imitate human speech. Or, I guess, a human imitating a dog imitating a human.¡±


    ¡°You mean like Scooby Doo?¡± said Connie. ¡°Uh, I¡¯m not really hearing it, man.¡±


    Faust went quiet, and very red.


    Connie continued, ¡°I¡¯ve never been much of a fan of kid actors, to be honest.¡±


    Haralda tapped the pair on the shoulder as politely as she could.


    She whispered, ¡°Beck has left us. Is Kari still going on about nothing in particular?¡±


    The pair nodded.


    ¡°We just heard about their fourth birthday,¡± said Faust, idly brushing his hair. ¡°I¡¯m so interested I might just die.¡±


    ¡°Do you wanna go and get another coffee?¡± asked Connie. ¡°Maybe¡­ I don¡¯t know¡­ see if there¡¯s any other records you like?¡±


    ¡°No, I¡¯ll sort this out,¡± said Haralda, feeling the regret of all teachers when their star student inevitably gets cocky and steps out of line. Kari had been so quiet and well-behaved, as well. A pity.


    Across the room, Eirlys and Saheel had given up all pretense of listening and were quietly strategizing by passing post-it notes between them. Only Tarquin stood, rapt, occasionally getting out a handkerchief from his muddy trousers to wipe a tearful eye.


    WORDS ARE INSUFFICIENT TO DESCRIBE THE EVENTS FOLLOWING MY PURCHASE BY THIS FAMILY, croaked Kari. I WILL SHOW, NOT TELL, BY OPTING OUT OF THIS MOTION THAT HAS SO CURSED MY BODY WITH UNDESERVED PURITY.


    With a snap of their fingers, Kari reverted back to the appearance of a feral child. They lifted up the oddly sack-like garment they were wearing to expose their back. It was riddled with scars that snaked their way across every inch of rough, broken skin.This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    THE WHIP, croaked Kari, their eyes glazing over with a seeming detachment to it all. FOR INFRACTIONS RELATED TO AN INSUFFICIENT CLEANING OF THE ESTATE.


    Kari brushed aside their matted fringe, revealing numerous bumps and blotches dotted around their scalp.


    BLOWS, said Kari. A GIFT FROM THE PATRIARCH FOR MY VISIBILITY DURING A HOUSE-PARTY.


    Lastly Kari extended their arms up to their shoulder, which were branded by patches of discoloured skin in the shape of horseshoes.


    FIREBRAND, said Kari. While their voice had been relatively flat up till now, this word was pronounced with the malice that teachers used to refer to homeschools. FOR NOT BEING FAST ENOUGH IN THE DAILY GAMES OF TAG WITH THE BROTHERS.


    Haralda felt her admonishments die on her lips. Not only was this situation not in the Barden teachers¡¯ handbook, which she herself had written, it was so far outside the handbook that she felt utterly lost when she brought her pencil to her clipboard to write down the next move.


    DECIDE HOW TO REACT ¨C


    That was always a safe bet. So while Tarquin inundated his handkerchief with snot, Saheel kneeled down to pray and the others looked on bewildered, she would have to fall back on the agreed democratic method. Essentially, ignore anything that went off script.


    ¡°Kari,¡± said Haralda, not unkindly, ¡°None of this is a sufficient objection to the second motion. If you have nothing further to say, I expect everyone would like to get back to democratic procedures.¡±


    I AM BUILDING MY ARGUMENT, said Kari. ALL THINGS IN GOOD TIME.


    ¡°Then hurry up and make it relevant,¡± snapped Haralda. Realising this was probably a little too harsh for somebody who¡¯d spend their entire life trapped in a Rube Goldberg machine of child abuse and slavery, she softened her voice and added, ¡°Why don¡¯t you tell us your story after the meeting?¡±


    MY CONCLUSIONS DIRECTLY RELATE TO MY BELIEF THIS MOTION SHOULD NOT BE PASSED, said Kari. I WILL NOT BE HURRIED INTO DIMINISHING ITS DRAMATIC IMPACT.


    ¡°Who wants Kari to hurry it up? asked Connie. Faust, Haralda, Eirlys, and after about a minute of considering it, Saheel, raised their hands.


    Saheel nodded sagely, his voice charismatic and pure. ¡°You said you were going to tell us why we were here.¡±


    INDEED.


    ¡°So, why?¡± asked Eirlys.


    IT IS A TOUGH CROWD, sighed Kari, TO INSIST ON REDUCING A LONG SPAN OF CONTINUOUS EXPERIENCE TO A MERE THESIS.


    ¡°Out with it, already,¡± said Connie, pacing impatiently up and down the length of the chamber.


    HAVE I INCENSED YOU SUFFICIENTLY WITH A DESIRE TO SEE THIS FAMILY, WHO WERE SO DISPOSED TO MALEDICTION, LEFT IN RUIN?


    ¡°Yes,¡± said Tarquin clenching his fist. ¡°We ought to take them to prison, oughtn''t we? Our police force is a joke if people like that are allowed to roam our streets!¡±


    WORRY NOT. Kari waved a hand. FOR THEY WERE LEFT IN RUIN. I FOUND IT ON MY TENTH BIRTHDAY. THE DJINN.


    ¡°The gin?¡± asked Faust, smoothing out his beard in deep thought.


    NO. D.J. I N N.


    Faust scratched his head. ¡°Oh, that¡¯s like a dubstep thing, right? I listened to a lot of that when it first got popular.¡±


    ¡°You did?¡± asked Connie, eyes shining with utterly misfounded hope.


    ¡°Sorry, brother.¡± Saheel pressed his hands together. ¡°But I believe a Djinn is an evil spirit of the desert.¡±


    ¡°Like Jenever?¡± asked Faust. ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure that¡¯s a spirit. Might be evil the morning after.¡±


    ¡°No,¡± said Saheel. ¡°I think it¡¯s the root for the word ¡®Genie¡¯, which is where we get Aladdin and Arabian Nights and the like. In the original stories, of course, humans didn¡¯t ask genies for wishes. They made pacts, like with the devil.¡±


    BEHOLD. Kari fished out the shiv from their pocket and presented it reverentially. THE DJINN.


    ¡°That¡¯s a knife,¡± tutted Haralda, disapprovingly. ¡°Children shouldn¡¯t be running around with knives.¡±


    THE DJINN TOLD ME HOW TO DO IT. WHICH NIGHT. WHERE THE KEYS TO THE MAIN HOUSE HUNG. WHICH FLOORBOARDS WOULDN¡¯T CREAK. WHICH LOCKS TO TURN. WHO WOULD SCREAM.


    ¡°Jesus Christ,¡± said Faust. ¡°You¡¯re ten.¡±


    Kari took a deep breath, the sound of them inhaling getting louder and louder, as if they were savouring the fact they still had functioning lungs.


    I AVENGED MYSELF AGAINST JURE, THE PATRIARCH, AKIA, THE MATRIARCH, THE BROTHERS EDUARD, GERSON AND JOE. THE SCULLERY MAID. THE COOK. THE BUTLER. THE GUARD. THE TEN WHO CAME.


    ¡°We found Kari in a cell,¡± mumbled Haralda, as the dread properly enveloped her.


    ¡°What the fuck,¡± said Connie, instinctively shifting her feet into a fighting stance. ¡°You¡¯re ten?¡±


    AND WHEN, DEAR HARALDA, TARQUIN, CONSTANCE, FAUST, EIRLYS, SAHEEL, YOU CALLED THEM ON YOUR COMMUNICATION DEVICE, I HEARD THEM WAILING TOGETHER, FROM A DISTANCE, AS A CHORUS, AS A PROCESSION OF BODIES THAT I LEFT TO LIE FOREVER SLEEPING IN THEIR BEDS, NEVER TO RISE UNDER THE CURSE OF THE DJINN. AND THEY WAILED:


    KARI, YOU ARE NINE OF NINE

 2.2

    <div>


    As far as Tarquin was concerned, negative emotion was like underwear ¨C he was perfectly happy with the idea of people having it, but felt rather uncomfortable if they trouped around showing it off. He held himself to the same standards, having long established himself as the chipperest, most helpful (and therefore most lovable) member of his family, but thinking about family was exactly what was tearing him up inside right now.


    Kari looked like his grandson. Similar build, similar gait, and up until now, similar happy-go-luckiness, what with the child¡¯s random bouts of dancing and tendency to skip around instead of walk. Upon hearing the lengthy tragedy of Kari¡¯s life story, Tarquin figured the only thing that had made one child a killer and one child head of the student council was circumstance. It was the kind of thought that got his lip wobbling. What would happen to his grandson if Tarquin himself wasn¡¯t there to guide him? He didn¡¯t know.


    ¡°I have to win this, don¡¯t I?¡± he whispered, a little guiltily. And with practised ease, he fixed a smile back onto his face.


    Nobody else was smiling.


    ¡°You¡¯ve doomed yourself,¡± observed Eirlys, scrunching up a post-it-note. ¡°The audience has made it clear what they think about murderers, and you just admitted to being one.¡±


    Kari clambered off the podium and swaggered towards her, an uneven rhythm in their step.


    ALL HERE ARE DOOMED, they declared. CONDEMNED FOR OUR SINS.


    Haralda put her hands on her hips and said, ¡°Well, I certainly don¡¯t remember murdering anyone.¡±


    ¡°We would if we had, wouldn¡¯t we?¡± said Tarquin. He¡¯d always thought the risk of not being able to provide for his family from prison outweighed the reward of getting even with somebody. Unless he¡¯d killed with kindness, Tarquin was no murderer.


    ¡°Damn straight,¡± said Connie. ¡°If I¡¯d run someone over, I wouldn¡¯t have so many clients.¡±


    ¡°I have never killed,¡± said Eirlys, flatly. ¡°And I don¡¯t recognise the voice of the man over the phone. You¡¯re an outlier.¡±


    LIES, said Kari. SELF-DECEPTION. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR DEATHS.


    ¡°This is nonsense,¡± smiled Tarquin. ¡°How can we be responsible for the murder of people we¡¯ve never met?¡±


    IN THE SAME WAY YOU WOULD STEP ON AN ANT, said Kari, walking past Eirlys to tug at Saheel¡¯s arm. SAHEEL DID NOT SPEAK OUT.


    Saheel had clouded over something fierce. He was generating wrinkles that would likely last him the rest of his life.


    ¡°Get off!¡± he said, leaping back. ¡°Brother, just because Sean called me doesn¡¯t mean I killed him! I hadn¡¯t spoken to him in literal decades, and our reunion was due¡­ this weekend¡­¡±


    Eirlys turned to him, eyes glinting with disapproval behind her glasses.


    She said, ¡°You never said you knew the Irish man.¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t think it was important,¡± said Saheel, wiping his brow. ¡°It took me a while to even recognise it was him. Like I said, it¡¯s been decades! We only hung out a little together in undergraduate, for crying out loud!¡±This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.


    ¡°Easy,¡± said Eirlys. ¡°Analyse to understand. You don¡¯t remember killing him?¡±


    ¡°If I did, I would tell you,¡± said Saheel.


    Kari sniggered, the same way Tarquin¡¯s grandson would upon duping someone with a whoopie cushion.


    THIS SEAN ALMOST CERTAINLY DIED BY YOUR HAND.


    ¡°No!¡± said Saheel, priestly fa?ade cracking as he backed away. He bumped up against the wall. ¡°Stop looking at me, brothers and sisters!¡±


    Eirlys shrugged. ¡°There¡¯s no evidence to support Kari¡¯s claims. Relax.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m trying to, sister,¡± said Saheel. ¡°Just, lord, get that thing away from me!¡±


    ¡°Kari,¡± snapped Haralda, ¡°I expect you to stop harrassing Saheel and return to your podium.¡±


    Tarquin always ran a meter in the back of his mind that tracked if anybody wasn¡¯t participating in a conversation ¨C it was one of the ways he tried to make himself helpful. A blip on his subconscious radar tugged him in the direction of Faust.


    The man slumped on the steps, elbows digging into his knees, head limp in his hands. He was breathing unevenly, through the gaps in his teeth. Whatever would cheer our moody Faust up? Why, a great big smile from his teammate Tarquin!


    Tarquin patted him on the shoulder and asked, ¡°Are you okay there, Faust?¡±


    The undertaker mumbled something into his cupped hands. So, he was playing hard to cheer up. What else was new?


    Tarquin perched himself on the adjacent step and said, ¡°Come on now, what¡¯s eating at you? I¡¯m here to listen, aren¡¯t I?¡±


    Faust glared at him, eyes red and sore. ¡°Tarquin, you can fuck off with that faux-sympathy of yours. I¡¯m not sure what¡¯s worse: whether you think it¡¯s convincing, or whether you don¡¯t but you just do it anyway.¡±


    ¡°Well, now,¡± said Tarquin, loosening the tight zip on his borrowed faux-fur jacket, ¡°That¡¯s quite a rude way to talk to a friend who¡¯s trying to help, isn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°For fuck¡¯s sake, grandpa,¡± spat Faust. ¡°Read the mood a little! Here I am dealing with the potential prospect of having offed myself, and here you are offering me a hug and shouting a ridiculous team name!¡±


    ¡°Well,¡± said Tarquin, tightening the screws on his bolted-on smile to suppress the wave of negativity rising within him, ¡°The way I see it, you look quite alive to¡ª¡±


    ¡°I said leave me the fuck alone!¡± said Faust. ¡°What don¡¯t you get about that? I¡¯m NOT playing hard to get, I¡¯m NOT trying to attract a rescuer, and I DON¡¯T want to hear your saccharine ideas about what is and isn¡¯t possible!¡±


    ¡°Come on now¡ª¡± Tarquin unconsciously laid a hand on Faust¡¯s back.


    ¡°You¡¯re still doing it!¡± Faust writhed away, like he¡¯d just touched a hot stove. ¡°You don¡¯t know anything about my life. Facing down an ostrich with a barrel of formaldehyde did not redeem me, make me complete, whole again, tick off a box in my character arc, nor did it make us friends!¡±


    ¡°I understand,¡± said Tarquin, not really understanding. Sure, he¡¯d had a few spats with his son when he was a teenager, but they¡¯d smoothed it over alright, hadn¡¯t they? Everybody just pretended to be okay. That was how conflicts worked.


    ¡°I just want you to know I¡¯m here to listen,¡± Tarquin added.


    ¡°And I just want you to know that you¡¯re not helping,¡± said Faust. His volume had gradually, angrily risen to the level of a normal conversation. His beard bristled, the hairs standing on end.


    ¡°Connie,¡± shouted Faust, gesturing at Tarquin with only one word of instruction: ¡°Please!¡±


    Connie, who had been watching from a distance ¨C rather shirking her duty as a teammate, Tarquin thought ¨C strode over at once.


    ¡°Come on, man,¡± she said, shifting from side to side uncomfortably. ¡°He needs some space.¡±


    ¡°But we have the word counter,¡± protested Tarquin. ¡°We have time to delve into this subplot¡ª¡±


    ¡°My life is NOT a fucking subplot,¡± said Faust, flashing him a look of hatred that only the worst of Tarquin¡¯s clients gave him. ¡°My feelings are NOT fuel to make YOUR team look more fucking interesting!¡±


    He erupted into a stream of tears, but unlike when Tarquin cried, it didn¡¯t seem to impede his ability to communicate or think in any way. In fact, like this, he almost looked more justified.


    ¡°Come on, Tarquin.¡± Connie clicked her fingers. ¡°You gotta know when to hit it or quit it, man.¡±


    So Tarquin shrugged, true feelings locked down behind the armour of his smile, patted his knees and buzzed happily back to his podium alongside Connie. But something about it had lit a fire in his chest, and words that he would never say sprung up uninvited. Why did Faust think he could go around just trashing the carefully established harmony of their team? How could he wallow in despair so un-self-consciously, to the point where he actively sabotaged how interesting their team was to the audience? Couldn¡¯t he see how he was throwing Tarquin under the bus?


    No more.


    Tarquin clenched his fists. All other people ¡ª teammates or not ¡ª being transient, the only thing that mattered was family. It was time to start being selfish.

 2.3

    <main>


    <div>


    <div>


    It went without saying that Connie, after hearing Kari suggest she¡¯d killed the Scottish man, remembered the way his drunken hollers had echoed through the backstreets. The night it happened, years ago now, she came back and bricked her phone. She showered for an hour, staring at the water slipping through her fingers down the drain, even as it went from scalding her skin to chilling it. She didn¡¯t read the newspaper for a year. Nobody questioned her when she filled out the forms for a new company phone, and every day she buried the memory a little deeper until the lie she wanted to live became the truth.


    So why break the habit of a lifetime? Being responsible for somebody¡¯s death just wasn¡¯t a good look. She wished she¡¯d worn something long sleeved ¨C kept picking at her arms.


    ¡°Come on, guys,¡± Connie said once Tarquin returned to his podium. ¡°We¡¯re not gonna find anything out by just talking about it. Nobody knows anything at this point. Move on.¡±


    Kari sniggered, and shot Connie a gaze so piercing that she had to double check she hadn¡¯t accidentally turned up naked. How come a ten year old got to be taller than her?


    Haralda nodded. Connie wouldn¡¯t have said the teacher¡¯s gunmetal outfit was particularly flattering, but then neither was her face.


    Haralda said, ¡°I agree. That objection was precisely the kind of derailment we were trying to avoid, and as it has only given us more questions than answers, I hardly think it deserves a counter argument. All those in favour of abolishing the 10,000 word deadline?¡±


    Connie put her thumb to the ceiling. Worrying about the number had nearly been as stressful as paying the rent, although thus far it had led to significantly less hair loss.


    6?? 1?? ¨C INVALID PERMISSION


    The energy in Connie¡¯s thumb promptly fizzled out. Kari, given their age, hadn¡¯t yet developed the self-consciousness to be embarrassed by something like rolling on the floor laughing. They sounded like a goddamn hyena in heat.


    ¡°For fuck¡¯s sake,¡± said Connie, ripping loose a strand of her hair with an explosive gesture.


    Eirlys adjusted her glasses. ¡°I expected as much. They wouldn¡¯t make it that easy.¡±


    Saheel shrugged. ¡°Still, sisters, we had to give it a try, didn¡¯t we? But it makes me think¡­ did Beck really just give his life away for nothing?¡±


    HOW NA?VE, cackled Kari. HIS LIFE WAS FORFEIT THE MOMENT HE MURDERED HIS SPOUSE.


    ¡°What are you saying? How can you possibly know that?¡± Saheel frantically mimed a crucifix, then turned to Eirlys and blessed her in turn. He did not extend this courtesy to the others.


    Haralda folded her arms. ¡°When he was on the phone, he did say the words, ¡®Honey, what the¡­ flip¡­ is that you?¡±


    ¡°That doesn¡¯t mean he murdered her,¡± shouted Saheel. ¡°This is crazy! You can¡¯t just label someone a murderer like that on such spurious grounds!¡±


    ¡°Calm down,¡± snapped Eirlys, wincing and cupping her ears. ¡°Kari¡¯s trying to get in your head. You said you didn¡¯t kill the Irishman, and I trust your word. Okay?¡±If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    ¡°I can¡¯t possibly imagine Saheel here killing anyone,¡± said Tarquin. ¡°And Connie is one of the nicest people I¡¯ve ever met, isn¡¯t she? Calling us murderers seems to me to be a cheap way for Kari to drag us down to their level, in order to make it harder for the audience to judge them for their crimes. Well, we¡¯re not buying it, are we?¡±


    Saheel sighed. ¡°Okay. Thanks.¡±


    No objection came from Kari, primarily because they had reached the stage of laughter where it became impossible to breathe. They twitched on the ground, face in ecstasy.


    Haralda leaned forward to generate a peculiar gravity, as if daring anybody to steal her turn.


    MOTION THREE


    Haralda said, ¡°Right. We now know there are limits on what we can change. Here¡¯s the sheet of suggestions we completed prior to Greer¡¯s death. I suggest we try to pass them all and see if there are any loopholes that we can exploit.


    ¡°Thank you,¡± said Connie and the rest of them.


    ¡°Are there any meaningful objections?¡± asked Haralda, who had noticeably relaxed as a chairwoman since Beck had disappeared.


    Connie glanced at Kari, who of course had raised their hand. Of course they had. She was getting more and more pissed off at their smarmy fucking smile by the minute.


    WE ARE NOT HERE TO CHEAT DEATH, said the kid.


    Connie put her hand up as she marched towards Kari¡¯s grotty little face. The little fucker was looking down on her. ¡°Man, you¡¯re only saying that because 1) you¡¯ve had a shit life and--¡±


    THIS STRIKES ME AS AN AD-HOMINEM, said Kari, looking down on her. HOW RIDICU¡ª


    ¡°NO! You listen to your fucking elders right now, you¡¯re literally ten and I¡¯ve had enough of your bullshit! You don¡¯t understand life, alright? You just don¡¯t! You¡¯re so far off from driving, drinking, getting paid, getting laid, binging on shit TV, going to raves, going to parties, loving, losing, lying awake at night wondering if it¡¯s all worth it, working so hard you forget yourself, saying fuck it and booking a last minute flight to Ibiza, losing yourself, trying drugs, finding yourself, realising you were an idiot last year, every year, but forgiving yourself, putting one step forward every day, until you look back and see how far you¡¯ve come and realised it¡¯s everything, it¡¯s the whole journey, the package of experiences in its entirety, that¡¯s made you happy!¡±


    "¡­", said Kari, mouth agape.


    Connie gasped for air. She hadn¡¯t breathed once during the whole charade in fear that Kari would interrupt her. It wasn¡¯t that she didn¡¯t believe in what she¡¯d said, some part of her did, somewhere, but more that no matter how much she tried, she couldn¡¯t get the happiness to spring up.


    Somebody slow-clapped her. She looked back, and saw Faust had stood up, his expression granite. He nodded.


    ¡°Nice speech,¡± he said. ¡°I wish I saw life like that. Is that¡­ is that really how normal people see it?¡±


    ¡°More or less,¡± said Saheel. ¡°For me, the important thing is the people you spend it with.¡±


    Connie ran a hand through her hair. ¡°Hit me up when we get out of here, Faust. I¡¯ll take you clubbing.¡±


    He frowned and sat back down, cradling his knees, apparently having said his piece. Would it have killed him to say yes? Now he¡¯d made her look desperate. In reality, her tinder was so flooded that it crashed her phone upon opening.


    ¡°Well, then,¡± said Haralda, brushing down her dress. ¡°I consider Kari¡¯s objection thoroughly overruled.¡±


    Yeah, Connie started to feel a milligram of remorse as she looked at the kid¡¯s expression. It was like their face had just blue-screened. She thought, There¡¯s more to life than revenge, isn¡¯t there, you little shit?


    Haralda said, ¡°I¡¯ll run through the suggestions rapidly, then. First: create a perfect clone of Greer.¡±


    7?? ¨C


    ¡°Hang on,¡± said Connie, reaching out to the frozen Kari¡¯s hand and twisting it up.


    7?? ¨C INVALID PERMISSION


    ¡°Very well,¡± said Haralda, ticking it off her clipboard. ¡°Create a robot with the same personality as Greer.¡±


    7?? ¨C INVALID PERMISSION


    ¡°Hmm,¡± said Haralda. ¡°Bring the Greer of yesterday into this room.¡±


    7?? ¨C INVALID PERMISSION


    ¡°Well this fucking sucks,¡± said Connie.


    ¡°Resurrect Greer,¡± said Haralda.


    7?? ¨C INVALID PERMISSION


    ¡°Retroactively extend the death word count to 100,000 words and alter reality to match the conditions,¡± said Haralda.


    7?? ¨C INVALID PERMISSION


    Connie¡¯s phone rang, playing the same song she¡¯d put on vinyl earlier. She went red as she rushed to pick it up, just about noticing the number was withheld. Everybody watched her keenly.


    ¡°Put it on speaker,¡± suggested Tarquin.


    She pretended not to hear.


    ¡°Conneh,¡± chanted the drunken Scottish man.


    ¡°What the fuck do you want?¡± she whispered.


    ¡°Conneh?¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°...Stop voting against the spirit of the fuggin rules.¡±


    </main>

 2.4

    <div>


    Like the majority of problems this decade, it all began with the memes. After his night shifts, Faust scrolled through them while the birds chattered vibrantly, his laptop weighing down his chest, body spent but mind awake. The screen, inches away, lit up his face like a spotlight, brighter than the sunrise outside. His eyes were cracked and dry.


    The memes said things like, "When you realise you''re not the most important person in anybody''s life and you''ll never be anything but a last resort," and they came with pictures of a cartoon character grinning at a noose. They''d make Faust snort out his nose; make his heavy computer wobble and rise as he tittered. There was something beautiful about thousands of people coming together to anonymously acknowledge the darker parts of life.


    After all, it was ironic. They were funny.


    And then Faust found himself in the supermarket buying four packets of paracetamol ¡ª as many as they''d let him buy. He rammed them right into the back of his medicine cabinet, hiding them with beard oils, foot creams, and complimentary bottles of shampoo. Now, when he got back from work and he let his jacket fall onto a pile of clothes next to his shoes and he lay there staring at the dust in the sunbeam poking into his room, he realised he could hear the pills whispering to him, softly.


    "Who would win?" They regurgitated onto the canvas of his sleep-deprived mind. "A lifetime of struggles and hardships, or one ropey boy? Just kidding. Unless...?"


    He made a noise like tch at the ridiculousness of it all, and shoved his head under the pillow, emtombing himself in the bed where it was dark and safe. The battle played out daily, as if he were treading water with no land in sight, and the cocktail of thoughts was a ball and chain, dragging him down, down, down. Would he really have been able to stay afloat forever?


    Faust looked at Connie, at her trendy clothes, her perfect haircut, the way she smiled so easily as she talked on the phone. Somehow, he guessed, she''d slipped that ball and chain off, and now she was free to swim.


    Tarquin was the same. Even now, he let his arms rest on the podium as he grinned. People who''d never sunk into a bottomless pit of despair were always so irritatingly insistent that he smile along with them.


    Faust buried his head in his hands, like an ostrich. They were just memes. He hadn''t really done it, had he?


    "Sure thing, man," said Connie, dashing her phone to the floor with a flourish. "Okay, so the Scottish geezer said we''ve reached a milestone of like, 10 votes, and he''s really proud that we''re voting so much. Keep up the good work, he said!"


    "That''s brilliant, isn''t it?" said Tarquin. "We must be getting close to making some progress, don''t you think?"


    "They called you just to say that?" asked Eirlys, furrowing her eyebrows. "There wasn''t anything more to the message?"


    "That''s what I was thinking," said Connie, the corners of her mouth twitching.


    "No sense in fussing over it." Haralda ripped another sheet off the clipboard and held it next to a lantern. "All those in favour of projecting a hologram of Greer''s consciousness from the afterlife?"You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.


    Faust stared at his thumb as energy shot out of it like a sparkler. When he blinked, it left afterimages streaked by tears. He shrugged; put his thumb up.


    7?? ¡ª INVALID PERMISSION


    Connie stifled a laugh behind her hand.


    TOMFOOLERY, spat Kari, suddenly reanimated.


    "Still?" said Eirlys. "I''m sorry, Haralda, but this is a distraction. None of this is going to work."


    Something buzzed very loudly near Faust, and it took him a while to realise they were calling him on a withheld number. Generally, he treated his phone as a smaller tablet, and the only notifications he got were from his SIM provider.


    "Would you mind putting it on speaker phone, this time?" asked Tarquin, smiling extra hard to try not to get on Faust''s bad side.


    Faust sighed and accepted the call, immediately regretting the decision to project it at maximum volume, because from the other side came his own voice.


    "Faust," said the phone. His voice sounded horribly deep and crackly, and he wondered how anyone could ever bear listening to him.


    "Ugh," said Faust, tensing up as he cringed. "Always a pleasure to hear from you, me."


    "Faust..."


    "But, if you were me, you sure as hell wouldn''t be saying my name in earshot of everyone, would you?" said Faust. "Where''s your fucking sense of dignity? Should I strip myself here and now, if you''re so determined to drag my worth through the mud before these people?"


    "...Stop going against the spirit of the rules. God, if I have to tell you lunatics again, I''m gonna start assaulting you with never ending Giga-bird action arcs. Capiche?"


    Click. Faust hid his face in shame ¡ª how could anyone take him seriously when he spoke like that? He waited for the jeering to start.


    "We stop, now," said Eirlys.


    "Connie?" asked Haralda, rolling up her sleeves. "Are you quite sure the Scotsman was congratulating us?"


    "Oh, shit, sorry," beamed Connie. "I must have got confused, or something. Can you blame me? The guy had an accent thicker than custard. At least Faust told it to us straight!"


    "Aaaaaah," Faust shouted into his elbow at the indignity of it all. The others didn''t seem to hear.


    "Let''s table motion three, then," said Haralda, scratching it out with the rubber end of her pencil. "Connie, I believe you were intending to propose the fourth and final motion of our meeting?"


    MOTION FOUR


    "Sure, man," said Connie, her eyes still lit up like she was watching a sitcom.


    Haralda crossed her arms. "I would prefer to be addressed as Madame, thank you very much."


    "Man''s gender neutral nowadays! Anyway, credit where credit''s due, this is a Team Shame proposal, and it should put an end to all the mystery. We want to open portals to the people on the other side of the phone so that we can find out who the fuck they are, speak with them, and, I guess, disprove the ridiculous idea that we murdered them!"


    "Thank you," they chorused.


    "It seems sensible enough to me," said Haralda. "Are there any objections? ...Kari?"


    NONE. Kari held up their shiv reverently. THEY WILL SOON KNOW THAT EVEN IN THE AFTERLIFE, THEY CANNOT ESCAPE THE DJINN. I SHALL HAVE MY REVENGE TWICE OVER.


    Faust got to his feet, and held up an arm, limply.


    "I don''t want to," he said.


    "Uh," said Haralda, glancing over him. "Is that the extent of your objection?"


    "Maybe the price of knowledge is too steep. Maybe there''s a reason we made ourselves forget. Maybe I''m happier to go on without knowing. I don¡¯t know if I could live with myself if I found out that kind of a truth."


    "Come on, now," said Tarquin, walking over.


    "Oh, for fuck''s sake." Faust rolled his eyes. "This again?"


    And Tarquin slapped him, clean across the face.


    "Get it together, won''t you?" he said. "You can think yourself in knots all you like, but you''re never going to get an answer if you don''t come over here and face the truth! You just don''t know, so what exactly are you doing moping around about it? How about getting all the facts BEFORE you decide what to feel, eh? Maybe you did kill yourself! Maybe! But until you know that for a fact, why are you hiding in the corner, ashamed and scared, letting that counter rack up and up and up and up? That''s going to help you, is it? I''ve had enough of you making me look like the bad guy for giving a shit! How about you start treating me and everyone around you with a little more respect?"


    Faust stared at him. Slowly, he took a breath and tilted his head.


    He said, ¡°Wow, Tarquin. Didn¡¯t know you had it in you.¡±

 2.5

    <div>


    Eirlys folded over a post-it note labelled ESCAPE as the counter popped out of her hand. Until she knew how the showrunners got their information, she couldn¡¯t risk them acting against her plans.


    It looked like they manually reviewed proposals and rejected them if they went against the ¡®spirit of the rules¡¯. After all, if the system was immune to exploitation, they wouldn¡¯t have needed to call up Connie and Faust to complain.


    ¡ª It stood to reason, then, that there had to be a loophole. Some proposal she could submit that wouldn¡¯t seem like it gave them an advantage, but did. If she were caught trying to pass it, though, things would probably get even worse than the Greer situation had.


    ¡ª Eirlys swore to get her back, whatever the cost.


    ¡°Fine,¡± Faust was saying. ¡°Like you said, I¡¯ll figure out how I feel about the truth once I learn it. A crushing dose of reality never hurt anyone. Only... Tarquin?¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    Faust leaned in, pressing his eyes right up against his teammate¡¯s. ¡°If you ever lay a hand on me again, I will take my needle and I will sew up your fucking eyes.¡±


    ¡°Goodness,¡± said Tarquin, putting a good ten feet between them.


    ¡°Faust!¡± Haralda slammed her fist onto the podium, making it rattle. ¡°I will not entertain those sorts of threats in this civilised chamber. Do we need to step outside for some fresh air?¡±


    ¡ª Haralda: a threat if left unchecked. While the teacher had gotten things running smoothly, her authority ultimately relied on people never calling her bluff.


    ¡ª Eirlys had been on the lookout for a good opportunity to do so. Anything to gain a little more ground.


    ¡°Nah,¡± said Faust, flatly, as he nursed the mark on his face. ¡°Sorry, Haralda. I¡¯m normally such a nice person, god knows what just came over me. Let¡¯s hope it doesn¡¯t happen again.¡±


    ¡°Yes, let¡¯s.¡± Haralda glared at him down her nose. ¡°Very well. All those in favour of creating a portal to those on the other side of the phone?¡±


    ¡ª Eirlys put her thumb up.


    ¡ª The crackling energy seemed to be made of the same substance as the word count. Oddly, neither of them produced any heat.


    7?? ¡ª MAJORITY REACHED


    There was an abrupt change in pressure and a rushing of wind, like the time Eirlys opened her front door during a tornado. Her hair whipped behind her head, tousled.


    Along the perimeter of the chamber, the lanterns snuffed themselves out, expelling a thin trail of smoke that smelled like birthday candles. Eirlys¡¯ screen burst into static, then snapped off. She tried to orient herself by looking at the 70,000 door, but even that had stopped glowing. For all intents and purposes, the only thing left visible in the world was the word count on her hand.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.


    Next to her, Saheel yelped. Across the room came similar cries from Connie and Faust. All was quiet save for the sound of desperate, heavy breaths.


    ¡°Our father, who art in heaven¡­¡± Saheel chanted to himself.


    ¡°What the devil is going on?¡± came Tarquin¡¯s panicked voice. ¡°We voted to open a portal, didn¡¯t we?¡±


    THE CENTRE, croaked Kari.


    ¡ª Hearing someone like that in a chamber darker than the night sky was enough to send shivers down Eirlys¡¯ spine.


    ¡ª But fear was unproductive. All phenomena had a reason.


    She squinted, and amongst the swirling miasma of visual distortion managed to make out a shape like a large gong that seemed to be darker than everything else.


    ¡ª The portal? Whispers poured out of its depths.


    ¡°What the fuck?¡± shouted Connie, audibly hopping around, her boots clomping on the marble. ¡°Something¡¯s grazing the bottom of my leg, man! Something¡¯s down there!¡±


    Eirlys touched her hand to her shoe, and sure enough, small particles were brushing against it, not dissimilar to a cloud of insects. In the blue light of the word count, the shape of the fragments seemed inconsistent.


    ¡ª It tickled.


    ¡°A-ha,¡± said Haralda, clicking in a button to activate the torch on her phone. She swept the beam across the room, revealing a floor covered in little shards of marble. But the portal defied her attempts to illuminate it, devouring the photons whole, blotching out the centre of the chamber like a stain on reality.


    One by one, the others clicked on the torches, save Kari, who was only identifiable through the glare off their pupils.


    ¡°Oh boy, that¡¯s a tooth,¡± said Faust, holding up one of the shards.


    ¡ª A molar, to be precise.


    ¡°We assumed the tower was made of marble,¡± said Eirlys, crunching her foot around in the bone. ¡°But¡­¡±


    ¡°Ah, FUCK!¡± screamed Connie, waving her torch around in an attempt to light everything up. ¡°Jesus¡­ whose idea was it to just leave Greer there? That scared the absolute shit of me!¡±


    ¡ª Don¡¯t look at Greer.


    ¡ª It was all Eirlys¡¯ fault, though. Now these odd fragments were riding in on the wind and piling over her teammate¡¯s corpse, like blossom.


    THE UNDERWORLD, announced Kari. Thankfully, Tarquin was training his torch on the child. LAND OF THE DEAD. I GLIMPSED IT IN THEIR EYES WHILE THEY BREATHED THEIR LAST.


    Eirlys thought about it, then frowned and said, ¡°How would that have looked different to regular darkness?¡±


    YOU SAY I KNOW NOTHING OF LIFE. WELL, YOU KNOW NOTHING OF DEATH.


    ¡°Hmm.¡±


    ¡ª If nothing else, it represented a possible avenue of escape.


    ¡°Right,¡± said Haralda. ¡°This wasn¡¯t exactly the motion we passed. Should anyone wish to close the portal, I won¡¯t judge you.¡±


    Saheel procured two crucifixes from some secret compartment in his robe and promptly dual-wielded them. ¡°I don¡¯t know. This seems awfully dangerous.¡±


    ¡°We have to at least investigate, don¡¯t we?¡± asked Tarquin. ¡°I¡¯m willing to take the risk if it means getting back to my family.¡±


    ¡°Damn straight,¡± said Connie. ¡°If this tower really is made out of bone, I sure as hell don¡¯t want to waste any more time standing in it.¡±


    ¡°Are you absolutely sure it¡¯s safe?¡± asked Saheel. ¡°We ought to take precautions. If you get lost in there, or worse ¡ª trapped ¡ª how exactly are you going to get out?¡±


    ¡°We¡¯re already trapped, aren¡¯t we?¡± said Tarquin. ¡°How could it be any worse in there?¡±


    They stood for a while and stared into the negative space of the portal while a thousand hushed voices whispered, and an endless stream of bone fragments streamed out.


    ¡°Gee, I can think of a few reasons,¡± said Faust.


    Eirlys said, ¡°Dangerous? Yes. But we can still pass motions if others are in different locations.¡±


    ¡°Hang on, though, Eirlys, are you guaranteed there¡¯ll be a phone signal in there?¡± asked Saheel. ¡°We can¡¯t just assume it¡¯ll work like in here.¡±


    ¡ª Saheel seemed to have a gift at finding ways to catch Eirlys out. Before, she¡¯d just thought him paranoid, but now she was starting to realise how much of an asset he could be.


    ¡°Good point,¡± said Eirlys. ¡°So we vote to create seven communications devices that are always connected.¡±


    ¡°Wouldn¡¯t hurt to vote to get some light in here, either,¡± said Saheel. ¡°Why not give them floodlight capabilities¡­¡±


    ¡°...Or the ability to turn darkness into light?¡± asked Eirlys.


    ¡°Wow,¡± said Faust. ¡°Look at you two go.¡±


    ¡°See what happens when you don¡¯t rush into things?¡± said Saheel, miming yet another crucifix. ¡°All those in favour?¡±


    ¡°I suppose it couldn¡¯t hurt to be cautious, could it?¡± asked Tarquin.


    ¡ª The energy from Eirlys¡¯ thumb streamed out towards the portal as she raised it, melting away into the darkness like snow on a roof.


    ¡ª It felt like¡­ it felt like she was feeding it.

 2.6

    <div>


    Saheel watched as the particles from his thumb streamed hungrily into the portal. It felt like sin. A spiritual war raged inside him ¡ª on the one hand, he saw this experience as a test of character, perhaps a last hurdle before he was allowed to gain entry to heaven, but on the other, he was starting to have doubts about the whole god thing.


    So he prayed, fervently, that god was real.


    Once the vote had gone through, a bathroom tile with a strap fastened itself to his wrist. Little dots were carved over its surface, presumably the speakers, while a small notch on the strap could be pressed down to activate a microphone. Far more wondrous was the way it projected a beam that evaporated any shadow it fell on, and the dazzling effect of turning on seven of these units in a cramped room made Saheel shut his eyes. Even that didn''t bring him darkness, because it illuminated the space behind his eyelids, treating him to a diagram of his blood vessels.


    "This defies logic," said Eirlys.


    Wincing, Saheel opened his eyes, but lighting everything up had only made the portal darker. When he looked at it, it was like the cells in his eyes just gave up. He turned his light off, and the others did, too, going back to torchlight. He hated the feeling of standing there, unable to see, while bones ground together and rolled over his shoe.


    IT IS NO MERE DARKNESS, said Kari, shuffling around. YOU WOULD BE SIMILARLY UNABLE TO BRING THE DEAD BACK TO LIFE.


    "We''ve made a terrible mistake, doing this," said Saheel. "We shouldn''t be meddling with things we don''t understand."


    Eirlys grabbed his hand and squeezed it in a grip that would have been reassuring had it not been as cold as a bag of frozen peas. Without warning, she brought her lips to his ear, and he nearly punched her in shock.


    "We can send the others in ahead of us," whispered Eirlys. "That''s as safe as we''ll get. If we oppose this and just close it... well, the audience won''t be pleased."


    "I don''t know if I can do this," he whispered back, trembling. "This is crazy."


    "So sit back and let it play out."


    Haralda stepped towards the portal, her torch dying out as she got closer. She was shaking, puffing out her chest to keep her head as far back as possible, and she held out the clipboard in the same way he clutched his crucifix.


    "As chairwoman, I''ll be the first to step through," said Haralda. "It would be improper for harm to come to anybody else."


    "Are you sure?" asked Tarquin, leaping up. "I''d be quite happy to take your place for the good of the team, wouldn''t¡ª"


    Haralda cut him off with a stern look. "This isn''t up for discussion."


    And she walked forward, inches now away from the void. Saheel didn''t envy her ¡ª what did it look like, to have the whole of her vision consumed by the emptiness of death? She froze up, as if daring something to come rushing out, but the bone fragments drifted through as lazily as ever.This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.


    ¡°Having second thoughts?¡± asked Tarquin.


    She shook her head.


    Something was wrong. Should Saheel go? He set off, half running towards Haralda as she poked a finger through the portal, only for a twisted mass of bone to latch onto her and yank, hard, and it took her by such surprise that she fell over, her legs slipping over the fragments like wet gravel, and just as she was about to be tugged wholly into its depths, Saheel caught her by the shoe.


    She hung there, suspended between the priest and whatever was pulling on the other side, and he could hear her hollering what felt like miles away. They''d nearly lost her.


    Saheel dug in with his feet. Whatever was pulling her, it was strong, like arm wrestling a bear. He leaned backwards against the force to outweigh it, and found himself being lifted up as well, the veins on his arms bulging as he put all of his strength into trying to get her back. But he couldn¡¯t get enough purchase, and he soon left the ground, hurtling himself towards that pit of darkness.


    "What did I say?" Eirlys wrapped her arms around his stomach, grunting. Behind her, the others lined up, forming a train, all of them leaning back to struggle against this impossible strength. Even Kari was there, at the end, their stick thin limbs working uselessly.


    The seven of them were getting pulled in, their feet slipping over the bones as they lost ground. Saheel didn''t have to imagine what the portal looked like from close up anymore. What it looked like was staring into the open mouth of a gigantic shark. He could hear the bones grinding together.


    "We have... to work... together..." panted Tarquin, his faux-fur coat ripping at the shoulders as he strained. "Give it all you''ve got! On three... one, two, three!"


    In unison, they heaved, and Saheel''s feet scuffed against the ground until he was able to stand.


    "One, two, three!"


    Saheel was flung backwards by the force of those behind him, taking him off balance. Briefly, they managed to get Haralda''s head back out on this side, with only her arm still in the darkness. Her face was flushed with rage.


    "Close the blasted portal!" she bellowed.


    And Saheel''s poor stance caught up with him. The underworld reeled him in as he scrabbled against the ground in a desperate search for friction. He managed to get his thumb in the upright position, all as innumerable particles streaked across his vision into the portal.


    6?? 1?? ¡ª MAJORITY REACHED


    The portal snapped shut, like a closing eye, and they fell onto the deep layer of bones, stabbed and scratched and scraped by the jagged fragments. Saheel switched on the bathroom tile torch to chase out the shadows. Haralda sat up with a stump in place of her right arm that was gushing with blood.


    She growled, face pale, and said, "My clipboard! Where''s it gone?"


    "THAT''S what you''re worried about?" said Tarquin breathlessly. "We need to vote to heal everyone, right away. All those in favour?"


    "Wait," gasped Saheel, even as his thumb started spewing a stream of light straight into the bones underneath him. "Haven''t you noticed? Something''s seriously wrong with this voting system! Why did the light go into the portal, and now, why is it going into these bones? Until we get an answer¡ª"


    "Whoops," said Faust, sitting guiltily with his thumb up. "Sorry."


    Eirlys sighed. "Well, we''ve already called the vote. We have to see it through."


    6?? 1?? ¡ª MAJORITY REACHED


    There was a blinding halation, brighter than even the bathroom tiles, and the bones underneath them juddered. They dislodged themselves, tearing holes through Saheel''s robe as they raced to the centre of the chamber just as iron filings home in on a magnet. The sound was cacophonous, full of clinking and smashing, and he cried out, shielding his face until the floorspace of the room became spotless.


    The bone pile grew, towering up towards the ceiling, twisting around itself as the pieces slotted together into a circular blob with nine depressions ¡ª the same pattern as the floor. The torsos of seven skeletons crunched out of the mess, while two of the holes remained unfilled. From the bottom sprouted a wave of flesh, sweeping over the pile like a timelapse of algae engulfing water, and Saheel gasped with horror as muscles, blood and skin knitted their way across the humanoid forms.


    There it was, complete, a hellish mound of flesh and bone, the upper half of seven naked humans hanging out of it like flagpoles, and one of the humans, unmistakably a black-haired Irishman with a scraggly beard, turned and looked Saheel straight in the eyes, twenty years older than when he¡¯d last seen him.


    Sean.

 2.9 — VOTING OPEN

    Kari counted all seven of them fused together in the mound: French man, Italian woman, Scottish man, Faust, American woman, Irish man, the patriarch Jure. Jure¡¯s monobrow looked as fuzzy as it had the night Kari murdered him, and Kari slid a finger over the cool edge of the Djinn, hungry for another taste of revenge.


    The group gathered around the stairs, transfixed by the beast. Haralda pulled the tight sleeve of her cardigan over her newly generated arm.


    ¡°What was it like in there?¡± asked Connie.


    Haralda shook her head. ¡°No place for the living. I suppose it could be quite comforting for the dead, like a good night''s sleep. But there is nothing for us there.¡±


    The now topless Tarquin said, ¡°But these¡­ whatever, they are, the people on the phone¡­ they didn¡¯t want to stay in there, did they? We¡¯ve let them out.¡±


    The seven naked forms leered at them, stretching their newly formed arms, rolling their necks in place, but didn¡¯t ¡ª  or couldn¡¯t ¡ª speak.


    ¡°What do you want, Sean?¡± shouted Saheel. ¡°Why are you here? Did you bring us here? Tell me what in heaven¡¯s name is going on!¡±


    Then everybody¡¯s phone rang, and Kari stepped forward, brandishing the Djinn to cover them while they answered ¡ª really, none of them even considered it might be cover for a surprise attack. They held the phones to their ears, expressions darkening.


    ¡°KARI,¡± wailed Kari¡¯s victims from each device, and as they spoke, a light in the centre of the mound pulsed on and off.


    Kari licked their lips.


    ¡°YOU LET US THROUGH, KARI, AND YOU WILL SUFFER FOR THE SECOND CHANCE YOU HAVE GIVEN US.¡±


    Kari sniggered. Never in the week leading up to their execution did they think they¡¯d get to experience something so delicious. The estate had been powerless against the Djinn before, and this time would be no different.


    ¡°WE¡¯LL HAVE YOUR SOUL, KARI. WE¡¯LL LEAVE YOU HERE AND WE¡¯LL WALK AGAIN UPON THE EARTH.¡±


    ¡°Fucking hell,¡± said Connie, shaking. ¡°We get rid of this thing and we get rid of it NOW.¡±


    ¡°Quite right,¡± said Tarquin, stiff as a board.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know¡­¡± mumbled Faust.


    ¡°No good can come from it,¡± declared Haralda, and she shepherded the group further away, tugging Kari by their collar. ¡°It must be destroyed at once.¡±


    ¡°Teleport it out of the tower,¡± said Eirlys, snapping her phone shut. ¡°Falling endlessly through the clouds should be a pleasant enough afterlife for them.¡±


    ¡°For the love of all that is holy, could you please stop and THINK?¡± said Saheel. ¡°Are you sure voting it away is going to work? This thing¡­ somehow, it feeds on us when we vote! How is it safe to do something like this?¡±


    Connie turned on him, made like she was going to shove him, then darted away before saying, ¡°So we walk away and have some coffee, or something, and then what do we do when we find ourselves needing to vote about something else? The longer we put it off, the stronger it¡¯ll get. If we vote now we can nip this whole thing in the bud, man!¡±


    ¡°And if it goes wrong, sister?¡± asked Saheel. ¡°If we make it stronger?¡±This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.


    ¡°Surely it can¡¯t be against the rules to put distance between us and it,¡± said Eirlys, studying her post-it note. ¡°It doesn¡¯t have anything to do with the word count, and it¡¯s not trying to cheat death.¡±


    ¡°Are you sure?¡± Saheel was hyperventilating, barely able to get the words out through panicked breaths. ¡°Are you SURE?¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s four of us who wish to pass the motion,¡± said Haralda. ¡°Majority rule.¡±


    BORING, said Kari, stretching. YAWN. BUT I CAN¡¯T STOP YOU.


    ¡°That¡¯s me in there¡­¡± mumbled Faust, catatonic. ¡°It¡¯s really me¡­¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re making a mistake,¡± said Saheel.


    ¡°Trust me, Saheel,¡± said Eirlys, clasping both of his hands. ¡°I¡¯ll word it very specifically. All those in favour of teleporting that mound of people fifty meters east?¡±


    Kari¡¯s thumb came ablaze with particles, which immediately rushed towards the bone pile. Arms which had once been thin and sinewy engorged and rippled with muscle, and the humanoid torsos slithered into the air, supported by a rapidly growing scaffolding of flesh. The seven beings smiled, held out their own thumbs, and tilted them down.


    4?? 3?? ¨C MAJORITY REACHED; INVALID PERMISSION


    ¡°Oh shit,¡± said Connie. ¡°Oh FUCK.¡±


    And the beast charged. Every one of the wretched souls seemed to know their target ¨C Patriarch Jure shot towards Kari, propelled by the mess spooling out of the mound at such a speed that it took the child by surprise. Out of sheer reflex, Kari held out their left arm to defend themselves from a rain of blows so that they could find an opening for the knife, but Jure wasn¡¯t interested in punching. The monstrosity latched onto Kari¡¯s wrist with large, clammy hands, and¡­


    Into Kari¡¯s mind came the smell of roses that used to waft in from the estate gardens, one of the sole sensory experiences that they enjoyed, for it reminded them of their home country. The smell stayed, briefly, before the memory shattered. In an instant, the smell was forgotten, replaced by longing.


    Then came the distant, blurred, but ever-treasured memory of their mother¡¯s face amongst the fallen leaves of autumn¡­


    STAND TALL, whispered the Djinn. FIGHT BACK.


    And Kari wrenched away, wrist stinging, mouth screaming, trying to run, feeling the awful presence of Jure hot on their tail. The child turned, and stabbed, and their aim was true, headed straight for his face ¡ª but at the last moment Jure¡¯s body peeled like an orange into three and became the Estate Siblings, burly, bare chested and armed with red-hot pokers. They swung their weapons down on Kari, faces silent with laughter.


    Kari heard the flesh singe, heard themselves cry out, smelled the unforgettable scent of burnt flesh (Jure would never have taken that memory away), but felt no pain. Kari stumbled to the floor.


    STAND, urged the Djinn. YOU ARE STRONG.


    Kari felt no strength. They looked meekly to the others, who were routed; Haralda twisting and struggling against the Frenchman, Saheel ineffectually raining blows upon the Irishman, who gripped him like a vice. Energy poured from the team¡¯s skulls into the beast, memory upon memory upon memory.


    It¡¯s game over, thought Kari, as the three siblings towered above, reaching out their hands to absorb their soul. They¡¯d pushed Kari to the limit in one life already, filling the days with endless torment, making them jump at the mere sight of a flame, forcing them to lie in agony most nights, when the burns just hurt too much. Eduard gripped Kari¡¯s wrist and plucked out the taste of licorice. Gerson took the singsong of a hummingbird. Joe rifled through further, and lingered greedily on the image of a certain knife.


    THEY PUSHED YOU PAST YOUR LIMIT, whispered the Djinn, AND YOU FOUND ME.


    No, Kari thought, I thought I became you.


    IS THERE A DIFFERENCE? asked the Djinn. WE DESTROYED THEM. ATTAINED VENGEANCE.


    No, I didn¡¯t get my revenge. Everything I did¡­ every throat of theirs I slit¡­ I did it as the Djinn. I laid the blame at your feet. Gave you the credit.


    YOU ARE ME. I AM YOU. ARE WE NOT ONE?


    No! Becoming you just made it easier. It meant I didn¡¯t have to carry the weight of their deaths on my shoulders. But now I¡¯m ready to face it. I see why I¡¯m here now. This time, when I kill them, when I get my vengeance ¨C it¡¯s not from the Djinn, but from me. From Kari. Are you ready?


    OF COURSE.


    And so Kari came to terms with the murders. A bright light, of truth, of knowledge, of justice shone from the knife, and Kari lashed out with it, severing the siblings¡¯ limbs. Kari slashed again, and again, like she was scything through a field of wheat, cutting apart the body that kept changing from scullery maid to guard to patriarch, and Kari worked all the way down to the base of the mound, where she sliced off the last of outgrowth number nine, and could gaze into the swirling mass of souls that lay beneath it.


    Kari said, ¡°I am Kari, nine of nine.¡±


    She held the shining Djinn high, ready to plunge it down, to finally claim revenge ¡ª  but the other outgrowths noticed, and swarmed towards her, forcing her to leap back.


    As before, she slashed ¡ª but her knife clanked uselessly against the arm of the Irishman. She couldn¡¯t make so much as a dent in the others, and the beast used this to its advantage, clumping their bodies around the wound to protect it.


    Sickeningly, the hole she¡¯d cut away scabbed over, and began to repair itself. The battle was far from won.

 &#x1F480; 3 &#x1F480;

    <div>


    While the beast was licking its wounds, Tarquin huddled everyone together. He felt a stranger in his own skin. It was impossible to say how much the Italian woman had stolen, but what he knew was this: his wife, his mother, and his son were absent from his memories.


    In the park, he remembered pulling and pushing an empty set of swings, whooping with joy, looking aside occasionally to an abandoned bench, and after he''d had his fun he perched on the edge of a picnic blanket and winced through a packet of vinegar crisps while other families played around him.


    He thought of his summerhouse, and recalled only an empty shed.


    What... what was his son''s name? How old was he? Had he ever even had one? Tarquin clenched his fists, ablaze in rage.


    "Thank you for saving us, Kari," said Haralda.


    Kari shrugged and pointed at the mound of flesh with the knife, which glowed such a brilliant green, like his wife''s emerald ring. The ninth outgrowth had nearly regenerated.


    His wife... what did she look like, again?The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    Eirlys tied her hair up in a ponytail and said, "We need weapons strong enough to hurt it, like Kari''s. I don''t know what that child did, but we need to do the same. And yes, Saheel, we''re going to vote them in."


    Kari nodded, and said, timidly, "Give them Djinn..."


    "Hey, Eirlys, no objections here." Saheel patted himself down. "But what''s to stop them rejecting every proposal we fling at them and stealing the energy anyway?"


    Eirlys studied the beast, nearly knitted back together now, before saying, "...Nothing. But there''s no other choice. All we can do is take shelter in the abstract."


    "It will work," said Kari.


    "Very well," said Haralda. "All those in favour of conjuring some Djinn of our own ¡ª that is, weapons strong enough to destroy our opponent?"


    The group raised their thumbs, and Tarquin trembled at the amount of energy cannoning into the mound; it was enough to instantly reanimate the ninth soul, as well as expand the mound itself so high that it crashed through the roof, letting in blinding sunlight and frosty air.


    In turn, some ¡ª but not all ¡ª of the twisted humanoids put their thumbs down. Notably, the adonic, roided out version of Faust kept his hand where it was.


    7?? ¡ª MAJORITY REACHED


    As soon as it came into Tarquin''s hands, he wondered how he''d ever gone through life without it. Confidence and power flowed through him. He gripped the Axe Of The Family Tree by its lacquered mahogany handle, and broke out of the group to run full pelt at the Italian woman, swinging it round at her head, anything to avenge the loss of his family...


    But the glossy axehead wasn''t glowing like Kari''s blade. Instead of sailing through her skull, it got lodged in it, and Tarquin found himself clinging on, trying to wrench it away as the Italian woman soared upwards, lifting him into the air by the neck...


    His life flashed before his eyes, a procession of contemporary Tarquins oozing out his brain, before every last memory shattered.

 Interlude

    <div>


    Voting results</a>


    A: Hello and welcome to ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die,¡¯ the talk show for dead people, by dead people! I¡¯m your host Alexa Despacito, and no, the therapy isn¡¯t going so well, thanks for asking. Here with me tonight is Tarquin Smith! How are you feeling, Tarquin?


    T: This is it, then. I¡¯m dead, am I? Well, it looks about what I expected.


    A: You got it! Welcome to the club.


    T: Suppose you tell me what happened to that Italian woman. She¡¯s alive now, is she?


    A: Alive and well, last we heard, although our producers aren¡¯t exactly able to contact anyone on the other side of the barrier. But I have it on good authority that being alive feels quite amazing, so it¡¯s a reasonable assumption to make.


    T: How could you possibly justify such a thing? That¡¯s my soul she¡¯s using, there! She¡¯s gone and stolen my soul!


    A: You don¡¯t exactly sound too happy about it, but yes, those are the rules of the game you were playing. What¡¯s wrong with that?


    T: It¡¯s ludicrous! Immoral! I didn¡¯t volunteer for any such thing, nor was I even asked for permission! That blasted woman had her one chance to be alive and she went and died so that should be the end of that, shouldn¡¯t it? Getting a second chance to be alive by stealing somebody else¡¯s soul¡­ why, how could it be anything other than evil?


    A: You really don¡¯t remember her, Tarquin? Not even her name?


    T: Why should I? I never knew her! She¡¯s as much a stranger to me as anyone I pass on the street! The fact that she would single me out for a victim, as someone who¡¯s made a pointed effort to live a moral life ¨C I¡¯m positively incensed! My blood is boiling! Pick a criminal, sure, or a murderer like that child, if a child can even be a murderer, but to attack a man who¡¯s spent his life minding his own business ¨C oh, blast it all!


    A: Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m sure you¡¯ll remember her and what you did eventually. You¡¯re going to have a lot of time to think about it, rest assured.


    T: It¡¯s just a mistake that I¡¯m even here in the first place, isn¡¯t it? Where does heaven come into all this? Who do I have to speak to in order to prove that I¡¯m innocent, that I led a virtuous life all along and this is just some big mix-up? I haven¡¯t been judged in an appropriate fashion, have I? Don¡¯t I even get so much of a trial? Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.


    A: Man, if you had any idea of the sheer number of people who are flowing in here every nanosecond you would understand why you aren¡¯t getting a trial.


    T: I demand justice.


    A: There¡¯s bound to be plenty of judges in the audience. Priests, too. Maybe go and have a chat with them after you¡¯ve had a long and hard think, and you¡¯ve managed to remember how you altered the course of that Italian Woman¡¯s life. Anyway, we¡¯re trying to run a show here. Did you expect to be the third character to get voted off?


    T: Of course I didn¡¯t expect it, did I? I¡¯d only just about resolved to try and win everything to get back to my family. I was trying to hold my team together. I don¡¯t know what I did wrong, but I¡¯m not going to dwell on what-ifs.


    A: Our sole piece of reader mail seemed to think it was because you were a ¡®boring old fart¡¯.


    T: Goodness. Well, I think I can safely dispense with that person¡¯s advice.


    A: So what was your favourite moment?


    T: I¡¯m supposed to have a favourite moment of that hell, am I? What was there to like? The monsters that wanted to kill me, the people that couldn¡¯t work together on so much as a jigsaw without coming to blows, the nonsensical d¨¦cor? There¡¯s nothing. Every second of it was torturous and you and your producer cronies should feel only guilt for having dragged a poor old man out of his retirement just to make him jump through hoops, like a rat in a maze!


    A: I think it¡¯s dolphins they make jump through hoops. I don¡¯t know, maybe they make rats do it too. What I¡¯m getting at is you didn¡¯t really enjoy your time in the tower?


    T: Absolutely not.


    A: Who would you like to see voted out next?


    T: I don¡¯t want to see anybody ¡®voted out¡¯, thank you very much. What I¡¯d like to see right now is for them to take the fight to that creature and knock it down and bust out of that horrid prison, that¡¯s what I¡¯d like to see! I want to see the living stick it to the dead!


    A: Look, there must¡¯ve been someone you didn¡¯t really like. It¡¯s okay, you can tell us. We already said we wouldn¡¯t judge.


    T: Oh, alright, then. Faust. If I hadn¡¯t spent so much time under his spell maybe I¡¯d have had more time to do something interesting.


    A: What do you mean by under his spell?


    T: You know exactly what I mean, don¡¯t you? The moping is all an act. He just wants you to take pity on him so that he doesn¡¯t get voted out. Why else would somebody continually resist everybody who tries to cheer him up? As I said before, he had a lot of nerve making me look like the bad guy!


    A: And who would you like to see ultimately win it?


    T: I don¡¯t know. Maybe Kari? He hasn¡¯t exactly had a good time of it. Maybe that¡¯s why he should get a shot at a proper life.


    A: I¡¯m pretty sure Kari is a girl. It was kind of the big reveal and triumphant moment of the last chapter.


    T: Okay¡­ anyway, the rest of us adults have already lived out quite a bit of our lives. It¡¯s only right that the younger generation should have their time to shine, isn¡¯t it?


    A: Well, currently the most popular character is Saheel, who managed to avoid getting a single vote.


    T: He¡¯s going to get a big shock to the system when he ends up here at the end of his life, isn¡¯t he? But he seems a nice enough fellow. I don¡¯t want to get caught up in the nasty business of deciding who lives and who dies, now, do I?


    A: What do I know? I¡¯m just a foetus. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, that¡¯s all we¡¯ve got time for tonight. I¡¯ve been Alexa Despacito, this was my guest Tarquin Smith, and this has been ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die¡¯! See you in a week!

 3.1

    Haralda peered over the Clipboard Shield, a rectangular scutum finished in technical glass so that it could double as a whiteboard. She had to kneel behind it because it was only four feet tall, but she felt as safe as if she were taking refuge in a nuclear bunker. Yes, the Frenchman had stolen some of her memories, but it was more of a blessing ¡ª she couldn''t wait to re-experience all those steamy novels.


    The Italian woman dropped Tarquin from ceiling to floor, and then she grew ablaze with light, fading out of existence like a photo left out in the sun. She turned to those she''d been sharing the beast with, smiled, and gave them an exaggerated salute.


    "Arrivederci," she said, leaving behind a hole in the mound.


    "You bastards!" shouted Connie, slinging the Net of Lies in front of her as she charged. Faust caught her and wrenched her back behind the shield.


    She struggled harder, trying to kick him, screaming "Let me go! I''ll get you for this, you bastards! I''ll fucking glass you!"


    "No, Connie ¡ª something''s not right," Faust mumbled, holding his elbows up to avoid cutting himself on the Double Edged Sword that poked out of a scabbard at his hip.


    Eirlys said, "Connie, look at our Djinn, then look at Kari''s."


    The makeshift shiv, just a few leather straps fastened to a sharpened steak knife, was shining brighter than a traffic signal. Meanwhile, Haralda''s own shield looked dull, inert, with even the umbo in the centre failing to catch any of the limelight.


    "We''re missing something," Haralda announced. "Let''s be off. I''ll cover our retreat, so whatever you do, don''t stick anything sharp into them. Don''t attack if there''s any chance you could get stuck."


    "No," said Connie, struggling as the others held her back. "We can''t just leave him, man! I''m done with walking away!"


    "Come on, sister," pleaded Saheel. "We need to think this through."


    "And I think we ought to show them who''s boss! It''s just going to get stronger and stronger! How can you just walk away after what they did to Tarquin?"


    Haralda fixed her gaze on Connie to perform The Look. She didn''t know exactly what The Look looked like, seeing as practising it in the mirror would have been suicide, but she did know that naughty children chose to give up their playtime in place of being sent to Madame Gunmetal''s office. It got results.


    Connie doubled over, rebooting, but soon enough sprang back and said, "Fine."


    They made a break for the stairs. The mound raced them, rippling with energy and poise, and propelled themselves forward on a torrent of flesh. They pounced, but Haralda was ready.


    As deputy head, she''d given a talk on self-defense after a kid went ham on a teacher. She''d made one half of her staff sling punches while the other half tried to intercept them. At the end of the day, she invited them all to strike her, and using just her arms, she taught them how to keep their torso free of bruises.


    How would this be any different?


    The American woman swung at Eirlys, but Haralda caught the blow.


    Saheel hosed down the Irishman with the Holy Water Pistol, pumping madly on the piston below the nozzle, but the torrent wasn''t strong enough, and the Irishman burst forth ¡ª Haralda got between them, and the shield went all fuzzy in her hands as he struck it.This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.


    Before the Scottish man could even think about attacking, Haralda was in front of Connie, swatting his fist out of the way.


    If only she could''ve kept this up. The shield was light enough, but it was large, and twisting it all around tired out her arms. They had to move.


    "The lift," she shouted, intercepting the adonic Faust before he grabbed the real one, who was already sprinting away.


    They made it clear of the beast, making straight for the lift, and Haralda turned, satisfied, before the Frenchman latched onto her neck.


    She choked. The plot points of My Reverse Harem floated up and out of her mind into the Frenchman, graphic enough to give him pause ¡ª she twisted away, and barreled into the lift. Gosh, she''d get to read that masterpiece again? Her heart thumped in her chest.


    The six outgrowths rushed over. Kari hammered the buttons to close the doors. On the other side, they scratched away at the metal with sharp fingernails, and it sprouted goosebumps along Haralda''s arms.


    NO TERRESTRIAL LAYER EXISTS


    "We need somewhere to escape," said Haralda, "And we need to make our Djinn glow. Can it be done?"


    "We''ll have to vote," whimpered Saheel. "We''ll have to make those things even stronger..."


    With the piercing sound of metal being rent, torn, and twisted apart came a gap in the elevator doors. Six pairs of eyes peered through it. Haralda plugged the gap with the shield, but it would only take a few seconds for them to fully prise open the doors.


    Connie kneeled next to Kari. "How did you get it to glow? What''s the secret?"


    BANG. They were punching dents in the door to soften it up.


    Kari was absorbed in repeatedly depressing the ground floor button.


    "Kari!" said Connie. "We don''t have much time, here, man!"


    Kari said, "...I came to terms with my part in their deaths."


    "What? How the hell are we supposed to do that? Most of us don''t even know who the hell they are!"


    The beast ripped off the elevator doors, and now Haralda could do nothing but thrust the shield out in front of her, pushing back their advances, hoping to delay them while the group pressed their backs to the wall...


    With dismay, she realised the monster wasn''t making a serious attempt to breach her one woman shield wall ¡ª they were biding their time until she tired.


    "Eirlys," shouted Saheel, pumping away at his pistol, keeping the Irishman back, "This is a crazy idea, sister, but when I had all those bullets in me, I had a hallucination of my university days, and it felt so real, so vivid that it couldn''t have just been a memory... I was living it again. Is there anything we can do with that?"


    Eirlys, who was clutching some kind of gun to her chest, said, "Um. Create six terrestrial layers, that take us to the day when each of us were responsible for a death. We relive the day. We find out the truth."


    "Yes," gasped Haralda, her lungs burning in agony. "All those in favour?"


    6?? ¡ª MAJORITY REACHED


    Kari pressed the first button as soon as it appeared, and the elevator whistled down the shaft. Haralda collapsed. Above them the beast exploded in power, expanding to swallow up the top of the tower, and they were engulfed by the sound of endless tonnes of bone crumbling apart into fragments. The shaft, visible from the open door, was a blur.


    With a ding, they reached layer 1. It was Haralda''s shoebox of a bedroom, and if she stepped out of the lift she would find herself straight on her bed.


    "They''ll come down after us with time, sister," said Saheel. "I recommend we¡ª"


    "Split up and look for clues, right," said Faust. "In our teams, I suppose."


    Haralda nodded at Kari, hefted her Clipboard Shield onto her back, and prepared to step out.


    "Wait," said Connie, breaking out in a sweat. "What if we find out we don''t like so much what we''ve done? The audience, man, don''t you think they''re going to judge us if we''ve done something really awful? Is there any way we could show that, like, that we''ve atoned? That we''re different people, and we''ve learned from it, and we''d do the right thing if it happened again?"


    "It''s not like Tarquin really did anything wrong," said Faust, "But they killed him all the same. Still, it would be nice not to have done myself in."


    They stood for a while in thought, trying to ignore the incessant wailing and gnashing of teeth a mile above them. The rumble slithered ever closer down the shaft. The traffic outside Haralda''s window started to pick up, and soon the drivers were honking and swearing at each other because, for their liking, it had picked up a little too much.


    Finally Eirlys said, "Remote controls."


    "Yes, sister," said Saheel, beaming. "That''s the ticket."


    "Pause, to stop and think; to remember. Rewind, to experience again. And record, to act differently."


    "And an arrow telling you what you did next wouldn''t hurt, either."


    "Wow," said Faust, "...Look at you two go, again. Wasn''t there a film about that, though?"


    "Is it worth the risk of making that thing even stronger?" asked Haralda, meeting their eyes as they nodded. "All those in favour, then?"


    6?? ¡ª MAJORITY REACHED


    With the shield at her back, communication tile on her wrist, and remote in her hand, Haralda stepped out with Kari into her bedroom. The group shared a terse goodbye, and then the door closed and the lift sailed downwards.


    "Right, young lady," said Haralda. "Time for us to get to school."

 3.3

    <div>


    On layer three, Connie left Faust to peruse her vinyl collection while she bundled up a change of clothes and took to her bathroom for some self-care. Her face in the mirror looked younger, but those damn healing votes kept erasing her makeup. She enjoyed a hot blast in the shower, spent half an hour touching up and correcting imperfections in her appearance with all manner of cosmetics, then got into a tailored dress shirt and black trousers. Satisfied, she stepped back and regarded herself while she ran a comb through her hair. This was a face Connie was happy for the world to see.


    She might have been putting it on a bit, but she was pretty upset about Tarquin. Revenge would be simple: she''d just have to stop the Scottish guy from dying, which would count as atoning for her actions to make the Djinn light up, and she was at an advantage there ¡ª she remembered what was going to happen. The Net of Lies was currently bunched up and slung off her hip.


    She strutted back into the flat with a flourish of steam and peacocked her way over to Faust, who was fiddling with some equaliser settings. He''d put the fucking cuddly tiger on the table next to him.


    "Well," she said, radiantly, "What do you think?"


    He looked her up and down then said, "Yeah."


    She glared at him. "Is that all you have to say? Come on, man, I just spent the better part of an hour on this. Give me some validation here."


    "Alright," he said. "You look dressed to kill."


    His stomach rumbled, and Connie felt a similar pang. An arrow extended out of their remotes, pointing to the cupboard where Connie kept the cereal bars she ate for breakfast every day.


    "Hey, that''s weird," she said, before he could open it. "What do you say we grab a bite to eat? It''s still pretty early ¡ª I work 12 till 12. I¡¯m a regular at this kooky cafe just down the road."


    Faust shrugged, carefully unsheathing his Double Edged Sword. It resembled a quarterstaff, except it looked sharp and pointy enough to split atoms. He laid it down on her bed. Connie thought it was the most impractical weapon she''d ever seen.


    She asked, "What, you''re not taking your badass sword?"


    He said, "Badass? If I go to a cafe with that fucking machete, people won''t be thinking badass. They''ll be thinking nutter!"


    So she decanted the contents of yesterday''s handbag into a nice faux-leather satchel, put on a blazer, and led him out into the corridor. From there, it was a short lift ride down a hundred-odd floors before they stepped into the streets of Barden City.


    The roads, which wound chaotically through the city, were entombed by brick, glass, and steel. Connie looked up and saw only a thin sliver of sky enshrouded in smog so thick the sun barely pierced through. Pedestrians spilled off the pavement onto the road, and she could immediately tell Faust wasn''t from here, because while she effortlessly leant back and forth to get out of their way, Faust was getting bumped around like a pinball.


    She saw his lips move, but whatever he said was lost among the roar of traffic and construction, so she grabbed his arm and helped him weave through the gaps in the crowd. Soon enough, they turned onto a quieter side road where the traffic was actually moving.


    "What the fuck," said Faust, coughing. "You LIVE here?"This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work.


    She shrugged and nodded, sidestepping a flotilla of bikes. On the rare occasion she left for the country, she had to play white noise on her phone or else she''d lie awake all night.


    "We''re not too far from the cafe," she said. "I''m just gonna make a call."


    It was quiet enough here, so she called up her boss, Gazzer. His voice was as greasy as his character ¡ª the guy slipped around regulations in the same way he avoided salads and responsible drinking. He generally treated his employees well, giving them a cut of every windfall he landed upon as long as they never asked him for a holiday. That sounded bad, but Connie had played him well enough. He thought she had an illness that meant she had to take 30 days off every year, and he paid her for it, too.


    "This is Barden Fleet," said Gazzer. "How can I ''elp?"


    "Gazzer!" shouted Connie. Walking on the phone in Barden meant constantly flipping the phone from your ear to your mouth.


    "Alright, Connie? How''s the endocriocitis treating you this morning?"


    "It ain''t flaring up too bad, man. Yourself?"


    "Oh, I''m grand. Listen, you''re on Newchurch from 12-6 and after that you got bookings the rest of the night. I ain''t never seen you so popular! What''s going on?"


    "Faust, NO!" she tugged him back before he stepped out into a zebra crossing, presumably thinking the cars would actually stop. "About those bookings, Gaz. Would it so happen that one of them was a Scottish bloke?"


    Gaz had a coughing fit so awful she thought the phlegm would drip out her speakers. Then he said, "Yeah, funny sounding feller that couldn''t pronounce nothing right. He booked you for eleven in¡ª"


    "A pub in Slumsfield, right? Now, Faust, walk! Hurry it up, man!"


    Gaz asked, "Hey, how''d you know that? I ain''t sent you the email yet. He your friend or summat?"


    The car sailing towards them honked its horn, and they just managed to cross the road before it barrelled past.


    Faust pat himself down, looking absolutely distraught and said, "You know, I actually preferred the underworld to this."


    "Not quite a friend, no, Gaz," said Connie. "You got a name or a number for this guy?


    "MacCain, I think. I can text you ''is number. But why you gotta speak to him so bad?"


    "Thanks, man," said Connie, and hung up. "Sorry about that, Faust. You hanging in there?"


    He was taking a breather, pressed up against the wall of some shop while the crowd streamed in front of him.


    "This is shit," he said. "Utter fucking shit. Where are all these people coming from? Where are they going? Is there any greater purpose to all this movement?"


    She shrugged. "Look, the cafe''s right there."


    It was a cross between a greasy diner and a gastro pub, that was to say it had the food of a greasy diner and the decor/prices of a gastro pub; taxidermied collections of butterflies on the walls lit by chandeliers. Before they hefted open the portcullis to get in, Connie had a thought to check her purse. She popped it open and sure enough, it was empty, so she made them double-back to an ATM.


    "This city is about as dystopian cyberpunk as you can get," said Faust. "Are you telling me you can''t pay by card in there?"


    "It''s buggy," she lied. "Best to have some cash in hand just in case."


    She put the card in while Faust hovered annoyingly close, and it told her the bank balance on this one was -135,000 down, but she put her hand on the screen such a way that it covered the minus.


    "Oh, shit," said Faust, his eyes widening at what looked like a seven figure account. "As if I needed another reminder of why I amount to nothing. What do you do for a living, exactly?"


    "I''m a chauffeur," said Connie, which was technically true. The bank only let her withdraw ¡ê20, but it was better than nothing.


    They went into the cafe, and tried to locate an empty table among the hundreds that had been converted into desks by grazing tele-workers. There was one in the corner, under a gigantic taxidermied stag''s head. Connie¡¯s lungs thanked the filtered air, and took deep, grateful breaths.


    "Not bad," said Faust, stroking it to admire the handiwork.


    A waiter came carrying a tablet ¡ª dressed far less sharp than she was ¡ª and stared at them expectantly.


    Feeling pressured, Connie picked the first thing she saw on the menu under a tenner.


    "Eggs benedict and a double espresso, please," she said.


    The waiter tapped it in, and Connie was glad to have his searching gaze fixed on Faust instead.


    "Give me," said Faust, hiding behind the menu. "A um, uhhh... can I get a, um, uhhh..."


    "Does sir need more time?" asked the waiter, in a tone that implied he wouldn''t be coming back.


    "I resent your challenge, and your attitude," he said. "I demand the fullest English breakfast you can get me, and I want like, a frappucino with every flavoured syrup you have."


    The waiter tapped it in and fluttered off while Connie did the maths in her head and frowned when it came to about ¡ê30. Well, she''d blag it somehow. Her phone buzzed ¡ª Gazzer had texted her MacCain''s number, along with an onslaught of nosy questions that she didn''t waste a second reading.


    She tapped the number, and put it on speaker phone.


    She said, "Let''s see if we can''t have a chat with the guy I killed."

 3.4

    <div>


    Faust didn''t like cities and he didn''t like busy cafes. Just talking above the general chatter in here felt as if he were pushing his voice box to the limit, and he squirmed uncomfortably whenever one of the teleworkers idly caught his eye. A woman chuckled. He sank in his seat, generating a list of reasons she might be laughing at him.


    At least all the cute animals on the walls wouldn''t judge him, but some of them didn''t half stare.


    "You got his number?" said Faust.


    Connie nodded, beaming. The light from the chandeliers caught her face in an idyllic way, and even though he''d seen the work she''d put in, he couldn''t shake the illusion that she''d stepped out of a masterwork watercolour painting, and he felt inadequate.


    She placed her phone ¡ª latest model ¡ª on the table as it projected a dial tone above the din. Nobody picked up. She rocked back and forth in her chair impatiently, and then:


    "You''ve reached the mailbox of Alan MacCain. Leave a message at yer peril!"


    "Man," she said. "Yeah, this is Connie from Barden Fleet, you''ve booked me for eleven and there''s a problem, could you call me back? Uh, also, your life is in great danger so you probably want to do it sooner rather than¡ª"


    "Thanks for yer message."


    Click. Connie immediately redialed.


    "You''ve reached the mailbox of Alan MacCain..."


    "For fuck''s sake," she said. "I get the feeling this guy isn''t going to get back to us."


    Faust shrugged. "You''ll see him this evening, right? We can bombard him with all the questions you like after you pick him up."


    "If this is the day he dies, and I meet him at eleven... do you reckon that leaves us much time for a chat? Hell no. The guy''s gonna have to try a lot harder if he wants to throw ME off his trail."


    She dug an impossibly small, impossibly expensive laptop out of her handbag, propped it up next to the salt shaker, and had it online before Faust could even blink. What was it like to have so much nice stuff? To make matters worse, she opened up her profile and idly pointed at a friend count in the tens of thousands.


    He was beginning to feel like a footman, and he berated himself for thinking the two of them could ever have been friends. They came from different worlds.


    "The thing about mutual friends," Connie was saying, "Is if you know enough people in Barden City, you can access pretty much anybody''s profile anyway. Look, here''s Haralda Gunmetal."


    Faust blinked at her profile picture. It was... imposing.


    Connie said, "Damn, girl. Not many people set the camera on the floor when they take their selfies."


    He would have liked to grin and banter around, but even the ''Deputy Head of Barden City Primary School'' had 500 friends ¡ª mostly family, coworkers, and parents, as well as a handful of people who read her book reviews.


    "Let''s see if I can''t find you, buddy," she said, typing only his first name in. "One result. Nice pic!"


    "Thanks," he mumbled, storm clouds growing above his head.


    She clicked around a bit, but he''d set pretty much everything ¡ª occupation, education, photos ¡ª to private. Nobody needed to know he only had 10 friends.


    "Aw," she said, leaning in. "I was hoping to see what kinda music you liked."The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    "I don''t know," he said, drawing back. "Niche stuff."


    "Try me!"


    Some dickhead arrived with a frappuccino and an espresso. Faust jammed the straw in his mouth. While it was refreshingly cool, it tasted about as sweet as licking out an entire jar of honey. He sucked on his teeth, grimacing.


    "So," he said, "You were about to use your network of informants to... inform you on Alan MacCain."


    "You liked that song I played earlier, right?" she said. "Tin Tin Out? Nineties breakbeat?"


    He sighed and nodded. Why did she have to like the same stuff as him? The cooler he found her, the more he resented her.


    "Everything But The Girl?" she asked.


    He sighed and nodded.


    "Artful Dodger?"


    He sighed and nodded. "Can we get back to being detectives now?"


    She downed her espresso, rippling with energy, and said, "Come on man, this is mad, I''ve never met anyone who was into anything other than pop, rap or classic rock. Let me have my moment!"


    "Even among your legions of friends?"


    "Well¡ª"


    He reached for the laptop and scrolled down the list of people she knew. It was like being back on the street again, swamped by the crowd. Before she could snatch it back, he typed in Alan MacCain and found the profile. Sure enough, they somehow shared a mutual friend.


    ALAN MACCAIN


    SYSTEMS ADMINISTRATOR AT BARDEN IT SOLUTIONS


    MARRIED TO LISA MACCAIN


    LIVES IN BARDEN CITY


    Faust scrolled through a few photos. MacCain certainly looked like he worked in IT, with the balding middle-aged chubbiness, poorly ironed shirts, insistence on wearing jeans and cargo shorts, and the fact that even in pictures with his wife he was hover-handing. This was someone he felt more comfortable comparing himself to.


    "This is the guy that''s trying to kill us?" he asked. "He looks a bit... meek."


    "Faust, you''re also trying to kill us," she said, smile evaporating. "Alright, I''ll try to write him a message."


    While she was writing, the dickhead returned to place two steaming plates of food in front of them. Faust''s eyes widened at what he''d got himself into ¡ª the plate was wider than his stomach, and absolutely stacked with beans, mushrooms, eggs, sausages, bacon, hash browns, toast...


    "The fullest English breakfast we provide, sir," said the waiter, bowing.


    "Who do you think you are? Jesus?" asked Faust. "Trying to feed the 5,000, are we?"


    "No, sir," said the waiter. "Just you."


    The waiter harrumphed and added, "Does sir not find this amenable? Would he prefer a larger portion?"


    In reply, Faust brandished a fork, pierced a sausage, making the juices spill out and over, and then he shoved the whole thing in his mouth. His taste buds exploded with salty, fatty, gristly goodness. He speared another, smeared it around in the bean sauce, and made it disappear.


    "Very good, sir," said the waiter, and left.


    "Damn, MacCain''s not got his read receipts on," said Connie, distractedly hoovering up some egg. "You''d think someone who works in IT would be more connected."


    Something popped up on his timeline, and after being overwhelmed by the greasy umami of a mushroom, Faust pointed it out.


    "What''s that?" he asked. "Some kind of update?"


    "Oh my god," she said. "I didn''t even see that. Man, this is brilliant! The guy checks in everywhere he goes."


    Indeed, scrolling down was a near endless procession of places that Alan MacCain had visited. Looked like it updated every hour, and it had started years ago.


    Connie stood up, ramming her chair into the man behind her.


    "We''ve gotta go, now! He''s just checked into the public library. Let''s go and catch him."


    In response, Faust fished the remote out of his pocket and pressed the pause button.


    The cafe grew silent. The patrons froze in mid sip; the waiters got stuck where they were walking between the tables. Outside, the cars stopped in the street; birds hung in the air. Forget about the animals on the walls ¡ª this moment on this day, 10:59, had been taxidermied. For Faust, this was absolute heaven.


    "Oh yeah," said Connie, waving a hand in front of a waitress'' face.


    "Fuck, that''s cool," said Faust. He held down the button on the communication tile, and said, "Eirlys, the remote is fucking cool."


    Eirlys'' flat voice resonated from the speakers: "Thanks."


    If she were proud, she didn''t sound it.


    Faust motioned for Connie to sit back down, and then spooned a platoon of beans onto a slice of toast before crunching down on it. She joined him and they ate in tense silence ¡ª while she seemed completely hyped up, he felt like trying to find further points they had in common would amount to self-flagellation.


    Time ceased to have meaning. There was only the monumental task of shovelling as much food into his face as possible while trying not to get any of it in his beard. At one point, he looked up, and Connie had finished, watching him with her arms folded and mouth agape.


    After eons, he cleaned his plate. He patted his belly, feeling as if he had suddenly become eight months pregnant.


    "Are you," said Connie, "Are you okay?"


    He wiped his mouth with his hand. "The last thing I ate was a handful of peanuts. Before that it was a sandwich for lunch yesterday."


    Connie went through the man-behind-her''s wallet and took out ¡ê40 to put on the table before she slipped it back into his pocket.


    When he shook his head, she said, "What?"


    "You could literally become a land baron, and you''re pickpocketing?"


    "Yeah, but this guy was on the phone to his accountant asking how he could dodge more tax. I¡¯m Robin Hood here, Faust," she said, as if that were a sufficient explanation.


    He shrugged. Far be it from him to judge.


    They stepped out into the dead, frozen city, and headed for the library.

 3.5

    <div>


    ¡ª Layer 5. The foothills were brushed with heather, rivers carved their way through valleys, buzzing with insects, and the mountain range cut into the sky. Eirlys and Saheel followed a gravel path as it wound along a ridge. From here, they could see verdant wilderness for miles.


    ¡ª Eirlys slipped into a flow state of putting one foot in front of another, the comforting weight of her rucksack bobbing up and down, letting the wind and sun and birdsong swirl around her, occasionally holding up a map to jot down some notes. Everything she needed, she carried. All that was left was the beautiful simplicity of following the path.


    ¡ª Judging by what was in her rucksack, she was near the middle of a weeklong hike in Haden''s Seat. The guide hadn''t sold too well, she recalled. She certainly didn''t remember coming across anyone on the walk.


    ¡ª She loved her job.


    ¡ª Next to her was Saheel, panting and sweating. His black robe caught the sun like a solar panel, and she could feel the heat coming off him. He looked rather dapper in the camo sunhat she''d given him, like a well-to-do uncle.


    ¡ª Well, they''d been going uphill for an hour, and the path was brushing up against a forest now, so maybe he could use a break. Eirlys had no doubt she''d spent today marching militarily, probably only stopping to cook dinner and set up a tent, but figuring out who she''d killed was going to be a mental challenge, not a physical one.


    Once they''d come adjacent to the treeline, and they were graced by shade, Eirlys said, "Let''s stop and rest here."


    "Oof," said Saheel, clasping his knees. "Thanks, sister. I''ll be honest with you, I don''t really get much exercise back in Sandbank. It''s too hot over there to go on walks like this."


    "Here''s a boulder we can sit on." She slung off her rucksack and sat on the dirt, pressing her sweaty back against the cool stone. The only thing more refreshing would have been to swim in a river, but Eirlys would only ever do that alone.


    Saheel chose to perch awkwardly on the boulder, and he kept shuffling around it, trying to find a spot that didn''t dig into his butt. Then he shot his Holy Water Pistol into his mouth and hair.


    ¡ª It didn''t seem possible for it to run out of water. Could that be exploitable?


    ¡ª She made a note of the boulder in her journal. The conifers here threw up their needles to blot out the sun during noon, making for a perfect rest stop. The air was thick with phytoncides, a refreshingly earthy, woody perfume.


    "So," said Saheel. "Did you come up with any more ideas about who the American woman could be? I''ve been looking out for her, but it''s clear we''re smack bang in the middle of nowhere."


    Eirlys shook her head. "We''ll just have to keep an eye out."


    "How often do you do these walks? You''re doing this for a book, right?"


    "We get one out every quarter. They have a team looking out for potential routes, and then they send me out to make sure they''re a) traversable and b) quiet."


    Saheel smiled, watching a bumble bee pottering around a tuft of heather. "And do you get a lot of people buying them? I suppose you must do, if they can afford to send you out here."


    "Enough to get complaints that the routes are too busy. A lot of people don''t have the confidence to just go out into the wilderness. Look," she said, gently sending in her finger to stroke the bumblebee. It sat there, docile, and she appreciated its fuzziness.Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    "I didn''t know you could do that," he said, leaning over to stroke a different one, impressing Eirlys by how careful he was in his approach.


    "Just watch they don''t put their arms up," she said, but they didn''t, and then they buzzed off down the mountainside.


    ¡ª Time to get serious. She got the remote out of her rucksack, and pressed pause.


    ¡ª Everything stopped. The distant meadows looked strange without the wind ruffling them. The silence was uncanny, but while it was ''fucking cool'', as Faust had said, it didn''t represent much utility.


    ¡ª But that was just its intended use. Eirlys was far more proud of managing to pass a motion that had given them a weapon of absolute destruction. She''d tricked the mound into giving her the keys to the castle.


    "Running some experiments, sister?" asked Saheel. "The breeze was nice and cooling, and I wouldn''t mind having it back."


    ¡ª Eirlys pressed play. She got out her Swiss Army Knife, found the serrated blade and sawed a branch off one of the trees about the length and thickness of a baseball bat.


    ¡ª The stick didn''t break apart when she smashed it against the trunk, so hopefully it would be strong enough.


    "What are you up to?" asked Saheel, pushing himself onto his feet. "Let me know if I can help."


    "Let''s play baseball, Saheel. Can you find a rock about the size of one?"


    ¡ª It didn''t take him long. He brought her two candidates.


    "This one''s rounder, but it''s heavy," he said. "The other one''s lighter but less aerodynamic. Which would you prefer?"


    "The heavier one. Come over here." She walked a little down the path to a point where one side was a sheer drop and the other was a solid wall of rock.


    "Don''t slip," said Saheel, tossing the stone from one hand to another. "I''ll throw it underarm, alright? I don''t want to ''cast the first stone'' on you. But sister, are you left handed? Why aren''t you trying to hit it out over the drop?"


    "I want to hit the wall." She gripped the stick in her right hand and held up the remote in her left, her thumb over the pause button.


    "You ready?" he asked.


    "Go."


    He drew his arm back, then followed through in a perfect arc, throwing the stone into a range where it would be an easy hit. But instead of swinging, she pointed at it and paused it. It floated there, midair, entirely divorced from gravity.


    "Okay, then." Saheel walked over, crunching gravel under his boots. "I guess that gives you enough time to get infinite home runs? But then, the bowler could just walk over and pluck it out the air..."


    "A question for you," said Eirlys. "Currently no forces are acting on the rock. When I unpause it, what''s going to happen?"


    "I suppose it will fall as normal."


    She motioned for him to stand back, then put all her body weight into swinging at the stone with the stick. For a brief moment, it dislodged towards the cliff face, but as soon as the stick stopped touching it, it froze again.


    "What about now?" she said. "What direction will it go?"


    "Down and towards the rock face."


    She hit it again. And again. And again. Each time, the stick only pushed it slightly.


    "What about now?"


    "We should get out of the way if you''re going to unpause it. It''ll probably bounce off the rock at considerable speed and break a bone."


    She nodded. "Get out of the way, then. Have a drink of water. There''s some dried bread in my rucksack. I''ll call you over when I''m ready."


    "I see," said Saheel. "The death of a thousand cuts. We studied a little mysticism at uni. It''s an ancient Chinese torture method. Individually, you might not bleed a lot, but when everything adds up together, you get an incredible effect."


    "Yes. Do you know how many bouncy balls you''d need to stack on top of each other, so that when they all bounced off each other, they''d go as high as the moon?"


    "Normal bouncy balls?"


    "Assuming we start off with a large ball, and each is smaller than the last so that they can be placed to bounce up vertically."


    "Lord knows," he said. "Hundreds."


    "Seven," she said.


    With that, he went back to sit on the boulder and stroke more bumblebees while she swung at the stone with all her might, nudging it a millimeter towards the wall with each blow. Eventually, she got it so close to the rock face that hitting it any further would risk adding more friction from the stick.


    ¡ª It only took half an hour, and it looked so innocuous, practically invisible.


    She called Saheel back over, and standing at a safe distance while he kneeled down to pray, she pointed at the stone and pressed play.


    ¡ª The noise was disappointing, like a vacuum accidentally sucking up a sock. One WHOOP, a cloud of dust, and the stone was gone.


    They crept down to investigate the hole. The stone had carved a clean pipeway through the wall as far as the eye could see, and when Eirlys strained, she could just about see a pinprick of light on the other side, possibly over a mile away.


    ¡ª She hadn¡¯t lost a hundred hours of her life speedrunning Breath of the Wild for nothing, then.


    "I am become death, destroyer of worlds." Saheel wiped his brow, shivering despite the heat.


    "Let''s do it again," said Eirlys. "Over the valley, this time."

 3.6

    <div>


    In the end, they made a competition of it ¡ª Eirlys cut Saheel a branch while he combed the path for a couple of suitable stones. This time, he found ones that were arrow shaped, reasoning the flatter surface area would reduce air resistance.


    With that done, they climbed a short way until they reached an outcropping that overlooked the whole of Haden¡¯s Seat. It was the kind of view he could have spent a week just drinking in, a fractal of little details. His gaze followed a stream as it spilled out the mountainside and barged its way through the heathland, leaving gorges in its wake as it widened and widened and hit the horizon. Clouds trailed enormous shadows behind them, flanked by birds.


    "We¡¯ll aim for that tree." Eirlys pointed as she peered through binoculars.


    He squinted at a smudge maybe five miles away. "I think I¡¯d need my other glasses to see that, sister, but alright. May the best player win."


    "I don¡¯t intend to lose. Does half an hour sound okay?"


    He nodded, and threw up his stone, pausing it as it came back down in front of him. Then he shifted to the side, trying not to notice the shingle he was cascading down the cliffside ¡ª heaven forbid either of them should slip here ¡ª and raised his branch.


    A couple of meters to his left, Eirlys did the same.


    While it did send waves of exertion coursing through Saheel¡¯s upper body, it did not exactly make for a spectator sport. It would have been like watching someone doing push ups. Regardless, he gave it his all. It was a little scary that he discovered how much harder he could swing when he pretended it was Sean, the wounds still raw from twenty years ago ¡ª those weren¡¯t exactly Christian thoughts.


    After his phone¡¯s timer rang out, Saheel fell back on his arse. His arms were burning, unused to labour. He doused himself with the Holy Water Pistol and drank heartily.


    Eirlys took a gulp from a more conventional flask. "Are you hanging in there?"


    "Don¡¯t worry about me," wheezed Saheel. "It¡¯s not as if I do this every day¡­ or like I go to the gym¡­"


    "Okay," she said. "Tell me if it¡¯s too much. It¡¯s just, with Greer. I don¡¯t want that to happen again."


    She said it so woodenly that Saheel almost chuckled, but he was starting to adapt to the black hole that was her emotional expression. It reminded him of this old crone who came to his services, always scowling, but unlike the others who just wanted to chat, she actually listened and believed.


    "Thank you, sister," he said. "That¡¯s really good of you to say. Now, shall we stand back a little and find out who¡¯s won this?"


    She nodded, and they got as far towards the mountain as they could on the outcropping.


    "The shape made it a little more difficult to hit," said Eirlys, adjusting the focus on her binoculars. "But without solid rock to slow it down, I wonder how far it¡¯ll go."


    They raised their remotes, counted down from three, and pressed play.


    WHOOMPH, went the stones, deafeningly loudly, and then they disappeared, that is to say, they were past the horizon before Saheel¡¯s eyes could report back to his brain.


    "God forgive us." He took off the sunhat. "I think we both made it past that tree."This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.


    "Call it a draw, then," said Eirlys, so they did.


    They decided their objective should be to move on and set up camp by a stream, so that they could spend the rest of the day preparing two more superweapons. Hopefully along the way they¡¯d be able to figure out how the American woman came into it.


    They stopped at the peak of the mountain to find the best way down on the map, and Eirlys said, "Hmmm. That¡¯s odd."


    "Yes?"


    "The light in the tunnel that we made with the first stone, how far along would you say it was?"


    Saheel rubbed his eyes. His legs were aching, and he didn¡¯t even have to carry anything, other than his beer belly.


    "Maybe a mile or so?" he said. "There¡¯s nothing to say that¡¯s where the rock stopped, though. For all we know, it could still be flying.¡±


    She pointed to the ground, then double-checked the map. "Well, that light, it¡¯s around here. More or less. Except for the fact that it¡¯s a solid mountain, and there¡¯s no way any light could be poking in."


    "Are you saying it wasn¡¯t daylight, sister?"


    "I¡¯m saying I don¡¯t know. But it certainly lines up with our ambitions."


    They clambered down the mountain  in thought, and had to cross a narrow ridge ¡ª naturally with a sheer drop either way ¡ª to get to the next one. The few times he tried to say anything to Eirlys, she didn¡¯t respond, and he realised she was pretty much dead to the world. So he got to thinking, trying to distract himself from the fact that if he wobbled too much either way he¡¯d end up breaking every bone in his body.


    "The American has to be another hiker, right?" he said. "I don¡¯t want to sound rude, but you seem to get awfully lost in thought. Could it be that you somehow passed her by when she needed a Good Samaritan?"


    Eirlys stopped, and hung her head in a way that looked kind of sad.


    "Yeah, maybe," she said.


    "Don¡¯t worry, sister," he smiled in the way that priests have to. "I¡¯ll keep an eye out."


    She nodded, and they continued. The landscape blurred together as the hours dragged on, the sun reaching its peak and gliding back down. Saheel saw many breathtaking things, but he was quickly discovering there was only so much you could take in before it became normal. What he didn¡¯t see or hear was anybody who needed rescuing.


    He shivered ¡ª they were still high on the mountain range, and fog was rolling in. It slithered up to them unassumingly, cutting off a meter every ten minutes, until they suddenly couldn¡¯t see five steps in front of them.


    They stopped, and Eirlys checked her compass with the map.


    "Ah, I¡¯m starting to remember this, now," she said, showing him. "The fog rolled in, so I cut across the top of the mountain rather than taking the scenic route. We¡¯ll probably have to do the same."


    Saheel checked the remote, and sure enough, the arrow coming out of it pointed towards the mountain, wanting them to go back up and climb even more.


    Half out of exhaustion, he said, "The scenic route around is flat, is it?"


    "Yes,¡¯ she said. "It¡¯s ultimately the one we included in the book as the main route. We may have to scale a cliff or two on my detour."


    "Well that¡¯s got to be it!" he said. "Maybe the American woman¡¯s blowing an SOS signal, or something, and you would have come across her, but you got turned around by the fog!"


    "And she holds me responsible for that?" she asked.


    "I don¡¯t know," said Saheel. He didn¡¯t want her to see him about to keel over with exhaustion, and he sure wasn¡¯t about to complain ¡ª but he could certainly redirect. All he wanted to do right now was lie down. He prayed for strength.


    "I think it¡¯s worth us taking a look," he said. "Just on the off-chance."


    She studied him up and down, face impassive, and then she said, "I asked you to tell me if you were feeling tired."


    "I¡¯m not tired," he panted. "I¡¯m just¡­"


    "It¡¯s okay," she said. "We can go round the ridge, but it¡¯ll take longer, and you need to stick as close to the wall as possible."


    "You don¡¯t think I haven¡¯t been doing that all day?" he said.


    They set off round the mountain, and as the fog got thicker, Saheel took to holding onto Eirlys¡¯ rucksack so he didn¡¯t lose her while he watched where he was stepping. He couldn¡¯t even see the drop that was a couple feet to his left.


    "Hello?" he bellowed. "Anybody out there?"


    But the only thing that came back was the echo of his voice, muffled by fog. The birds had long stopped chirping, and the wind grew stagnant.


    He yelped as his foot dislodged a rock and nearly went tumbling, but he managed to recover.


    "Are you okay?" asked Eirlys. "Do you want to stop?"


    "There¡¯s somebody out there who needs our help," said Saheel. "We can¡¯t afford to stop."


    "I¡¯m serious," said Eirlys, "Don¡¯t push your¡ªshit!"


    Saheel had stepped onto a landslide and loosened a rock that just so happened to be holding everything together. Eirlys¡¯ mountain climbing reflexes kicked in and she leapt to the side, scrabbling for handholds in the cliff. As soon as she secured herself, she reached out for him ¡ª but he wasn¡¯t so adept; the floor crumbled to pieces under him, he was swept away with the incredible current of loose stones, cresting a ridge, and then he plummeted.


    His stomach migrated to his throat, and he screamed. In that brief moment before he hit the ground, he realised exactly how Eirlys had sent the American to her death.

 3.9 — VOTING OPEN

    Haralda¡¯s world made it hard for Kari to be Kari.


    First, the teacher showed her a tiled cupboard with a toilet and a glass box that had some kind of faucet connected to a handle. Carefully ordered jars of a viscous fluorescent liquid sat next to the drain. Towels were folded and stacked on a counter.


    "Take as long as you need to get clean, my dear," said Haralda, smiling as she shut the door.


    A PUZZLE, whispered the Djinn. SHE IS TESTING US.


    But that was just a reflex. Kari whispering to herself. She laid the knife on the toilet and wriggled out of her sack. The next twenty minutes were agony ¡ª no matter what she tried, pulling this way and that on the handle, the water came out ice cold, and with no soap to scrub herself down with, the only way she could get the dirt off was friction. When she stepped out, shuddering into the towel, her skin had turned red and raw, and she was still caked in grime, her hair matted.


    Kari missed her bucket and her bar of soap. She reached for the knife as she stepped out of the bathroom, towel knotted around her, ready for things to get ugly.


    Haralda sat on the counter top of her kitchenette, scratching notes onto the clipboard shield. The noise made her look up.


    Her face fell. "What have you been doing in there? Look at you, you¡¯re still filthy! Didn¡¯t you use any shampoo?"


    Kari scurried away and backed under a table, flicking the Djinn back and forth. She¡¯d done something wrong. She was in trouble. She had to protect herself.


    But Haralda walked past her into the bathroom and said, "It¡¯s freezing in here! The shower¡¯s not even on!"


    More admonishments. Kari knew what would come after. She grabbed the table¡¯s legs and lifted it up to check the weight. It was far too light, but if Haralda approached, she could burst out, go for the jugular¡­


    Suddenly, they were both standing back on the bed next to the elevator. Kari shrieked, vulnerable in the open. Haralda was holding the remote, and managed to lift her shield just in time to parry the knife sent her way.


    "I¡¯m sorry," said Haralda.


    Kari grabbed the centre of the shield and tried to twist it away, but the woman twice her size held it firm, and then her ears kicked in and she realised what Haralda had said.


    "What?" said Kari. It was hard to get used to hearing a little girl¡¯s voice come out, rather than a demonic well of power.


    Haralda lowered the shield. "You must be livid that I didn¡¯t explain how the shower works, so allow me to apologise. It¡¯s supposed to come out warm. I have some lovely scented soaps as well, mostly citrus fruits, that you¡¯d be very welcome to use."


    "Shower?" asked Kari, puzzled. She checked the window, and it wasn¡¯t raining. There were strange metal wagons rolling along the street, but no slaves were pushing them.


    "Well, yes," said Haralda, leading her back to the torture chamber. The teacher pulled a string that hung from the ceiling, and it clicked, and then she turned the handle on the faucet to make hot water flow out. The glass box began to steam up. Kari held a hand under the stream, finding it to be pleasantly warm.


    The next wonder: Haralda picked up the jar containing a thick green liquid, popped the cap off with a fingernail, and held it up to Kari¡¯s nose to smell. She pictured herself lying under a lime tree in the orchards.Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.


    "Perfume," said Kari. She¡¯d never been allowed to wear perfume, and half of her was repulsed. The lady of the manor had smelled like that when she was administering lashings with the whip. It stank of power.


    "Not quite perfume," said Haralda, and she actually smiled encouragingly as she explained. "It¡¯s soap. You squeeze the bottle ¡ª like this ¡ª and rub it around your hands, and then you can lather it over your body to get out the dirt. This one here is shampoo, and you put it in your hair after you¡¯ve rinsed it. Just make sure to rinse it off afterwards."


    Kari smelled the shampoo, and grinned at the milky aroma. She tried to read the bottle, and it took her quite a while, but eventually she said, "Coconut."


    "Any questions?" asked Haralda. Kari got the vague sense that, in the same way she¡¯d draped herself with the Djinn, Haralda was wearing some kind of teacherly persona to make herself more approachable.


    "If I use these products, will they make me a noble?" Kari asked.


    "Am I a noble?" said Haralda, and Kari caught the scent of the lime on her.


    She was safe, then. If Haralda could use it and not become a noble, then there was no risk to her, either.


    Once alone, she dropped the towel and leapt into the warm water, letting it run over her like royalty. Then she squeezed a great big dollop of the soap into her hands and giggled at all the bubbles springing out. Unlike before, it was easy to get clean, the right sort of clean ¡ª not an impure curse that bleached the history of scars off her skin ¡ª but even though she was done, she didn¡¯t want to get out. She watched in amazement as her fingers wrinkled up. Eventually, the hot water ran out, and she leapt to turn it off before it got icy cold.


    She wiped the condensation off the mirror and stared at her now clean face. The only trace of Djinn left on it lay behind her eyes, but she was okay with that. It would be there for when she needed it.


    Haralda brought her a school uniform and brushed her hair gently after Kari changed into it ¡ª if she couldn¡¯t pull herself away from the mirror before, now she was glued to it. There she was, in a white polo and trousers, looking like a normal girl save for, well, the scars and the knife hanging out of her pocket.


    She pointed at herself and said, "That¡¯s me?"


    She ran fingers through her hair, and it felt so weirdly smooth, and it smelled heavenly.


    "A pretty young lady, ready for her first day of school," declared Haralda, then looked at the clock and pressed rewind on the remote again.


    "What is school?" asked Kari, blushing. ¡°Is it like work?¡± After that shower, she didn¡¯t want to go and dust old cabinets. In fact, she didn¡¯t want to step near any kind of dirt ever again.


    "It¡¯s a place where you learn about the world with other children," said Haralda. "There¡¯s nothing more important to do as a child than learn about the world."


    Needless to say, Kari was awestruck. Was this even a world she could fit into?


    They had breakfast, but Kari couldn¡¯t stomach the rich milky-honey-oat mix that Haralda heated up in a strange humming appliance, and chose instead to subsist on a couple of plain slices of seeded bread. Seeds ¡ª what a treat!


    After they¡¯d finished, Haralda rewinded again,to "save on washing up", and they walked down a set of metal stairs to the street level, where those wagons were flying past.


    Kari craned her neck to look up at the buildings. There were so many windows, and Haralda had told her that behind each one lived a different person. She was probably lying.


    The teacher walked up to a blue wagon and twisted a key into it, making it click. She put her clipboard shield in a compartment at the back, then swung open one of the doors for Kari to get in.


    Heart thumping in her chest, Kari sat inside, slipping around on the leather seat as the woman drew some sort of harness across her shoulder and clicked it into place.


    "This is my car," said Haralda, slotting the key into a special hole below the wheel.


    The car shuddered into life, making Kari jump.


    "Djinn," said Kari, gripping the door. "Animated by an evil spirit."


    "Not quite." Haralda turned the wheel and pressed down on her foot.


    Kari leaned back in her seat, pressing herself against the headrest, unbelieving as the world behind the glass slid around and reoriented itself. The car roared like an untamed beast, and Kari watched Haralda¡¯s hands fearfully, scared that she¡¯d lose her grip on it and the car would stampede off through the streets. She began to feel queasy.


    To keep her occupied, Haralda tried to explain the basics of a combustion engine, but it was too technical, and Kari instead began to notice a growing number of children on the side of the road. Soon, they stopped outside a compound of buildings, and Kari was awestruck by how many young people streamed in, laughing and talking among themselves, all carrying a satchel or rucksack.


    "This is Barden City School," said Haralda. "And I¡¯ve got to find out how I killed someone here. We¡¯ll fit you into a class and hopefully you¡¯ll be able to make a lot of new friends. Doesn¡¯t that sound nice, young lady?"


    There were so many of them, smiling like that, and some of them were jostling each other around, just like Eduard and Gerson and Joe did¡­


    She saw fists being raised, anger on faces, heard shouting, even some girls screaming¡­


    NO, yelled Kari, as the Djinn. She tore Haralda¡¯s hand away from the door and pressed the knife to her throat.


    I¡¯M NOT GOING TO SCHOOL.

 &#x1F480; 4 &#x1F480;

    <div>


    ¡ª Rewind. Dawn.


    ¡ª Sunlight rolled over the peaks and down the foothills.


    ¡ª They were back down in the valley, encircled by heather, wind ruffling the tent. The door to the lift jutted out of a boulder.


    ¡ª Saheel, lay back, sinking into the moss, eyes shut tight, wincing, but unharmed.


    ¡ª Eirlys had been quick enough. But it was a small victory, and she still felt responsible.


    ¡ª That made three people who''d trusted her to be competent; three people she''d let down.


    ¡ª And then she noticed the number out of her hand, glowing crimson.


    "Very well," she said.


    ¡ª First, she touched the remote to the number and pressed pause. It kept jumping up in that sporadic, anxiety inducing manner.


    ¡ª Next, she tried pausing herself. But that didn''t work, either.


    Saheel was shuddering with adrenaline, but once he got up and saw her, he stopped dead.


    "Oh no, sister," he said. He tried to pause the counter with the remote.


    "It''s not going to work." She unstrapped her communication tile and let it fall into a gorse bush.Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.


    "What are you doing?" he said. "We need to force a timeskip, and now! Aren''t you going to call the others?"


    "They''d never agree," she said. "And if the flesh mound blocked it, we''d just be making it stronger."


    "But... but..."


    "I don''t deserve it, priest," she said, and went to sit inside her tent. She zipped up the entrance, then used the Glue Gun to seal it. Her temporary home had already caught the sun ¡ª the warmth comforted her, like going back to the womb.


    ¡ª It would make a fine grave.


    Saheel yanked on the zip, trying to unstick it, but it had already glued fast. Instead, his silhouette crouched next to her, only a thin layer of fabric between them.


    ¡ª Damn it all. She grabbed a handful of grass and ripped it out of the ground.


    "Eirlys..."


    "Forgive me, father, for I have sinned," she said.


    "No!"


    "I acted negligently, and it resulted in the death of somebody who trusted me to guide her¡ª"


    "There was no way you could have known," he said. "At worst, that''s only manslaughter..."


    "Let me confess," she said. "Please."


    "Everybody makes mistakes. The American woman took her own risks in coming out here. You can''t say it''s a sin to not be perfect. Don''t give up just yet. I''m begging you."


    "Saheel," she mumbled. "Excuses are the privilege of the living. What''s done can''t be undone. I''m responsible. Now, I demand my absolution!"


    Saheel ripped open the tent, and the sun bathed Eirlys in blinding light. "What am I going to do without you, sister? You''re the one that''s been coming up with all the plans ¡ª lord, you just saved my life! We said we''d escape together! I can''t believe you''re just giving up!"


    Eirlys couldn''t meet his eyes. "It''s as Kari said. I''m condemned. I wasn''t competent enough. It''s only right to trade my life for hers."


    He grabbed her, and lifted her through the hole. "You must have something. Some secret weapon. A way to smash through the fourth wall and get out of here right now! Don''t you get it ¡ª the only reason we''ve made it this far is because of you!"


    ¡ª And Eirlys laughed. The hilarity spread throughout her body until she threw her head back in his arms, whooping, her shouts echoing for miles around.


    ¡ª He held her, uncomprehending.


    "Sorry," she said. "Even in my final moments, I wasn''t strong enough."


    "Just what am I supposed to do?"


    She smiled. "Stay here and charge up a rock until you get the wordcount back. Then go and come to terms with your murder, in a way that I couldn''t. You''re stronger than you think, Saheel. Trust your own judgment. Now, won''t you read me my Last Rites?"


    ¡ª But it was too late. She passed away in his arms.

 Interlude

    <div>


    Voting Results</a>


    A: Hello and welcome to ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die,¡¯ the talk show for dead people, by dead people! I¡¯m your host Alexa Despacito, and I¡¯m anything but slow, thank you for asking. Here with me tonight is Eirlys Pritchard! How are you feeling tonight, Eirlys?


    E: Dead. And so balance is restored.


    A: Uh¡­ me too!


    E: Then there¡¯s only one thing left to resolve. Have you seen Greer?


    A: Oh, she¡¯s around somewhere, I¡¯m sure of it. Rumour has it she¡¯s been spending her time in the Gigabird section, no matter how many people tell her that skeletons don¡¯t have the surface area to fly.


    E: Thank you for the information. Well, goodbye, Alexa Despacito.


    A: Hey, hey! Hang about! This is your exit interview we¡¯re holding here! You¡¯re a serious type, aren¡¯t you? Just think of me as Styx¡­ gotta tell your story if you want to cross!


    E: Hmm. Time no longer needs to be rationed. What do you want to know?


    A: We¡¯re at the halfway point now. How do you feel about being the fourth to die?


    E: I¡¯m glad I was able to find out why I had to die. Maybe I hadn¡¯t realised how heavy a weight I was carrying. Once I¡¯ve apologised to Greer, I¡¯ll be able to rest in peace.


    A: Wow! Well, the Underworld¡¯s a big place, plenty of people to talk to, but not much beyond that. What are you thinking of doing with your afterlife once you¡¯ve settled all your regrets?


    E: It¡¯s a secret.


    A: Come on! Your story or you can¡¯t cross!


    E: I don¡¯t think you have the power you say you do. But, then, that means it¡¯s alright for me to tell you. Actually, some publicity may be helpful.


    A: You¡¯ve more than piqued my interest, Eirlys. If I had a seat, I¡¯d be leaning forward in it.


    E: I¡¯m going to break out of the afterlife.


    A: Oh? That¡¯s¡­ pretty disappointing. Alright, I¡¯ll set you up with a referral to the Rebirthing Guild. I¡¯m sure they¡¯d want to hear your take on the problem. There¡¯s only, what, about twenty quintillion of them?


    E: So it¡¯s a common ambition. But the American Woman is now alive, right?


    A: So I¡¯m told.If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    E: Then there are ways. How exactly does this game work? Is this the only one running? What are the requirements to start one? Is it the only method to become alive again?


    A: Uh oh, ladies and gentlemen. The lady¡¯s trying to worldbuild!


    CROWD: BOO! HISS!


    A: You¡¯ll have plenty of time to figure out all of that by yourself, especially if you spend your time around the misery guts in the Guild. Anyway, we¡¯ve got some reader mail for you. Would you like to hear it?


    E: I¡¯ll leave the past in the past. Once I¡¯ve atoned for the mistakes in my life, I¡¯m not going to worry about them. I already know I wasn¡¯t strong enough.


    A: Some of them wrote some very nice things, actually! Are you sure you don¡¯t want to kick your afterlife off with a little goodwill?


    E: You have five minutes to make your case.


    A: Well, one reader wrote ¡°I like you too but I need to know your friends'' stories. My apologies lady¡±. What do you make of that?


    E: They¡¯ve got good grammar. Fine. I¡¯ll listen to the rest, assuming there¡¯s not too many. The way that they¡¯ve written it makes it sound like they were obligated to vote. Is that the case? Who are the ¡®readers¡¯?


    CROWD: BOO! HISS!


    A: Deny the worldbuilder! Shun! Shun!


    E: In other words, you don¡¯t know.


    A: After all, I am just a foetus. The next person wrote ¡°Sorry, I''m just way more invested in everyone else''s stories. Enjoy your afterlife!¡±


    E: I would be enjoying it more if I was getting answers to my questions. I don¡¯t like to be kept in the dark.


    A: Here in the Underworld, our chief export is darkness! Better get used to it!


    E: Fine. Enjoy reading your stories, person, and I¡¯ll enjoy my afterlife up until I find a way out of here. Again, an apology ¨C it would make sense if the voters also participated under pain of death.


    A: It would be pretty awful if they were just doing it for fun, wouldn¡¯t it? Next letter: ¡°Your usage of time-stop mechanics were fun to read ... but you weren''t quite gonna get as much development out of finding out how you were responsible for someone''s death.¡±


    E: These are words that can only come from somebody who has never been responsible for someone¡¯s death. I hope, for their sake, that they never have to feel such pain.


    A: We got a little bit of hate-mail, as well. What do you make of ¡°Knowing you have secret plans is far less interesting than knowing what those plans are. You were so worried about being punished for trying to break the rules that you forgot what the rules were¡±?


    E: We figured out early on that playing the game was going to mean balancing audience interest and personal gain. But when the Flesh Mound became involved, and I realised they relied on their subjective knowledge to deny certain votes ¨C the risk was just too great. If this person doesn¡¯t want to accept that, then I don¡¯t care. As I said, it was in another life.


    A: Okay! Who do you want to see die next?


    E: Nobody. And they won¡¯t. They¡¯ll find a path out before you can get them all. I¡¯m not sure exactly what that initial time-stone triggered, but it did something. They¡¯ll break through. Mark my words.


    A: Okay, but let¡¯s just say it all goes horribly wrong ¨C who would you want to see eventually win it?


    E: Saheel. And I think he¡¯ll be able to once he realises how strong he really is. Without him to shape my ideas, I wouldn¡¯t have got nearly as far as I had. He helped me to find out why I was condemned. So for that, I will always be grateful.


    A: I can reveal that the person with the least votes was Constance, with 8.7% of the vote share ¨C that¡¯s Connie, for you people who seem to be complaining that you can¡¯t remember who she is!


    E: The readers didn¡¯t know who we were from the start?


    A: What do I know? I¡¯m just a foetus. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, that¡¯s all we¡¯ve got time for tonight. I¡¯ve been Alexa Despacito, this was my guest Eirlys Pritchard, and this has been ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die!¡¯ See you in a week!


    A: Okay, the camera¡¯s off. Let me fill you in.

 4.1

    <main>


    <div>


    <div>


    Many children have pulled the ¡®I know we¡¯ve just driven to school but I¡¯m not going¡¯ card, but Kari was probably the first to enforce the argument with a knife. She was pressing hard, for a child, and Haralda¡¯s neck stung as the blade bit in. A trickle of blood ran down onto her cardigan.


    Slowly, Haralda dabbed a finger in the blood and held it up to show Kari.


    "You¡¯re hurting me," she said. "If you press any harder, you¡¯re going to kill me."


    I DON¡¯T CARE, croaked Kari, her eyes glassed over. I¡¯M NOT GOING TO SCHOOL.


    Haralda sighed. "This is why children shouldn¡¯t play with knives. I¡¯m not trying to patronise you, young lady, but if you don¡¯t like the idea of other people hurting you, why are you hurting me?"


    YOU¡¯RE HURTING ME! Kari¡¯s eyes flashed with anger. PROPOSING TO SEND ME TO THIS INTERNMENT CAMP, WHERE I SHALL DIE AT THE HANDS OF THE INMATES. I WILL NOT GO GENTLE INTO THIS GOOD NIGHT, SCHOOLTEACHER.


    Haralda wondered how the scruffy ten year old could have such an eloquent split personality. But no matter how Kari was trying to dress it up¡­


    "You¡¯re worried about bullies, aren¡¯t you?" asked Haralda. "Don¡¯t worry. There are no bullies in my school. But a bully who¡¯s worried about being bullied is still just a bully. If you want to talk about this like respectable adults, then drop the knife. Otherwise, stand by your principles and kill me."


    Kari pressed even harder. YOU CANNOT TRAP ME WITH YOUR ULTIMATUMS.


    "Actually, young lady, it¡¯s very simple. You kill me and remain the Djinn for the rest of your days, or you put down the knife and become Kari, the pretty schoolgirl with a bright future ahead of her. Oh, and I¡¯m losing blood, so hurry up or time will choose for you."


    Kari lowered the knife, but she didn¡¯t put it away. She cast her gaze out into the playground, where a class of children were running around, giggling.


    I SEE THEM. JOSTLING. HARASSING. EXTORTING. THEY DELIGHT IN TERRORISING EACH OTHER.


    Haralda got a plaster out her glovebox and stuck it over the cut. "They¡¯re playing soldiers. Look, they¡¯re all smiling. It¡¯s good character building."


    PLAYING? THEY DO NOT HAVE INSTRUMENTS.


    "Make-believe," explained Haralda. "We pretend to be someone we¡¯re not, and it teaches us to understand the points of view of others."


    IT IS AN ENFORCED LEARNING TOOL? asked Kari.


    Out on the playground, a girl ran into the group, shouting, "Stop the war! Billy¡¯s dropped his glasses!"


    The English and the Germans scoured the football pitch to find them. After that, they shook hands, got into planes, and proceeded to shoot each other out of the sky.


    "The children get a lot of joy from it," said Haralda. "Instead of looking for people hurting each other, why don¡¯t you try and spot some compassion? Can you see anybody being kind to someone else?"


    Fortuitously, a boy walked past handing out lollipops to all his friends.


    "Okay," whispered Kari, looking down at her lap. "But I still don¡¯t want to go."


    The child seemed to be withering away in her seat. The strange, charged aura of violence evaporated.


    "The way I see it," said Haralda, "The things that frighten us the most are the things we have to do. But you don¡¯t have to go alone. You don¡¯t even have to talk to anyone. Just¡­ come with me, and see what you think. If you don¡¯t like it, you can leave. Does that sound okay? Do you want to try?"


    Kari looked again at the children with a kind of detached wistfulness, and she wiped a tear from her eye. She nodded.


    Haralda discreetly popped the BARDEN TEACHER¡¯S HANDBOOK: TALKING POINTS FOR RELUCTANT STUDENTS back in her skirt pocket. It was all there in the manual, and she would know. She¡¯d written it.


    Kari clung to her sleeve as they marched into reception, to a chorus of ¡®Good morning, Madame Gunmetal¡¯ from the children streaming past. Haralda greeted each one by name. Certain troublesome little boys and girls shied away from her like vampires from garlic, but she said good morning to them anyway, because they knew their days were numbered. A whisper rippled throughout the school:This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    "Did you hear there¡¯s a new student?"


    "I saw her! She came in with Madame Gunmetal!"


    "Is she her daughter?"


    ¡°Why has Madame Gunmetal got a big whiteboard thing on her back?¡±


    Reception was off limits to children ¡ª a quiet space with a fish tank, some chairs, and a counter. The young receptionist, Anton, wore a dress shirt unbuttoned in the Italian style, which was to say he looked like a stripper. The mums had all grumbled about this particular diversity hire until he¡¯d started flirting with them, after which they¡¯d fought so fiercely to pick up each other¡¯s sick kids that they¡¯d had to reorganise it into a lottery system. The man had broken several marriages, and, in a memorable case where he¡¯d slept with both the husband and the wife, saved one.


    "Good morning, Haralda," said Anton, looking up from a book with softcore pornography on the cover. "Ooh, is that a new student?"


    Haralda stared at him until he buttoned up his shirt, put on a tie, and put the book in a drawer. Kari hid behind her.


    "This is my niece, Kari Gunmetal," she said. "We¡¯ll sort the paperwork retroactively. I need something from you, Anton."


    "Ooh, my dear," said Anton, blushing. "I thought you¡¯d never ask!"


    "Behave yourself," she snapped. "Just because we share the same taste in literature does not mean you have job security."


    He nodded, sultry.


    "I¡¯m looking for a French man. Perhaps he¡¯s one of the parents. Perhaps a contractor."


    He raised his eyebrows and winked, breaking out into a shit-eating grin.


    "Well?" she barked. "You¡¯re the administrator, how many French men do we have on record?"


    He tapped something into a computer ¡ª the man had made himself indispensable by automating their entire database to give himself more time to read on the job ¡ª and within seconds, he told her, "We¡¯ve got fifteen French children at the school, and contact details for their parents, as well. If you want my opinion on which dad has the nicest arse¡­ well¡­"


    "Enough!" she snapped, well aware that the arrow on the remote was trying to nudge her away from reception. "If any of them calls the school or comes in, I want to be the first to hear about it. Is that clear?"


    He nodded, seductive. Haralda was disgusted that anyone could find that attractive.


    She took Kari by the hand, and before leaving, turned and said, "Thank you, by the way, for your comments on my review of The Time Traveller¡¯s Mistress. I found your interpretation of Darlington¡¯s character very¡­ well."


    "Any time!" He smiled and went back to his book.


    They marched on through the corridors, where children were waiting for classes to begin. As they walked by, a spell fell over them, and the unruly crowds straightened out into uniform lines, each and every child hailing Madame Gunmetal. The classes further down the corridor heard her name and were in position long before she got to them.


    She swung open the door to the staff room, which she thought of privately as the war room.


    "Thank goodness you¡¯re here," said three different teachers, forming an orderly queue.


    Amy, the Year 3 teacher, was first. "Haralda, we¡¯ve had a lot of children running around during the building at break time, and it¡¯s a health and safety nightmare trying to get them supervised. The rota¡¯s stretched thin as it is, and we can¡¯t spare the staff."


    Haralda flipped to the floorplan of the school on her clipboard, and studied it. There were a lot of different doors into the building from the playground, and it would be impossible to guard all of them.


    She said, "We can¡¯t lock any doors because of fire safety. But I¡¯ll get the caretaker to put traffic cones in front of here, here, and here, and at breaktime I will personally guard the bottleneck and see to it that every child has a good reason for passing through."


    "Thanks, Haralda," said Amy, smiling. "Is this the new student I¡¯ve been hearing about? And what is that on your back?"


    "Your class is waiting for you, Amy."


    "Oh, right, yes," she said, and blustered out the door.


    Next up was Florence, the servile, withering, namby pamby Headteacher. The best thing Haralda could say about her was that she was photogenic.


    "We¡¯ve got a problem with the school dinners," squeaked Florence. "The caterers are saying they haven¡¯t been delivered enough stock, and¡ª"


    "Have you called up the logistics company?" asked Haralda.


    Florence shrank into herself. "Well, no, not yet, I don¡¯t see any reason to jump to conclusions, I mean¡ª"


    "They are receiving the taxpayer¡¯s money to feed our children!" barked Haralda. "You can¡¯t stand idly by while they profiteer. Call them up and demand a new delivery right now. If they don¡¯t want to listen, then we¡¯re calling up Pizza House and sending them the bill. I won¡¯t have our children going hungry."


    "Y-yes," said Florence. "Can I say that if they don¡¯t, then I¡¯ll put you on the line?"


    "Of course, now what are you waiting for? Go!"


    Florence held up the edges of her skirt as she half ran to her office and closed the door. Haralda shook her head ¡ª useless woman, but somehow she had a knack with children, like the Pied Piper. Even Kari was staring after her, wide-eyed.


    Finally, with the staffroom near empty, the teachers having gone to their classes, there remained Lizzie, the Year 6 teacher, who was trembling. She was one of the new teachers, freshly graduated, and she dressed Victorian, demure.


    "Is everything quite alright?" asked Haralda. After confirming it was appropriate in the Handbook, she put a hand on her shoulder.


    "It¡¯s silly," said Lizzie. "I know it¡¯s silly, but I don¡¯t feel like I have control of the class."


    "Are they giving you trouble?"


    "Last week, when we did music, oh, it¡¯s stupid, but I couldn¡¯t control them, Haralda ¡ª they were running wild, smashing the recorders against the windows ¡ª and when I raised my voice, they just laughed at me!"


    "Why didn¡¯t you make a report about this?" asked Haralda. "It¡¯s the Brick Gang, right?"


    Lizzie tried to reply, but found herself choking back tears.


    "I won¡¯t have any of my teachers afraid to go to work," said Haralda. "Come on. Have you got today planned out?"


    She held up her paperwork ¡ª meticulous. To think that a few little tykes could turn such an intelligent, dutiful woman into a snivelling mess. It wasn¡¯t an injustice Haralda intended to tolerate.


    She said, "Would it make it easier if I sat in your class?"


    "Yes," said Lizzie. "I¡¯m¡­ I¡¯m not being weak, am I? It¡¯s those kids! They¡¯re completely out of control!"


    ¡°Crush them,¡± suggested Kari, grinning.


    ¡°What?¡±


    Haralda took great satisfaction in remembering how well-behaved the class had been at the end of the day.


    "Right,¡± she said, rolling up her sleeves. ¡°Come along.¡±


    </main>

 4.3

    <div>


    Sure, it was the fifth rewind, but they¡¯d get him this time ¡ª the front door of the library represented the sole escape route, and Connie covered it, ready with her net. Alan MacCain could hide, but he couldn''t run. After several minutes, however, Faust emerged from the building shaking his head. He looked pissed off, and the double-edged sword worked wonders for his personal space, effortlessly parting the crowd around him.


    They sat by a fountain in the square for the fourth time, where the air smelled relatively fresh.


    Faust sighed, squinting at the laptop screen under the sun. "For fuck¡¯s sake. Not in the library at 11, not in the stock exchange at 10, not dropping off his kids at 9. It''s almost like people can just lie on the internet. Or, you know, set up a script to lie for them."


    She leaned over to look. "Come on, man, nobody said it''d be easy. Let¡¯s try a different angle ¡ª what about his wife? Where''s she at?"


    "Let''s see," he said, uselessly hitting the brightness button, "At 9, she was... at the Fruit and Wool Exchange, because of course she was. That''s a place that normal people visit. At 10, she went to feed the ducks in the park, presumably to fatten them up, because by 11 she was chowing down on their brethren in a restaurant. Have fun on your wild goose chase, Connie, but I think I''d rather stay here and watch paint dry."


    "Well meow to you too," she said, holding up the remote. "Suit yourself. I''ll contact you on the tile when I''ve¡ª"


    "Don''t you think we''ve done enough rewinding?" he spat.


    She glared at him, and he glared back. The fountain trickled down behind them, while an endless throng of people streamed by, oblivious to the intensity of their staring contest.


    She straightened out her blazer. "It''s almost like you don''t want to find him."


    He smoothed over his beard. "It''s almost like you''re procrastinating getting on with the day because you''re terrified of finding out the truth."


    "Excuse me?" She shivered, then put her hands on her hips to imitate justified anger.


    "Tarquin insisted I quell my self-loathing until I knew for certain ¡ª well regard thyself, mistress! If we just kept going, we''d bump into MacCain eventually, wouldn''t we?"


    "But the information''s right there," she said, her smile wavering. "If we find him before I kill him, then I can save him and come to terms with it! I can do the right thing! Isn''t that the point of all this?"


    Connie broke eye contact ¡ª she couldn''t match his intense gaze. All she needed to do was get MacCain to cancel his booking. That was her win condition. How could something so simple be so difficult to achieve?


    Faust shook his head. "How can you come to terms with the truth if you don''t know what it is? You think me gallivanting around with you here is helping me figure out why I took a swan dive from a chair?"


    "If you want to go, then go." She trembled, ready to smash that rewind button.


    He grabbed her thumb to stop her, making it look like her viper tattoo was biting him. His fingers were soft in a way that made her very self-conscious, and she couldn¡¯t ignore how they felt.


    "Please," he said. "Do the right thing. If you keep running away like this ¡ª they''ll kill you. And if I walked away, that''d just be another fucking thing I could torment myself with."


    Connie yanked her hand back and threw the remote into the fountain. It bubbled under the surface.


    "Do you guilt trip everybody in your life?" she stormed off, circling the fountain. "Why do you care so much about what happens to a stranger, huh?"


    He sighed, deeply, and looked her up and down, gritting his teeth, oblivious to everything that was going on around him.


    And he said, "...Because you''re happy."Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators!


    She had to do a double take. "Because I''m what?"


    "Losing yourself, finding yourself, remember all that? You''ve cracked the code somehow, you''ve actually made something of yourself, you''re living the life you want to live, and I resent you for that! But if you have all of that wisdom and you still want to throw everything away, then why should I even try clawing my own life back? Can you tell me that?"


    "Oh yeah," said Connie, regret mounting in her stomach towards that particular monologue. She''d probably gotten a little carried away.


    "So what''s it to be?" he asked, streaming furious tears. "Seek the truth, or render me twice dead upon the blade of your avoidance?"


    "The truth," she said, beaming out a little more of the strained resource that was her happiness.


    ¡ª


    Barden Fleet''s headquarters lurched above the road, propped up by a couple of pillars to form a makeshift garage. Taxis idled there, pulling in throughout the day, painting the roof black with their fumes. You had to sign a waiver if you wanted to stand under there for more than 20 minutes. Connie''s throat cracked, as if somebody had poured a layer of fresh tarmac down it, and she regretted that if she kept working here, her healed angelic voice would turn monstrous.


    She led Faust through the peeling front door, passed an operetta of office administrators who were noting down new bookings, and walked straight into Gazzer''s office. The office appeared to have been copy-pasted from a mansion''s living room, with a couple of long, plush sofas that wouldn''t have looked out of place on a porn set. Gazzer always kept a fire going under the mantlepiece, ''for the ambience''.


    Her boss arose like built-up grime.


    "Gazzer!" she said.


    "Alright, Connie," he wheezed. "How''s the endocriocitis treating you?"


    "You think I''d be here if it was flaring up, man?"


    Gazzer sized Faust up in the same way that a rugby player looks at a mathematician. But whatever cutting remark he was preparing died on his lips when he caught sight of the sword, and instead he sloshed his head down in a respectful nod.


    "New boyfriend o'' yours?" he said, extending his greasy hand for Faust to shake. "Doesn''t look your type."


    "He isn''t," said Connie. "Faust is gonna be shadowing me today, because he wants to find out the meaning of life and the secret to happiness. Is that alright?"


    At this, Gazzer wheezed uncontrollably, steadying himself on the chair as he laughed. He looked in pain.


    "Course it is," he said. "Look, lad, I can''t get you to nirvana or nothing, but I can help you make bank as a taxi driver, and then you might actually meet shorty here''s criteria! Ahahaha!"


    Faust stepped closer to Connie and mumbled, "I thought you said you were a chauffeur."


    "A CHAUFFEUR?" cried Gazzer. "Jesus H. Christ!"


    Being a sixty-something unscrupulous businessman, Gazzer lacked the self-consciousness to not roll on the floor with laughter. He thudded onto the carpet and proceeded to have a heart attack. Faust rushed over, flitting around him like a panicked butterfly, trying to build up the resolve to actually touch the fatberg of a man.


    "Leave him, he''s alright," said Connie. "Greasy fucker does this every day."


    "A chauffeur!" Gazzer wailed. "Ahahaahaha!"


    Faust glared at her, angry.


    "It was a joke, man," she said, holding out her arms as if to say ''that''s life''. "You know, referencing all those job titles out there that inflate what they really are, like a cleaner that calls himself a ''sanitation engineer''... just a little bit of self-deprecation."


    He seemed to buy it, but it didn''t get a smile out of him. They waited for Gazzer to stop having a heart attack, whereupon he stood up and lit a cigarette.


    "These days I''m running out of extra lives," he explained. "Anyway, Connie, you''re on Newchurch¡ª"


    "From 12-6," she beamed. "And then I''ve got bookings for the rest of the day. And you ain''t never seen me so popular, and one of them is a Scottish bloke who said all his words funny, and he¡¯ll be at a pub. Can I have the keys, now?"


    Gazzer had another heart attack.


    ¡ª


    It was a quiet day for the transportation industry.


    Rain poured out the sky, hammering down onto Connie''s windscreen only to be slapped away by the wipers. The fans pumped hot recycled air onto her face. They sat stationary outside the Newchurch station, a line of brake lights piercing the gloom in front of them as a queue of taxis extended across the car park. Occasionally, someone would get in the front car, that taxi would drive off, and the whole line would trundle forward like a funeral procession; Connie rode the clutch for a couple meters before hitting the brakes.


    Faust drummed his fingers on the door. He''d propped the laptop on top of the glovebox.


    "So this is chauffeuring," he said. "Fine way to pass the time."


    "Heh," she said. "Nice reference to the joke I made earlier. Which was a joke."


    "Alan MacCain''s on the move again. Now he''s in Croatia... are you gonna take your hands off the wheel? You¡¯ll get a heart attack yourself if you keep that up."


    She kept a firm grip on it. "Nah. People get pissed off if you''re not ready to move up as soon as the guy in front''s pulled out. It is what it is."


    "I can''t help but notice that it''s been half an hour and you haven''t actually made any money yet," he said.


    "You get good and bad days," she said. "This is a particularly bad day. Nobody wants to come to the city when it''s raining."


    Income-wise it was, all things considered, a particularly normal day.


    She said, "Anyway, you can''t be happy if you sweat the small stuff like that. Try and be a little optimistic. Even without tips, Gazzer''s paying me a little just to sit here."


    "Must get lonely," he said. "And kinda boring, to just sit around until you''re needed."


    "...That''s not optimistic."


    He hung his head. "I suppose. And you make enough out of this to afford a penthouse suite how?"


    ¡°Oh, bookings.¡± She lifted up the armrest, got out her box of cassettes, and handed it to him. "Not so boring when you got these bad boys. Go ahead, take your pick."


    He leafed through them, and picked out the song she''d been playing earlier in the flat.


    "This one''s a jam," he said. ¡°So, how did you know the Scottish man had booked you outside a pub?¡±

 4.4

    <div>


    Connie fixed her gaze on the car in front, gripping the wheel stiffly. She''d rolled the seat as far forward as it could go, and she looked a little squashed, but otherwise her feet wouldn''t have been able to reach the pedals.


    Faust found her odd. Rich people normally boasted about their wealth every chance they got, but whenever he asked questions about her life she just seemed to retreat inward, as though ashamed of her self-made success. He kind of wished more rich people were like that ¡ª maybe the world would be a better place if more of them were like Connie.


    "The Scottish guy," prompted Faust. "How''d you know where you had to pick him up?"


    She screwed up her face in concentration, like she was actually driving instead of idling in a car. He waved a hand in front of her face.


    "Hello?"


    "What, MacCain?" she asked, pursing her lips. "There''s a board up in HQ with my timetable on it. Checked it when we went past. Didn''t you see it?"


    "But you knew before that, right? In the cafe?" He jammed the tape in the player, but the speakers in the car were like listening to music through a tin can and a wire. Even an EQ whizz like him had trouble pumping the bass up.


    Connie shuffled uncomfortably and pulled her seatbelt back around her shoulder.


    "I guess Gazzer must have sent me an email and I checked it when I was getting ready earlier," she said. "Yeah, that''s probably what it was."


    Faust shrugged. "So be it. I just thought if you''d remembered something then maybe we could find that little weirdo a little quicker."


    "Nah, still drawing a blank," said Connie. The traffic opened up ahead, so in true taxi driver fashion she slammed her foot on the accelerator, then hit the brakes two seconds later. You would think their cars could only stop and go.


    ¡°Well, don¡¯t hesitate to share any sudden, plot-induced flashbacks.¡±


    They''d gone through half the album by the time they got to the front of the queue, and seeing as he failed to get a conversation going, they ended up sitting with the music as a buffer between them while they bobbed their heads. She rolled the window down, and rain spilled in.


    Two young lads in thick raincoats walked up, their faces hidden behind hoods. Conveniently for the narrator, one was extraordinarily angular and the other could have passed for a whale.


    "Oi, can you take us to the beachfront?" asked the whale while they got in, filling the car with a vague smell of dampness and cheap tobacco.


    Faust sized them up, and immediately propped his sword against the glovebox so the lads could see it ¡ª he got a lazy minor antagonist vibe from them. They stared at it, and then looked at him in such a pugnacious manner that he immediately decided to watch the road instead.


    "Wot," said the angular one.


    Faust pretended not to hear. He¡¯d always thought of himself as a lover, not a fighter.


    Connie clicked on the meter, its dot matrix display humming into life alongside the engine, before she pushed the accelerator to the floor and propelled them forward. Rain battered the windscreen.


    Despite her speed, Connie kept glimpsing into the rearview mirror. She exhaled friendliness. "Some day to go to the beach, huh, gents? What''s the occasion?"


    They blinked and breathed, and the fat one rolled up a cigarette on his knee.


    "Yeah," said the angular one.


    "Oi, mate, what is that coming out your hand?" said the fat one. "It''s like... a number or something."


    Faust buried his hand in his lap to hide it. He tried extra hard to subtly nudge the sword so that it would catch the glare of passing headlights. Maybe that would intimidate them into silence.


    "Oi, mate, is that a sword there?" said the angular one. "It is! Why''ve you got a sword for?"


    "Imagine having a sword," laughed the fat one. ¡°That¡¯s Barden City for you.¡±


    "Swords are cool," said Connie. "What, you guys don''t have swords?"


    "Nah. Fucking shit weapons, innit. No range on them. Can''t get through armour," said the fat one.


    "Give me a spear anyday," said the angular one. "Or a hammer for smashing. Nobody used swords back in the day, that''s just an over-exaggeration by Hollywood."


    Faust nudged the sword back into the shadows. Wherever he went, he seemed to attract these kinds of minor villains that only existed to question his life choices and make him feel like shit. He turned up the music loud enough to drown out their complaints that the music was shit, while Connie went bright red.


    They reached the beachfront, where the battery-acid waves pooled against the rocks, the taxi meter having ticked up to a cool twenty pounds. To Faust, that didn''t seem worth Connie''s time at all, but he supposed it all depended on the salary she got.This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.


    Connie cleared her throat, polite enough not to turn around when demanding currency. In return, the lads made a show of searching every single pocket of their multiple layers of hoodies, and the fat one eventually came up with a soggy ten pound note.


    The angular one shook his head. "Sorry, I think we both forgot our wallets."


    "Okay," sighed Connie. "Then you''ll have to fund an additional trip to the ATM."


    "No card, either," said the fat one.


    "No phone, either," said the angular one.


    "We''re awful forgetful, aren''t we?"


    "Couple o'' fucking idiots. But we ain''t got any money, do we?"


    "Nope."


    "None."


    Connie clicked open her seatbelt and turned around, smiling sweetly.


    She said, "That makes a very awkward situation for us, doesn''t it, gentlemen?"


    "Very awkward, yeah," agreed the fat one. "Now!"


    In unison, they yanked on the door handles, rushing so fast that their heads thunked against the glass when they failed to get them open.


    "Oh, boys," tutted Connie. "That was exactly what you didn''t want to do. See, before I could¡¯ve laboured under the misapprehension that you were just the usual dregs that crawl out of Slumsfield. Now I know you''re a real couple of pieces of shit."


    She got a brushed aluminium aerosol from the side of the door and trained the nozzle on them.


    Instinctively, the angular one reached to swat it away, but she sprayed his hand before he even got close.


    "Owwwwww!" he shouted, clutching it. It broke out in a weird rash. "That ain''t fair!"


    "See how you like it in your eyes if you wanna to press the issue," she spat. "Now, am I going to get my money, or do I have to call my boss?"


    Faust felt a little bit of an observer, so he brought his sword inches from the fat one and said, "Who''s laughing now, you degenerates?"


    "We ain''t got no money!" wailed the fat one. "It''s the truth!"


    "Didn''t wanna get mugged, did we?" said the angular one, crying in pain as he chomped on his hand. "Plus, you cabbies are always charging ridiculous prices! There¡¯s a reason you don¡¯t get no tourists in Barden, you know!"


    With her free hand, Connie called Gazzer and put him on speakerphone.


    "Alright, Connie?" he said. "I''m up to my arse in paperwork right now, would you mind¡ª"


    "I got a couple of gentlemen refusing to pay in the beachfront car park," she said. "Tell the Fleet."


    "The Fleet?" asked the angular one. "What do you mean the Fleet?"


    "Why''s it capitalised?" asked the fat one.


    "She means," growled Gazzer, "That I''m sending word for all two hundred cabbies under my company to drive down there to sort you cunts out. You have five minutes. If I were you, I''d empty your pockets. Now!"


    Connie held her hand out, and a twenty pound note miraculously emerged from the fat one''s trousers.


    "Uh uh," she tutted.


    He put the tenner on as well.


    "This city is a shithole," said the angular one. "It desperately needs EU funding."


    Connie unlocked the doors, and they sprinted out, vanishing into the wind and the rain.


    "Thanks, Gazzer," she said.


    His phlegmy laughter echoed down the line. "Ahahaha! Gets em every time! Stupid fuckers don''t even have one brain cell between them! ''Mobilising the fleet''! Hah! Who do they think I am, the fucking Godfather?"


    "How often does that happen?" asked Faust, taking deep breaths to lower his heart rate.


    "Couple of times a week," shrugged Connie, shaking the aerosol. "Nothing a bit of capsaicin can''t sort out."


    "So, Fast, what do you reckon?" asked Gazzer. "I can set you up with a cab tomorrow and get you absolutely raking it in."


    "Fast?" said Faust, grabbing the phone. "Listen here, you ingrate, it''s Faust, and if I hear so much as a snigger, then I can assure you that there will be litigation!"


    "Alright, sorry," he wheezed. "Hold your lawyers. I''m trying to offer you a job here, mate!"


    Faust glanced at the meter, and then the clock. It didn''t take a genius to figure out she''d made less than ten pounds an hour.


    "Saying she''s making bank is... a flat out lie," he said. "How much of a salary are you paying her to sit in that queue?"


    "Hang on, man," said Connie, trying to grab the phone back, but he twisted away.


    A gust of laughter escaped Gazzer''s mouth. "Aha. Ha. Sorry, mate, my ears are failing me in my old age. What was the... ahahaha... question?"


    "Faust," growled Connie. "Give me my phone back."


    "What are you paying per hour?" asked Faust.


    There was a thud, like somebody had just fallen on the floor, and a wheeze. "Ahahaha! Salary? You''ve got the wrong end of the stick, feller! She ain''t getting nothing from me but the car and the admin! I ain''t paying nobody to just sit around on their¡ª"


    Connie snatched the phone back, and hung up. She laughed, even as her face fell. And suddenly, everything fit together. No wonder she was trying to put up a front that she''d worked for all her money ¡ª she didn''t deserve what she had. Probably the daughter of some baron, LARPing as a working class cabbie.


    "I can explain," she said.


    "You lied," said Faust. "Who are you, really?"


    "I didn''t lie¡­ it was just another joke! Alright, back to work we go!"


    "You... you''re fake," he spat, hitching the sword into its scabbard. "Here I was thinking you were some champion of the hustle, of the grind, when really working is apparently some kind of hobby for you! You''ve been laughing at my struggles all along, haven''t you? ''How cute'', you think, as I pour out my heart! ''Tee hee, I''m a chauffeur, look at me'', you giggle from your safety net!"


    "Fuck off. I work for my shit, same as everybody. I''m pulling twelve hour shifts here, forgive me for having a sense of humour about it."


    "But you don''t have to, do you, and that makes all the difference. The penthouse? The expensive breakfasts you say you eat every morning? The Expresso Maker you were too fucking snobby to let me try? I guess happiness comes easy enough when daddy¡¯s topping up your bank account!"


    "Get out," she said. "If that''s truly what you think of me, then get out."


    "What else am I supposed to think?" he said. "You''re a fake. Can you explain how the maths add up for you to afford your lifestyle? I wanted to trust you, Connie, but how the fuck can I when I don''t even know who you are?"


    She stormed out of the car, fighting her way through the pounding rain, walked over to his door, and swung it open.


    "I said get out!" she shouted. "Go and talk to a therapist, you self-pitying freak!"


    He snapped his fingers, then looked surprised when nothing happened. "Oh, but it looks like normal people can''t just summon whatever they want! I won¡¯t be needing one. Looks like I''ve found the solution to my never-ending melancholy: just be rich! It was that easy!"


    "Are you done?" She sniffled, shivering in the rain. "Are you quite fucking finished?"


    He stood up, closing the door behind him. "Just one last thing, and then I''ll wash my hands of it. The way you''re living this day, trying to avoid it, you''ll never come to terms with the fact that you killed Alan MacCain. Lie to me, abuse my good faith all you want, but at least have the decency not to lie to yourself!"


    He ran into the darkness, down a road he didn''t know, the streetlights blurring in his eyes. Cars streamed past him, splashing him with puddles, but he kept on running. There were barely any pedestrians on the pavement, which made it all the more stunning when he crossed paths with Alan MacCain wearing a macintosh. He looked just as mild-mannered as his profile picture. The Scotsman shivered before ducking down an alleyway.


    "Stupid fucking two-faced Connie," Faust muttered, waiting till he''d rounded the corner before doubling back and tailing him.

 4.6

    <div>


    Sunset, before he knew it. The repetitions drilled themselves quickly into Saheel, and though his arms ached and his throat was parched and his stomach was empty, he kept going. Position the stick behind the head, twist the body and ¡ª thwack. Position the stick behind the head, twist the body and ¡ª thwack. Thwack. Thwack.


    Thwack. He didn''t let himself stop, because if he stopped he would have to think about who he''d left behind. No stranger to meditation, he let himself slip into a trance and willed his sense of self to decay. Sublimate the ego. Become only the body. Forget.


    Thwack. Thwack until the number appeared, whereupon he let the stick slip out of his stinging, blistered hands. He stood by the tent, swaying from fatigue, and looked at the frozen rock before him. It dangled midair, innocently.


    Before he pocketed it, he took a piece of chalk and marked the side he''d been hitting so he could remember which direction it would fly. If it misfired, he wouldn''t have time to perceive the mistake ¡ª he''d just die. He half expected it to weigh him down, or crackle with dark energy, or something, but it was indeed just a simple rock with the power to break reality over its knee.


    The lift doors opened as soon as he called for it, and he took one last look at the heathland before pressing button six.


    "So long," he said, and the doors shut.


    In contrast to the fiery pink glow of the sunset, the lift felt impossibly dark. Above him, he heard all manner of grinding and clanking, whispering and chanting, and the slow scrape of bone crawling down the shaft. Saheel shuddered. It wouldn''t take long until they reached the first layer.


    He expected the lift to take him to his PhD bedroom-cum-study, but it didn''t. The doors opened. A thin strip of light squeezed through the crack in a blind, piercing the darkness to fall directly on his wife''s face.


    She was snuggled up under the duvet, hugging it close to herself, and her black hair fell around her, stirred by the lightness of her breath. She looked the very image of serenity.


    He stepped out of the lift, his foot sinking into the soft mattress, displacing her so that she rolled up against him, engulfing him in the heat of her body. Groggily, her eyelids raised. She looked up.


    "You''re back. What are you standing on the bed for?" she murmured, voice low and drowsy.


    Saheel felt that no matter what this game had thrown at him, he''d done an okay job keeping himself together and focused on the task at hand. But hearing the love of his life''s voice, the person who''d supported him and nourished him and cherished him for fifteen years ¡ª it was too much.


    He hugged her and didn''t let go; he pressed his face into her shoulder, which was burning hot with warmth and goodness, and he spilled tears all over her. He was racked with the kind of despair that made it impossible to even begin saying something, because as soon as he tried ¡ª and where would he even begin to explain the events of the past day ¡ª he erupted into sobs. He ached with the toll.


    But somehow she understood, for she wrapped her arms around him and held him close, and she took a hand and ran it through his hair.


    "It''s okay," she cooed. "It''s alright."


    He felt torn inside out. His forehead ached from screwing up his face so tightly, but he just couldn''t stop crying. He pulled her ever closer, as even the smallest degree of separation, the tiniest pocket of air between them, was agony.


    He thought he''d never see her again.


    "I''m here," she said, the bass from her voice box vibrating through him. She planted kisses on his forehead, the tiniest of candles to light up the darkest of caves.


    They lay there, comforter and comfortee, locked in that embrace, until he fell asleep, drifting away, enveloped in her warmth.


    ¡ª


    "Happy Saturday, my dudes, this is Sandbank FM with the 8 o'' clock news. Gnarly!"


    It wasn¡¯t a Saturday that Saheel had lived through.


    He opened his eyes and reflexively hammered the alarm off. As he rose, several objects rose with him in his pockets ¡ª the two remote, the tile, the water pistol, the glue gun, and the rock, and he resented their weight. He prayed ardently it was all just a dream, but there was the count, glowing out of his hand. The black robe got swapped for a white robe, which was more suitable to the tropical climate.This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it


    He followed his nose into the kitchen, where Asha was frying up an omelette, her hair tied up in a bun. His vicarage was  a cosy open-plan bungalow just ten meters and a few triple-glazed windows from the sea, with a breakfast bar dividing the kitchen and the lounge. As for the weather ¡ª well, it was Sandbank, so a beautiful teal sky hung over the waves, and the sun''s rays blanketed the house enough for them to never need heating.


    As on every weekend morning, he started it by hugging her from behind; they shared a kiss, and he put on a pot of coffee for them.


    She regarded him, genuine sorrow on her face, and said, "Feeling better now?"


    He nodded, and went back to kiss her again.


    He said, "I just missed you."


    "Me too," she said, pressing him into her side as she turned back to save the egg from burning. "The weeks are getting awfully lonely. Are you sure you''re okay? Come here, don''t go crying on me again..."


    "It''s not something I can explain," he said, lip wobbling. "I thought we''d finally found a way out of the darkness. But even though we put everything into it, we fell short of the mark, and I''m worried now that all hope is lost."


    "There, there." Asha plated up the omelettes, dashed them with pepper, and slid them onto the table. "Remember your masters? You''ll keep at it and find a breakthrough like you always do. It''s all a test from the big man, right?"


    "Maybe," he said, plopping down two mugs of steaming filter coffee. "Maybe not."


    "Don''t worry about it now," she said, "It wouldn''t be much of a weekend break if all you did was stress over your project."


    Saheel nodded, hoovering up the omelette and all of its gooey, eggy goodness, savouring the pepper that started a pleasant fire in his mouth, and then he washed it down with the coffee.


    They tidied away in unison, and everything was washed up and back in the cupboards within minutes.


    "Oh goodness, look at the time," said Asha. "We haven''t got long to get everything ready."


    "Why?" he asked, and even as they stood idly they had a hand on each other. "What time did you say they could come round?"


    "Eleven. They seemed to want to spend the day together; apparently you and him have a lot of catching up to do!"


    "Maybe less than you think. Do you want to shop or tidy?" asked Saheel, getting the car keys from the bowl.


    "Shop," she said, taking them off him. "You got enough driving in yesterday, by my reckoning. Just make sure to actually move the furniture when you hoover, sweetheart."


    "Yeah, yeah," he said.


    They kissed, and then she was out the door. Saheel turned his attention to the house, and as before, tried to impose a set of repetitions on his body so that he didn''t have to think about the weight he was carrying. He hoovered, fluffed the cushions, wiped down the surfaces, bleached the toilet, and was cleaning the windows by the time she got back. If Sean was going to die today, he wasn''t going to let it be due to lack of hygiene.


    "Wow," she exclaimed, as he showed her around like an estate agent. "How did you get all this done so quickly? It normally takes you a day just to decide which antibacterial spray you want to use!"


    "I''m a man on a mission," he said, fingering the remote in his pocket.


    The doorbell rang ¡ª to the tune of ding dong merrily on high, of course. Saheel put an arm round Asha as they went to open the door.


    "Hiiiiiii," the four of them chorused.


    Sean extended his hand, and Saheel shook it. Despite the heat, the Irish Vicar wore a sweater and black trousers, and his face was sickly pale. In fact, he was actually shivering; his fingers were ice cold. So this was the man he was going to kill.


    Dove leaned in, and they kissed each other on the cheek. She was beautiful, her blonde locks, her shapely features, the tiny smattering of lipstick, the way her summer dress hung off her body ¡ª think of bible quotes, Saheel, bible quotes! Deuteronomy 2? He hadn''t preached that one in ages, let''s see...


    Both of his guests wore wedding rings, which was natural, after all, because they were married.


    "Come in," said Asha, stepping aside so they could do just that. Saheel looked at his wife, and of course, she was even more beautiful ¡ª his soulmate. If she bade him, he''d renounce his faith in an instant. In her t-shirt and shorts, she looked like home.


    Sean and Dove made a show of wiping their shoes on the doormat ¡ª how odd, to not wear sandals in Sandbank ¡ª and then bent over to unlace them.


    "Don''t worry about your shoes," said Saheel, "It''s fine, just come in."


    "Now now," said Sean, prising them off his feet, "I''d already started going to the trouble of taking them off, it''s only the right thing to do to keep going."


    Asha giggled; Saheel laughed.


    "There we are," said Dove. "Oh, what a lovely house! So close to the sea! Brilliant!"


    "Sit down, I''ll get you both a coffee," said Asha. "The windows aren''t so good when the seagulls end up pooing on them."


    Sean laughed; Saheel laughed. They took their place on the leather sofas, which were naturally angled to take advantage of the view.


    "Yeah," said Sean, relaxedly sinking in, spreading his arms and legs to either side of him. "I''ve already had to clean a few of the buggers off of the church roof."


    "That must be quite the change of pace from Barden," said Saheel, hugging his knees.


    "Man, there''s so many differences, I don''t even know where to start," he said, taking a cup that Asha passed to him. "Thanks, Asha."


    "Thank you," said Dove, sipping on it. "Oh, what a lovely blend. What blend is this?"


    "It''s from Lidl," said Asha. "It''s not a special blend."


    Saheel moved up so she could nestle in next to him. Remembering their plans for the day, he said, "Thanks, honey. Sean, Dove, we''re thinking of taking you guys out for a walk along the seafront. I don''t know if you know, but there''s a protected colony of birds about a mile to the east. How does that sound?"


    "That sounds swell," said Sean.


    "Yeah," said Dove. "What kind of birds?"


    "Oh, parrots, parakeets," said Asha. "It''s the perfect place if you ever decide you''ve had enough of the church and want to take up life as a pirate."


    Sean laughed; Saheel laughed.

 4.9 — VOTING OPEN

    The school''s walls were screaming with so much information that they gave Kari a headache. No matter where she looked, they were covered in bulletin boards, posters, number lines, timelines, art projects, poetry projects, interactive calendars, pictographs of children; no thought was given for a place to rest the eyes. But it didn''t seem to bother Haralda or Lizzie, who strode through the corridor with purpose.


    They came to the Year 6 classroom, which was similarly slathered in letters and numbers and colours ¡ª there were even paintings hanging off clothes lines straight across the middle of the room. Children sat dutifully at tables in rows, watching three of their cohorts at the front, who had hijacked the teacher''s computer and were using it to project a video of a dancing cat onto the one blank wall in the room.


    As soon as Haralda walked in, the childrens'' heads snapped towards her like magnets, and most of them gasped, while others burst silently into tears. The three kids at the front shut off the video, standing there sheepishly, arms behind their backs.


    "And just WHAT is going on here, exactly?" Haralda bellowed.


    It wasn''t the sort of question that elicited a response. The class sank in their seats, becoming intently interested in the smooth surfaces of the tables in front of them.


    "Well?" she said. "Would anybody like to tell me what Ricardo, Richard and Brick were doing?"


    The three boys stiffened at the mention of their name, but otherwise maintained their staring contest with the floor.


    "Very well," said Haralda. "Boys, come with me."


    They trudged out behind her, abandoning Kari to an audience of twenty children and one teacher. A collective sigh spread across the class, but it died as soon as it came on, because their teacher silently and calmly wrote up the itinerary on the whiteboard without so much as acknowledging them ¡ª and there are fewer things more indicative of trouble than a silent teacher.


    The children, more children her age than she''d ever seen before in her life, stared at her. Kari shuffled in place, keeping a hand on the knife. Some of them were as big as adults.


    "Alright," said Lizzie, once she''d finished drawing up the timetable. "Good morning, class."


    "Good morning, Miss Bell," said the class, bemusedly. The sheer motion of twenty children fidgeting and wriggling in their seats was overwhelming to behold.


    "As you can see, we have a new student with us today," said Lizzie, setting twenty sets of eyes upon her. "Would you like to introduce yourself?"


    Kari went bright red.


    (I AM KARI, DESTROYER OF HOUSEHOLDS, SLAUGHTERER OF MEN, BLADE SHARPER THAN THE NIGHT).


    "I am Kari Gunmetal," she said.


    The children in the front row noticeably sat up straighter, and the ones who hadn''t got out their journals did so.


    "Could you say it a little bit louder so everyone can hear?" asked Lizzie, smiling.


    Kari noted the happiness was only directed at her.


    "I am Kari Gunmetal," she announced, hating every second of the attention. "Niece of the Madame."


    The class stopped wriggling. A couple of them whispered to each other, but as soon as they saw her looking, they pressed their fingers to their lips in a bizarre display of good behaviour. Some bowed in respect.


    "Would you like to write your name on the board?" Lizzie handed her a pen.


    Kari took it, clenching it in a fist, and awkwardly brought it up against the writing square, her hand wobbling as she traced her best approximation of a K. Then it was onto the A ¡ª a tricky capital, and she ended up making the hole way too big, so then she had to extend the legs, and then it was bigger than the K, so she had to extend that as well. The curve on the R was a tricky one, so she made do with straight lines, and it looked good enough by her reckoning, and the I was just one flick of the pen downwards, so no trouble there.This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    She stepped back to admire her name. It had only taken two minutes ¡ª a new record. But when she turned around, the pride on her face evaporated, for most of the children regarded her with absolute derision, giggling to each other. Whatever respect they''d had for her vanished in that look; the only look the estate had ever given her, a look that said she was de-facto subhuman.


    What was it she''d done wrong?


    "Thank you, Kari," said Lizzie, wincing. "Why don''t you go over and join the Slither In group in the corner, there?"


    Kari went to sit where she was told, and as she walked further and further to the back, the class turned and watched her. No, she decided, she wasn''t going to tolerate this. Haralda earned respect through power, and Kari wasn''t going to let her down. She clutched the knife in her pocket, sought out a target ¡ª some curly haired boy who was snickering into his hand ¡ª and...


    Haralda came back into the class, with Ricardo, Richard, and Brick trailing behind her, eyes wide with trauma. They approached Lizzie.


    "I''m sorry, Miss Bell," said Ricardo. "Rule 1: Listen to and follow instructions."


    "I''m sorry, Miss Bell," said Richard. "Rule 2: Treat students, staff and the classroom with respect."


    "I''m sorry, Miss Bell," said Brick. "Rule 3: Leave the world better than you found it."


    "Thank you for apologising," said Lizzie. "And thank you, Madame Gunmetal."


    They went to fill the empty seats and crashed down into them, completely shell shocked.


    "I trust nobody else needs a reminder of the rules," said Haralda, tapping the writing square with a pointer. "You''re off to secondary school next year, and we¡¯ve never had less than perfect feedback from the institutions we send you to. If we don''t think you¡¯ll leave a positive impression, then you will repeat Year 6 until we do."


    "Well said," said Lizzie. "For our Numeracy today, we''ll be continuing our work on algebra, so please could everyone get out their maths folders?"


    Kari sat, dumbfounded, as the class exploded into motion, walked over to a row of trays, took out yellow folders, then returned to their seats. Lizzie came over to drop a paper copy on her desk.


    "Five minutes to finish off your homework," she announced, then kneeled down. "Have you done algebra, before, Kari?"


    "No."


    "Where did you go to school? How much numeracy have you done?"


    "What''s numeracy?" Kari stared at her. In her peripheral vision, she saw that most of the class was watching.


    "Maths. Math? Mathematics. Uh, addition, subtraction, multiplication, division... have you done any of those?"


    "I don''t know. This is my first day at school."


    "...Ever?"


    Kari nodded.


    "Just a minute," smiled Lizzie, scurrying off to talk to Haralda.


    Kari looked at her sheet, then at the sheet of the curly haired boy next to her. He was scrawling all over his, writing down a combination of letters and numbers. Well, it looked easy enough; she wasn''t stupid.


    4x + 4 = 20 | x =


    She squinted. How could 4 and 4 make 20? She imagined you''d have to add 12 ¡ª 4, 12, and 4 make 20, after all, so that''s what she wrote down. And within seconds the boy had seen it and spread a cascading whisper across the room:


    "She wrote 12!"


    ¡°She wrote 12!¡±


    ¡°She wrote 12!¡±


    Enough was enough. She brandished her Djinn, the limelight enveloping the classroom in an emerald tint, and shoved it down into the curly-haired boy¡¯s table. She''d only intended to cause a dent, but tore a hole straight through to the other side, and the table shattered, breaking in two.


    The curly-haired boy screamed.


    She slapped him, then held the knife up to his neck.


    WHAT''S SO FUNNY, LITTLE MAN? she asked.


    The boy froze in her hands ¡ª literally froze ¡ª and so did all the other children, stuck mid-gasp. Her anger vented into dead, eerie silence. She wheeled around, and there was Haralda, tucking the remote back into her pocket.


    "You said that school was different," said Kari, levelling the knife at her instead. "You said it was a safe place where children cooperate."


    "It is," said Haralda, approaching her, "And sometimes it isn''t."


    STAY BACK, screeched Kari. "Your school is no different from the estate. Everyone, everywhere is the same. To live is to exploit, to mock, deride."


    "You made a good effort," said Haralda. "I''m proud of you for trying. You were very brave."


    "I didn''t come here to be made a fool."


    Haralda tore a page off of her clipboard, scrunched it up into a ball, and slam-dunked it into the wastepaper bin.


    She said, "I''m the one who''s been a fool. It happened with the shower, and I should have been more vigilant, but here it''s happened again at the school. I underestimated how different the place you''ve come from is to here, and it''s my fault for putting you in this situation. Rule 3: Leave the world better than you found it. Well, today I broke rule 3. I''m sorry, Kari."


    Kari said, "We are bound by the fate we share. But I will no longer pretend to be someone I am not. I am not your niece. I am no schoolgirl, and me becoming one is a fantasy. I am Kari, Nine of Nine, and that is all."


    Haralda nodded, and held out her hand. They shook on it.


    "What shall we do now?" asked Kari. "We are no closer to finding this Frenchman."


    "Relive the day," said Haralda, leafing through a new page on the clipboard. "Find out the truth. I have to follow the remote, which means I¡¯m going to observe this class for the morning."


    "I''m not staying here," said Kari.


    "Right. Then perhaps you could work your way through the school and ask the French children for descriptions of their fathers. That would help to narrow it down."


    "Okay. As long as there is none of this algebra."


    They exited the class, Haralda pressing play as she did so, chaos erupting behind them. The deputy head led her to a classroom void of decoration, where there were only three children and one young teacher. The door was marked SPECIAL EDUCATIONAL NEEDS.


    They were singing a song in a tongue unfamiliar to Kari, grins stretched across their lips, and when the teacher saw them, he left the kids to sing and walked over.


    "Yes?" he asked. "One more for the flock?"


    "Kari, our exchange student is doing an assignment," said Haralda. "She''d like to talk to Olivier about his family. Send her back to me when she''s done."


    "Of course," he said, shooting her a big wink. "Come on in, my lost child, and tell me, do you speak any French?"


    [news]Voting will close on the 3rd May at 0900 UTC</a>[/news]

 &#x1F480; 5 &#x1F480;

    <div>


    Olivier was a boy with a complexion the colour of vomit and an uncanny bone structure, but he had an easy smile. He laid out fourteen flashcards before Kari.


    He pointed to the bathroom.


    "Salle de bain," said Kari.


    He pointed to the kitchen.


    "Cuisine," said Kari.


    He pointed to the bedroom.


    "Chambre," said Kari, and so on.


    When they''d gone through all fourteen, Olivier flashed her a brilliant grin. His voice rode the melody of foreign lands.


    "Yes, very good, you say it like a real French. Which country are you from?"


    Kari blushed, watching Olivier repeat the same exercise with the other two students, and her ears knew that they were throwing themselves at the language clumsily, like toddlers trying to walk the same pace as adults.Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.


    "I don''t know," she said.


    "Bon, une citoyenne du monde," he said, clapping his hands together.


    This gesture seemed to blow aside the shutters of her memory, stirring up long forgotten feelings in her ribs, impressions of a different time and a different tongue.


    Kari remembered the tang of ash catching in her nostrils and she remembered her father running his fingers through her hair to pick out the nits, and she remembered squirming and wriggling away until he resorted to singing lullabies in his deep, throaty voice. The broken fragment of a melody bounced around her head; her heart thumped in her chest as these emotions flooded her.


    "Olivier, do you know this song?"


    She hummed it for him, but she''d never sung before, feeding her voice box notes that cracked and wobbled to the point that when she''d finished she could only look at him in despair. It sounded nothing like the ideal in her head.


    Despite her performance, he nodded, smiling as he sang, voice flowing out of his mouth like icing. Although Kari didn''t understand a word he said, and the accent of his modern French ran at ninety degrees to her father''s, she recognised this as her mother tongue.


    "My song. What''s it called?" she asked.


    "L''araign¨¦e gypsie," he said. "The spider gypsy.¡±


    "Thank you," she said, clasping his hands. "I know now how I can live again. There is a path for me, and it¡¯s not here in Madame Gunmetal''s school. I need to find my people and learn my native tongue."


    Kari welled up with resolve, standing. And then she caught sight of the red number on her hand, a mark of condemnation for her murders, the lethal option she''d chosen when she could have simply run away. The final reminder that she had no place among any people.


    Voil¨¤ la pluie ¡ª a single tear. She fell to earth.

 Interlude

    <div>


    voting results</a>


    A: Hello and welcome to ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die,¡¯ the talk show for dead people, by dead people! I¡¯m your host Alexa Despacito, and I¡¯ve scraped the bottom of the barrel for a joke in this intro so many times that I¡¯m all out of barrel, thank you for asking. Here with me tonight is Kari Serpette! How are you feeling tonight, Kari?


    K: KARI IS GONE. KARI WAS GOODNESS AND INNOCENCE AND HOPE, AND THESE THINGS ARE DEAD WITHIN ME. ONLY I REMAIN.


    A: Okay. We¡¯ll just ignore the fact that everything you say is prefaced with the letter K and a colon. Would you like to introduce yourself?


    K: I AM THE DJINN. THE DARKNESS BEHIND THE EYES, THE SHARP POINT INHERENT IN SMILES, BLOOD BENEATH THE SKIN.


    A: I take it you¡¯re a poet.


    K: THERE IS ART ONLY IN PERFORMANCE, AND MY PERFORMANCE HAS SINCE CONCLUDED. THE PILE OF BODIES IN THE ESTATE SHALL REMAIN MY MAGNUM OPUS.


    A: Yeah, about that¡­ I¡¯m pretty sure all of those people are alive again. How does that make you feel?


    K: ¡­YOU JEST? ALL OF THEM?


    A: That would appear to be the case. Sorry.


    K:  THEN I WILL SEEK A METHOD BY WHICH TO ENACT MY REVENGE. IF I MUST, I WILL WAIT UNTIL EACH OF THEM DIES, AND I WILL TORTURE THEM IN THE AFTERLIFE. I WILL SAP THE VITALITY OF THEIR SPIRITS UNTIL THEY ARE LEFT ONLY WITH FEAR. I HAVE AN ETERNITY BY WHICH I CAN DEVISE WAYS TO MAKE THEM SUFFER.


    A: Wow. Uh, good on you, I guess. How do you feel about being the fifth to die?


    K: THE AUDIENCE MEMBERS WHO VOTED FOR ME ARE MORTAL. SIMILARLY, WHEN THEIR TIME COMES, I WILL BE THERE ON THE OTHER SIDE, WAITING. IT IS A GRUDGE LIKE A FINE WINE THAT I INTEND TO FERMENT AND, IN GOOD TIME, SAVOUR.


    A: I¡¯m not sure they¡¯ll go to the same place as us. How you feel in a word then: murderous. Although, since we¡¯re in a world without murder, perhaps the more apt term would be torturous?


    K: TORTUROUS. YES. AND AS THE MILLENIA ROLL ON, I SHALL CONJURE UP NEW AND HORRIFIC WAYS OF CAUSING PAIN. THERE IS NOTHING LEFT BUT TORTURE.


    A: You¡¯re going to dedicate your afterlife to revenge? Most people kind of mellow out when they get here. What would you say to putting up your feet and taking it easy for a little while?


    K: WHAT¡¯S SOFT AND HUMAN HAS GONE TO THE WORMS. MY ESSENCE AND EXISTENCE ARE ONE IN THE SAME: REVENGE.


    A: That¡¯s just swell. Say that again into the camera, please, we¡¯ll use it for the Where Are They Now: 10,000 Years After 10,000 Words Show. It¡¯ll make for good dramatic irony.


    K: MY ESSENCE AND EXISTENCE ARE ONE IN THE SAME: REVENGE. WAS¡­ THAT SATISFACTORY? PERHAPS I CAN INTONATE MORE SCORN.


    A: Nah, that was great, thanks. My producer sensors were tingling and I know a good shot when I see one. Now, would you like to hear the reader mail?


    K: ANY INFORMATION THAT COULD IDENTIFY THESE INDIVIDUALS WILL BE USEFUL. THEY WERE, AFTER ALL, RESPONSIBLE FOR THE DEATH OF A TEN YEAR OLD GIRL.


    A: Response #4 wrote: ¡°You peaked early. Now it is your time to go.¡±


    K: WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?


    A: Oh, you know, just readers from around the world.The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    K: HOW CAN I PEAK WITHOUT HAVING LOVED, HAVING LOST, HAVING GAINED REVENGE ON THOSE WHO RUINED MY LIFE, HAVING FOUND MY PEOPLE? I WONDER IF THOSE AROUND YOU TREATED YOU WITH SUCH CRITICISM WHEN YOU WERE TEN; IF THEY QUESTIONED YOUR LIFE CHOICES WITH A TENTH OF THE HARSHNESS I HAVE ENDURED. IN TRUTH, AND I CHALLENGE YOU TO DISAGREE, MY LIFE HAD NOT YET BEGUN.


    A: The anger¡¯s coming away a little bit now. Don¡¯t get all sad on me, will you? That would undermine the strength of your convictions r.e. torturing those who did you wrong.


    K: ANGER BEGETS SADNESS. SADNESS BEGETS ANGER. IT IS A QUESTION OF ENERGY, AND I AM IN NO SHORTAGE OF THAT.


    A: Okay. Response #7 wrote: ¡°She doesn¡¯t really do anything but compare everything to what she¡¯s used to. Not dynamic.¡±


    K: I WOULD LIKE YOU TO LOOK DEEP INTO YOUR SOUL AND ASK THE SAME QUESTION OF YOURSELF. CAN YOU MAKE SENSE OF NEW SURROUNDINGS WITHOUT RELATING IT TO WHAT YOU KNOW, OR IS YOUR PERCEPTION FILTERED THROUGH A SIMULACRUM, AS MINE IS? WE CANNOT SPEAK WORDS THAT WE HAVE NOT LEARNED. FOR INSTANCE, PERHAPS YOU HAVE JUST LEARNT OF THE IDEA OF A SIMULACRUM, AND NOW IT IS IN YOUR REPERTOIRE. I WAS LEARNING. I WAS DYNAMIC. AND YOU¡­ YOU KILLED ME.


    A: Again, you keep trailing off in a way that suggests you¡¯re not so much angry as¡ª


    K: GRRR. I AM. SO. ANGRY. THERE IS NO TRACE OF COUNTERPRODUCTIVE SADNESS LEFT, ONLY HATRED.


    A: Response #9 wrote: ¡°Kari, gonna be honest, you¡¯re kinda bland.¡±


    K: BLAND? AND WHAT IS FLAVOURFUL? CAN YOU PURPORT TO BE THE SAME? PLEASE WEIGH UP THE SUM OF YOUR ESSENCE, FILTER THE SUPERFICIAL AND TELL ME IF ANYTHING AT ALL REMAINS. WHAT ARE YOU BEYOND YOUR LIKES, YOUR DISLIKES, AND YOUR PRINCIPLES? YOU CAN CUDDLE UP TO THEM ALL YOU LIKE IF IT DISTRACTS YOU FROM THE INEVITABILITY OF DEATH. BUT I WAS JUST A CHILD WHO WASN¡¯T ALLOWED LIKES, OR PRINCIPLES, AND THAT REMOVED MY HUMANITY IN YOUR EYES. WHY, ADULT? WHY DID YOU KILL SOMEONE LESS FORTUNATE THAN YOU?


    A: Response #10 wrote: ¡°I like both of you, but your violence and anger is kind of getting a bit annoying. And I already know who you killed and why. You¡¯re just a sitting duck at this point.¡±


    K: WHY? WHY? WHY DID YOU KILL ME? WHY DO WE LIVE IN A WORLD WHERE A ¡®SITTING DUCK¡¯ MUST BE KILLED? WHERE A CHILD WHO HAS KNOWN ONLY VIOLENCE AND ANGER IS DOOMED ONLY TO REPEAT IT, AND DOOMED TO DIE BY THE VERY SAME THING? WHY ARE YOU SO VIOLENT? WHY ARE YOU SO ANGRY? WHAT DID I DO WRONG? WHY ME? WHY KARI?


    A: Response #13 wrote: ¡°I like you but we already know your story. The others are still mysterious.¡±


    K: WHY? I DIDN¡¯T GET TO CHOOSE MY STORY. ALL I¡¯VE EVER WANTED WAS TO DIE, BUT IT HAS BROUGHT ME NO PEACE, AND NOW I MYSELF AM TORTURED BY THIS QUESTION: WHY DID YOU KILL ME? WHY DO PEOPLE ONLY EXPLOIT EACH OTHER? I WAS TEN! I DIDN¡¯T KNOW ANYTHING OF THE WORLD, AND NOW I¡¯M DEAD BECAUSE OF MY LACK OF MYSTERY. WHY WOULD YOU KILL SOMEONE FOR THAT? IT¡¯S NOT FAIR! I DON¡¯T UNDERSTAND!


    A: Response #18 wrote: ¡°You were interesting at first, but now your secrets are revealed and your story is kind of over. Also, I personally find the school arc with you and Haralda to be least exciting.¡±


    K: WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY


    A: Response #19 wrote: ¡°You were interesting, and I wish you had more time to see the good parts of life, like Constance said. Sorry.¡±


    K: WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY


    A: Response #28 wrote: ¡°It looks like you''re out of character development. We already know your story. Rest in peace.¡±


    K: WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHYWHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY A: Jesus Christ, Kari! Kari! Can you hear me in there? WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHYWHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY A: If you¡¯re just going to keep shouting that, we¡¯re gonna have to wrap up the show... WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHYWHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY?


    A: Are you¡­ done?


    K:


    A: Kari?


    K: I want to be alone. I¡¯m going away. I¡¯m going where there¡¯s nobody to hurt me.


    A: Who do you want to see win the game, in the end?


    A: Kari?


    A: ...Are you there?


    A: Uh. Just a moment, readers! We¡¯ll have her back in a jiffy!


    A: Any minute now¡­


    A: I feel a cough coming on.


    A: Jung qb lbh zrna fur¡¯f tbar? Fur jnf whfg urer, jnfa¡¯g fur? Jryy, lbh orggre svaq ure, be jr pna¡¯g qb gur shpxvat nsgrefubj! Lrf, abj! Zbovyvfr gurz!


    A: Sorry about that, just clearing my throat. Actually, that¡¯s all we¡¯ve got time for, folks! I¡¯ll uh, catch you next week, or sooner! Thanks for your continued support!

 5.1

    Under Haralda¡¯s rule, the class achieved their learning objectives without incident, gaining the ability to solve linear equations and convert verbs into nouns. When the bell rattled in its tinny metal case and the students filed out for break, Lizzie approached her with nothing short of reverence.


    ¡°I¡¯ve never seen them concentrate so hard before,¡± she said, wiping a tear away with a polka-dot handkerchief. ¡°How did you do that? It¡¯s amazing!¡±


    Haralda smiled, took out the pocket guide and pressed it into her colleague¡¯s hands. She declared, ¡°There¡¯s no big secret. The trick is to make sure you get the little details right, and then everything else will fall into place.¡±


    ¡°What is this?¡± asked Lizzie, flicking through hundreds of pages on everything from classroom bin placement to optimal teacher hair length.


    ¡°A guide to all the little details,¡± said Haralda, before patting her on the shoulder and strutting back down the hallway, keen to check on Kari. The child hadn¡¯t come back, which hopefully meant she¡¯d found the special educational needs classroom more welcoming ¨C Haralda felt a crushing responsibility to give her a chance at a normal childhood. A deputy head wasn¡¯t supposed to get maternal instincts, but Haralda got them just the same, and the only reason she hadn¡¯t adopted before was because the authorities didn¡¯t have any faith in single parents. Well, Kari was her chance to prove them wrong.


    In the hallway, Olivier, Olly and Olive greeted her. The special class.


    ¡°Where¡¯s Kari?¡± she asked.


    ¡°Who?¡± said Olivier, face uncomprehending. The boy looked like a warm-hearted skeleton, and despite the amount of time he¡¯d spent in the hospital, was making good strides in the catch-up classes. Soon he¡¯d be ready to rejoin Year 6.


    ¡°The girl I took to your class,¡± said Haralda. ¡°Tall, with long dark hair.¡±


    The three children looked at each other, and she saw that they were panicking because they weren¡¯t able to answer a direct question from Madame Gunmetal.


    Olive¡¯s lip wobbled as she said, ¡°You didn¡¯t bring a girl to the class, Madame Gunmetal.¡±


    The other two looked at her like she¡¯d just done a Nazi salute at a war memorial. But Haralda didn¡¯t stay to thank them; she sprinted to the special needs classroom, barrelled into the door, tumbled through, and found Kari slumped over in a chair, dead.


    ¡°No,¡± said Haralda, brushing the child¡¯s hair out of her eyes. Kari¡¯s face did not look serene. It looked twisted, pained, and angry, a cocktail of emotions that were altogether too mature for such a young person.


    There was nothing in the guidebook about this. Students did not just die in Haralda¡¯s school. She stood there, vacant, looking at the girl she¡¯d have liked to call her daughter, the girl she wanted to teach a language other than violence.


    The sight became too much, and she felt vomit surging up her throat, so she ran out the class, slamming the door behind her, and made a break for the staff toilet. She heaved. Kari was dead. A thousand tiny doors had closed. She scratched into her clipboard:


    GRIEVE ¨C


    Just like that, the emotions dissipated. They were trapped on the page and could be dealt with later, when she had the time to be weak. For now, she followed the arrow on the remote to the main hallway, where she¡¯d promised to turn back any students braving their way into the building during breaktime.


    The first students unlucky enough to attempt this were the Brick Gang. They were smiling as they walked in, but they stopped dead as soon as they saw her.


    ¡°Where do you think you¡¯re going?¡± shouted Haralda. ¡°The corridors are off limits during break!¡±


    It was against the guidebook to shout, but Haralda wasn¡¯t feeling herself. Her voice compelled the Brick Gang back, and their eyes narrowed from mutual respect to fear.


    ¡°And tell everyone,¡± she shouted. ¡°The corridors are off limits! I¡¯m to see no-one in here during break, under penalty of expulsion! There are simply no excuses for not following the code of conduct!¡±


    They scarpered, and Haralda found that she was heaving out her breaths. Why was she so angry? Why couldn¡¯t kids just follow instructions? Why did they take Kari and not her?


    CALM DOWN ¨C


    It didn¡¯t help. She wanted to smash something. Punch a wall. So it was that contrary to the original day, when a steady trickle of children came in to have a nice chat and turn around once she¡¯d explained to them the basics of fire safety, no children passed by the corridor at all. In fact, the mood on the playground was dampened so much by the Brick Gang, who thought she¡¯d expel them if they didn¡¯t inform every single student, that the children stopped running around entirely. They sat on the asphalt, murmuring to each other, unable to laugh.


    Florence, the headteacher, approached Haralda with a hot cup of tea and led her into the office. The remote kept trying to nudge her back out into the corridor, and it was right to, because Florence had never once made a cup of tea for anyone.


    ¡°Haralda, my dear,¡± said Florence, daintily. ¡°Is everything okay?¡±


    Her calmness was crushed in the battle for the room¡¯s atmosphere by Haralda¡¯s rage. A bonsai on the desk shivered, and all of its leaves dropped off.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.


    ¡°How would you feel if a student had died in the school?¡± asked Haralda. ¡°What would your reaction be?¡±


    Florence¡¯s eyebrows narrowed. She leaned over to the bookshelf and reached out for the Barden City Teacher¡¯s Guide.


    ¡°No,¡± barked Haralda. ¡°Not my opinion. Your opinion. What would Florence, the headteacher, do?¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s come over you?¡± asked Florence. ¡°Are you feeling under the weather? Why are you shouting at children and coming in here asking me about such frightful things?¡±


    Haralda slammed her fist on the desk, sending awards flying.


    ¡°Answer the question.¡±


    Florence¡¯s eyes flitted down at Haralda¡¯s fist, then back up to her face. She calmly collected the awards and propped them back up, in order ¨C BEST SCHOOL 2001, BEST SCHOOl 2002, BEST SCHOOL 2003, BEST SCHOOL 2004¡­


    ¡°I¡¯d resign,¡± said Florence. ¡°Of course I would. I¡¯d never work with children again, in fact. You can ask any teacher in this school that question and that¡¯s the response you¡¯ll get. Okay?¡±


    Haralda nodded.


    ¡°Drink your tea,¡± said Florence. ¡°You¡¯ve done so much for us over the years ¨C don¡¯t feel like you can¡¯t ask us for help. I¡¯ve sorted the food situation on my own. They¡¯re sending over pizza. Nothing needs to be done apart from some emails. Do you want to just sit in the office until lunch? Take it easy for a while?¡±


    The remote jabbed Haralda through her skirt, insistently. She finished the cup and rose, flipping past CALM DOWN and GRIEVE on her clipboard to find a list of miscellaneous tasks.


    ¡°I¡¯d love to,¡± she said, ¡°But a Deputy Head can¡¯t go shirking work. For instance ¨C CONDUCT INVENTORY OF ART SUPPLIES. They may have changed drastically since last week, and I¡¯m not about to have a shortage.¡±


    Florence blocked off her exit. ¡°A deputy head also needs to listen to her headteacher. And I¡¯m ordering you to REGULATE YOUR WELLBEING. If you go out like you are now, you¡¯ll scare the children.¡±


    Haralda glared at her, but Florence didn¡¯t wither, even under The Look. So she sighed, sat down at the desk, and drank cup of tea after cup of tea, ignoring the remote as it crackled against her thigh. By the time it was lunch, she was able to tick off CALM DOWN.


    In the corridor, she joined the flow of children towards the lunch hall, quietly relieved they didn¡¯t run away ¨C the prospect of pizza made them more boisterous as ever, and her outburst was forgotten. The remote pricked her again. She took it out of her pocket and saw it pointing to the intersection she¡¯d been guarding earlier. It made sense, as children who¡¯d eaten their lunch needed to go outside, not back through the building. She took off her clipboard shield and leaned on it as she waited ¨C after what she¡¯d done at break, she wasn¡¯t expecting anyone to try their luck.


    ¡°Thanks, Haralda,¡± said Mary, walking by, transfixed by the shield but too stunned to actually comment on it. ¡°It seems you made quite the impression on the children. Aren¡¯t you going to come and eat?¡±


    Haralda checked the remote. ¡°I shouldn¡¯t. Fires don¡¯t wait for lunch breaks, and therefore neither should I. Go on, have your lunch. I¡¯ll eat later.¡±


    Mary shrugged and walked on. More of her co-workers trailed past, thanking her for volunteering, asking whether she was going to come anyway, then moving on. It struck Haralda how none of them offered to take her place. Florence was half-right ¨C they appreciated her, sure, but they still wouldn¡¯t lift a finger to help out if it killed them.


    A sudden noise broke her out of a daydream. She looked up, and there was Olivier, skin sickly, sweating like a fire hose as he crept towards her.


    ¡°Where are you going?¡± she asked.


    He stiffened, back immediately straight. He was shuddering ¨C he swallowed, the lump catching in his throat, and then he took another step.


    ¡°Young man,¡± said Haralda. ¡°You¡¯re not allowed in the corridors during breaktime.¡±


    Her words made him stumble, and he just managed to catch himself. He lifted his head, wobbling, trying to keep eye contact.


    ¡°M-m-my b-b-bag,¡± he stammered. The outburst seemed to drain all the fight he had left in him, and his head hung limp below his shoulders.


    ¡°You need to start taking what you need from your bag before lunch,¡± she instructed.


    She checked her clipboard to see whether she could let him off just this once, but the guidance was clear ¨C a rule must be enforced consistently or it¡¯s not a rule. ¡°Go back to the hall,¡± she said. ¡°You can get what you need when you come inside after break.¡±


    Olivier¡¯s eyes drooped. He turned, unevenly shuffling back to the lunch hall. She watched him go, bemused. Now that she thought about it, that was her last memory of him ¨C he¡¯d been reassigned to a specialist hospital afterwards, and she¡¯d never had the chance to say goodbye. She took a step after him, but the remote speared her finger, pointing unrelentingly for her to remain where she was.


    She waited, and a couple of other children came to get things from their bags. She sent them back, to be consistent.


    Then Florence buzzed over, biting at her knuckles.


    ¡°Ah, Haralda,¡± she said. ¡°I¡¯ve just remembered we need to do a stock-take on the P.E. cupboard, would you mind going to do that?¡±


    Haralda moved to pencil it in on her clipboard, but Florence pushed her back in the corridor, saying, ¡°No, now. I need you to do it now because¡­ if you don¡¯t do it now, I won¡¯t be able to order new stock in time for the next term. Go on, please and thank you.¡±


    Haralda checked the remote. Sure enough, it wanted her to go in the direction of the underground P.E. cupboard, which was really a dusty old war bunker put to better use. The walls and ceiling spanned multiple meters, and Haralda hated going in there because it was so quiet that she always caught tinnitus.


    She walked away, doubt in her mind. If she¡¯d never said goodbye to Olivier, and today was the last time she¡¯d seen him, well, she wasn¡¯t an idiot¡­


    Anton waved at her frantically from outside reception. Uncannily, he wasn¡¯t putting on his usual airs, and was exuding an oddly professional aura.


    Anton said, ¡°Your French man wouldn¡¯t happen to be the father of one Olivier Chiron, would he?¡±


    The remote jammed her again, and Haralda was so fed up with the thing that she flung it in the fishtank.


    ¡°He¡¯s dead, isn¡¯t he,¡± she said.


    ¡°Already?¡± He paced around the reception, picking up objects and fiddling with them. ¡°I thought he¡¯d just gone into shock.¡±


    ¡°Shock? What do you mean?¡±


    ¡°Something to do with peanut oil on the pizza. I don¡¯t know why he didn¡¯t have an epipen on him,¡± said Anton. ¡°Florence just asked me to call the parents and arrange ¨C hey, where are you going? Haralda?¡±


    She charged down the corridor, but slowed down when she caught sight of the teachers huddling in the staff room, shouting at one another. They¡¯d laid Olivier in a chair, covering him with coats. The boy was catatonic.


    Haralda pressed open the door just a crack. They were too busy nearly coming to blows to notice her.


    ¡°Shouldn¡¯t we tell Haralda?¡± asked Lizzie. ¡°She¡¯d know what to do.¡±


    ¡°No,¡± snapped Florence. ¡°Under no circumstances can she find out about this.¡±


    ¡°Right,¡± nodded Mary. ¡°She¡¯s way too important to lose. The ambulance is coming. The parents have been called. They¡¯ll sort this out.¡±


    ¡°Are you serious?¡± cried Lizzie. ¡°What are you going to tell her, exactly? He¡¯s gone to another school?¡±


    ¡°I suppose you want to have children like the Brick Gang running wild in your class,¡± said Florence. ¡°I suppose you want us to break our nine-year streak of winning best in country.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t, but¡­¡±


    ¡°There, there.¡± Florence brought her into a tight hug. ¡°We¡¯re not lying. Just¡­ keeping her out of the way until all of this has died down.¡±


    ¡°For the good of the school,¡± said Mary. ¡°For fuck¡¯s sake, would somebody get him some water, if he dies anywhere it needs to be in the hospital for the records.¡±


    ¡°Exactly,¡± said Florence, holding a bottle to Olivier¡¯s greying lips. ¡°For the good of the school.¡±

 5.3

    <div>


    At least have the decency not to lie to yourself, Faust had said. Connie was now drumming up the courage to do just that.


    On a booking, she drove a well-to-do gentleman to a suburb on the outskirts of Barden, where the mansions outnumbered the residents. She enjoyed the way the car shuddered when she kicked it into high gear to let it loose on the motorway, blowing past SUVs and Land Rovers.


    ¡°Jolly good show,¡± brayed the gentleman, waving at the people they were leaving in the dust. ¡°Mush, mush! Arthur never has the mettle to drive at such speed!¡±


    Connie laughed as she squeezed every last rev she could out of the car, shoving torrents of water in every direction. She was flying.


    ¡°Onward, faster,¡± said the gentleman. ¡°Freer, higher!¡±


    Connie suddenly had to slam on the breaks, because the roundabout was coming up and that was the end of the motorway and the narrow roads around here forced her to crawl at 30 miles an hour. The pruned trees seemed to drift by lazily, in slow motion, and she kept catching herself accidentally going 40.


    ¡°I say,¡± said the gentleman, taking off his rain hat and wiping his brow. ¡°Deirdre was most exacting in her recommendation, and I¡¯m not a bit disappointed. Why on earth is such an excellent driver as yourself working for a scabby taxi firm? If I didn¡¯t have Arthur, I¡¯d take you on myself!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s good money,¡± Connie was about to say, the lie rising to her lips as naturally as she took her breaths. But an image of Faust¡¯s scathing expression barged its way into her mind, and it was so overpowering that she accidentally blew past a red light. A battle of two shames was bringing a blush to her cheeks that shone past her makeup ¨C was she more ashamed of being seen as a failure, or was she more ashamed of lying about it?


    ¡°Madame?¡± said the gentleman, swigging from his hip flask. ¡°It was the turning back there.¡±


    ¡°Right,¡± said Connie, swinging them round in a three-point turn before the guy could even  register it. Then the tires were crunching up the gravel of his mile-long driveway. She decided to tell him the truth, and tears welled up in her eyes as she was about to say it. Connie wasn¡¯t a crier¡­ or was it just that she¡¯d told herself she wasn¡¯t a crier because crying meant you weren¡¯t being successful? To Connie, introspecting was like trying to sort out her headphones drawer, because all she saw was a tangled mess of aspirations and justifications with no end or beginning.


    ¡°The truth is,¡± she said. She¡¯d only let one little tear go, but it had blurred her mascara and then dropped down to stain a blotch onto her immaculate white shirt.


    She felt an ant before this rich gentleman, pulling up to his mansion with its own golf course and hunting grounds; with a network of fountains that had more complicated plumbing than Barden City Centre.


    ¡°Nice place,¡± she said, craning her neck to count the main building¡¯s five stories.


    He put on his rain hat and frowned.


    ¡°I suppose,¡± he said. ¡°You¡¯d think me lucky to have inherited such a property. But the problem with being rich is that you¡¯re only allowed to socialise with rich people, and I don¡¯t like those very much at all.¡±


    ¡°Hah,¡± she said. ¡°You¡¯d be surprised how often I hear that.¡±


    ¡°Here¡¯s your fee,¡± said the gentleman, counting out how much he owed her then doubling it by slipping her a fifty. He opened the car door, summoning the gumption to step out into the rain¡ª


    ¡°The truth is,¡± said Connie. ¡°I¡¯m a driver because I couldn¡¯t get hired anywhere else. Turned down by grad schemes. Turned down by internships. Turned down by retail. So I made my own way. And now I work so much that I don¡¯t have the energy to apply anywhere else.¡±


    The man paused. She tried to read his expression in the rearview mirror, but it was hidden by his hat. A guillotine hung over her head. She wiped her face and found it wet, but she wasn¡¯t even convulsing, and her voice was steady ¨C the tears were just running forth like she¡¯d accidentally left a tap on. For the first time in her adult life, she was vulnerable.


    ¡°Mmm,¡± said the gentleman, nodding. ¡°My grandson is going through something similar. Certainly, it¡¯s harder than it was in my day.¡±


    ¡°What?¡± She turned around. He hadn¡¯t admonished her. Hadn¡¯t told her she should¡¯ve been doing better.


    ¡°The most important skill you can learn is to ask for help when you need it,¡± he said. ¡°It¡¯s nothing to be ashamed of ¨C my friends and I bail each other out of scandals all the time. Don¡¯t suffer in silence, my dear, or suffering will be all you know.¡±


    ¡°I¡­ yes,¡± said Connie. She reached for her tissue box and wiped her eyes. She blinked, trying to read any sort of hostility on the leathery bag of skin that was his face.


    ¡°If you decide to pursue certification as a chauffeur, I¡¯d be glad to offer you sponsorship in the form of a small loan. Don¡¯t hesitate to ask.¡±


    ¡°I¡­ I¡­¡± Connie stared at him, mouth agape. The part of her brain that was supposed to be feeding her words seized up.


    He tucked a business card into the cupholder.¡°I suppose you must have a busy schedule and all, so I¡¯ll be off. Ta-ta, my dear, and don¡¯t lose hope!¡±The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    The gentleman¡¯s butler took his belongings and welcomed him into the gigantic door of his mansion, and he gave a little wave before disappearing into its depths. It was ten o¡¯clock at night, and Connie sat there in his driveway as the rain splashed down on her car, running off it in rivers.


    She felt the most embarrassed she¡¯d ever felt, but at the same time, a weight that she hadn¡¯t even known had been tugging her into the depths of despair had lifted. Her reflection stared back at her, makeup ruined, and she instinctively reached for the little kit bag to retouch it. What her hand brought back instead were the makeup wipes.


    She took the mask off. It took the whole pack of wipes to do.


    This was Connie, looking back at her. Connie with the spots, with the laugh lines, with the off-coloured cheeks. Flaws and all. The skin on her face breathed in the cool air with joy.


    (At least have the decency not to lie to yourself. The most important skill you can learn is to ask for help when you need it.) Was she ready?


    She snapped a selfie on her phone, of the woman who was not the ideal self but simply the reality, and she set it as her profile picture without adding a filter or even a tag like ¡®no makeup challenge¡¯. Instantly, the likes rolled in, and people she didn¡¯t know commented things like ¡®Yaaaas queen¡¯ and ¡®Such a powerful statement!¡¯


    ¡°What,¡± she murmured. Her normal self was a statement, with the ideal fake being the status quo?


    The likes racked up, easily leaping the one-hundred hurdle. At this point, the men began trying to DM her. And she realised, with a growing sickness in her stomach, that no matter what she posted, it would be taken as a statement with performative intent. She scrolled through the photos she¡¯d added in the last year ¨C extravagant breakfasts, a 360 view of her apartment with no corner left untouched, a 1,000 photo chronicle of her finding happiness in Ibiza ¨C and then she looked back at her face in the mirror of her crappy old taxi. Which one was Connie? Which one was happy?


    At 10:30, she deleted her account and cruised back down the motorway, ready to pick up Alan MacCain in Slumsfield, Barden.


    Connie had spent a year of her childhood in Slumsfield. She had the scars to prove it. Shuffling creatures in hoodies lurked the streets, and they fed on the wallets of tourists. Streetlights flickered on and off, struggling to make headway against the omnipresent gloom of smog, while the majority of windows were boarded up; the majority of doors cowered behind iron bars. It is said that a policeman once stepped into Slumsfield and spontaneously combusted.


    Connie kept the spray can of capsaicin in her hand, but truthfully, she would have preferred a gun. She kept her speed up as she followed the GPS to Alan MacCain¡¯s pub, because the streets in this part of town seemed to shift and reformulate themselves in defiance of her memory.


    The plan was to arrive outside the pub at exactly 11 o¡¯ clock, pick him up, and get straight out. If she was early, she¡¯d take a wide circle around the block, and under no circumstances would she park ¨C that was a surefire way to get a taxi without wheels, and inevitably, an engine. Getting out of Slumsfield on foot wasn¡¯t possible for anyone short of a prize MMA fighter.


    When she arrived at the pub, it was 10:56, so she circled around the block. The pub¡¯s lettering had been nicked, and all the windows were boarded up, with the only indicator that it was open being the spray paint on the door that invited in punters with no less than ten unique expletives.


    She¡¯d never wondered the first time round on account of knowing nothing about him, but what was Alan MacCain, the mild-mannered Scottish IT worker doing in a run-down pub in Slumsfield? With one minute until the decisive moment, she didn¡¯t have any time to figure it out. She turned the corner again, easing her foot ever so slightly off the gas, and there it was, the scene that haunted her dreams and tormented her in her quietest moments.


    Alan MacCain was running. Despite his macintosh streaked with blood, he was making good pace. Hot on his tail behind him, feet thundering over the crimson droplets, were two of those frightful shuffling creatures in hoodies, one extraordinarily fat, one angularly thin, one with a carving knife, one with a smoking revolver.


    ¡°Taxeh! Stop! Stop!¡± hollered Alan MacCain, his voice absorbed by the gloom. He lurched, nearly falling over, reaching his hands out for the car.


    There was a deafening gunshot, and Connie saw a bullet skim her car, thundering into a wall on the opposite side of the street. Her heart thumping in her chest, she yelped and dropped the capsaicin. Another gunshot; another near miss.


    ¡°He¡¯s out! Reloading!¡± yelled Alan. ¡°Slow down and let me in!¡±


    The gunman fumbled with the rounds, getting them out of his hoodie pocket and clicking them into place. Connie wasn¡¯t sure if there¡¯d be time to get MacCain in the car safely. If she slowed down, the two assailants would have a few free shots at her¡­


    It was the kind of snap decision that defined your whole life.


    (You have the net, and the audience is watching. Get out and defeat them. Save Alan MacCain. Be successful. What is Connie if not successful?)


    She actually started slowing down to do it, as well. And then she saw Faust peering around the corner, watching everything, his eyes wide with fear at the gunshots, clutching his double-edged sword, watching what she would do. He was here the whole time? But¡­ why?


    It didn¡¯t matter. She owed him the truth. She owed him that much, at least.


    ¡°Slow down!¡± hollered MacCain. ¡°Let me in, goddamn it! Taxi!¡±


    Connie shook her head; mouthed sorry. Hit the gas. Sped off. Watched him get riddled with bullets in the rearview mirror, watched him fall down, watched his blood pool out and mix with the rain. And then she turned the corner, put it out of her mind, and pretended it had never happened. At least, that¡¯s what she¡¯d done the first time. She hit pause, got out of the car and walked back over to the pub, the raindrops taking form and splashing her mid-air as she passed through them.


    Faust loomed over Alan MacCain¡¯s body, checking over his wounds. The two assailants were frozen, their weapons out in front of them. Connie recognised them as the two men who had been in her taxi earlier.


    ¡°Why are you here?¡± she asked. Couldn¡¯t take her eyes off the body.


    ¡°Was that the truth?¡± Faust said. He was soaked, dripping from head to toe. ¡°Was that what really happened?¡±


    She wiped a wet hand over her cheek, rubbing out a stray fleck of foundation. Her heart was beating harder than it had ever beaten.


    ¡°Yeah,¡± she said. ¡°That¡¯s the truth of it. I was the only person who could have stopped him from dying, and I drove off.¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± said Faust. He sighed, deeply and heavily. ¡°Well, it¡¯s what happened. No changing it now.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re not gonna chew me out for this?¡± she asked. ¡°Shouldn¡¯t you be livid? Shouldn¡¯t you be screaming ¡®How dare you abandon him in his time of need¡¯, ¡®How dare you only think about yourself¡¯, ¡®How dare you lie about it to the police¡¯?


    ¡°You lied about it to the police?¡±


    ¡°Well?¡± asked Connie, holding out her arms in a come-and-get-it gesture. The police had come the following morning, pleading with her for any information, no matter how small, that might lead to apprehending the perpetrators. And she¡¯d told them that she¡¯d drove around, unable to find him, and eventually went home thinking it was a prank.


    Faust just sighed, looked her up and down, looked at the diorama, and shrugged. He punched her lightly on the shoulder.


    He said, ¡°It looks like you¡¯ve beaten yourself up enough on your own. Far be it from me to add to that. Look, it¡¯s alright. It¡¯s okay. It¡¯s just what happened. Look, no, Connie, really, it¡¯s okay. It¡¯s okay.¡±


    He smiled awkwardly, and it was infectious enough for her to smile as well. For the first time in years, she relaxed her posture, her shoulders slumping thankfully into a resting position. It was okay.

 5.4

    <div>


    Deep in the bowels of Slumsfield, inside the dusty storeroom of a sagging flat-roof pub named The Fleet, Alan MacCain received a hearty welcome. The hearty welcome, in Slumsfield tradition, involved a blow to the head that knocked him out cold. Faust, who was making the roof of the pub sag further by climbing on it, watched from behind a dislodged tile as a team of gangsters tore off the Scotsman''s macintosh and strapped him down to a table.


    An eyepatched mafiosa distinguished herself by ordering around the collective mass of hired muscle, and she generated a dastardly aura that made it difficult to think of the others as anything but animals. They brought in a drill that was mounted on a rig, hung it over Alan MacCain''s groin, plugged it in, then slapped him until he woke up.


    "What are ye doing?" cried the scotsman, wriggling uselessly under the straps. He looked up to see the drill hanging a meter above the zipper on his trousers, and he let out a great cry. "Ach, why''s it always a threat to my masculinity?"


    "You survived the oil rig blowing up," said the mafiosa, stroking his face with a gloved hand. "Who are you playing today? Paul Bolton, Derek Lornsley, or the classic Alan MacCain? We figured it was time for something a little more personal."


    "Rosemary?" said Alan. "You traitor! Who are you working for this time? The Iron Triad? Jack MacCain, my brother? Or Dr. Paperclip? Or the Hippie King? Or the Federation of Radioactive Fascists¡ª"


    ¡°It¡¯s a crowd-funded venture, sweetheart," said Rosemary, "Did you really believe there was a Drug Overlord in Slumsfield? Where others see socio-economic problems, you look for someone to tackle into a vat of acid. Well, my clients are sick of it. Lower the drill!"


    It was a very cost-efficient deathtrap. Faust watched, bewildered, as a man with a cue-ball for a head gripped the drill and brought it downwards, agonisingly slowly. Was this all some big practical joke on him, or something? Did things like this actually happen in real life?


    "Ye won''t get away with this," shouted Alan. "Someone will come along to save me unexpectedly! They always do!"


    Faust raised his head and checked the street, but the only thing rushing through it was the rain. His shirt stuck to his chest, and his fingers had pruned up beyond recognition, and he was cold, and he was loving it. He''d always found beauty in suffering. Each extra drop of chilling rain that saturated his head resembled a kiss.


    The grunt brought the drill inches away from Alan MacCain''s masculinity. The men in the storeroom crossed their legs, wincing sympathetically. A part of Faust wanted to drop down and save him, but it was a guilty thought, because it would¡¯ve been doing the exact opposite of what he told Connie to do, and it wouldn¡¯t have changed what really happened. Even if it hurt to watch, the truth was the only thing that mattered now.


    "Barden''s different," said Rosemary, gritting her teeth. "Nobody''s coming tonight. You''re all out of luck, Alan."


    The drill, closer now, shredded through the top layer of fabric.


    "If anyone in this room wants to live," said Alan. "I advise them to put down the drill."


    "Put down the drill?" asked Rosemary. "Sure. Lower it!"


    "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!" screamed the scotsman. Then he looked down and saw they were drilling into the table beside his leg.


    "Very funny," he said.


    "We got a lot more backers than we were expecting," she said, pulling the drill back up to a meter''s height. "For every million, we''ll fake you out. Until we don''t."


    Faust shivered. He''d never seen anyone so absolutely hated. Sure, the people in his life weren''t exactly on his side, but nobody had ever pooled together for a hitman. Hell, he was somehow still alive in this death game, and he had no idea why.


    "I''ve got a trick as well," said Alan. Underneath the straps, he dislocated the bones in his body, making a horrible cracking sound as he slipped free, and then he was standing up, clicking everything back into place.


    "I-impossible," said Rosemary. "Get him!"


    The eight henchmen charged him, and Alan dispatched them all in such a rapid flurry of strikes that all of their bodies thudded to the floor in unison.


    "They remade me, after the oil-rig explosion," said Alan, cricking his neck. "They had the technology."


    Rosemary wasted no time in charging him with the drill, and the enemies locked themselves into a wrestling match, grappling at each other''s limbs, trying to turn the other''s weight against them. MacCain had the obvious size advantage, but Rosemary was better at slipping out of his grip, and the drill gave her the leeway to move around and stab at him threateningly. For a time, the pair were locked in each other''s arms, and the sexual tension was embarrassing. Then they were back to pushing against each other, their hands at each other''s necks.


    "Sorry we''re late, boss!" said the angular lad who was in Connie''s taxi earlier. He took one look at the scuffle in the room, at the bodies on the floorboards, and shot Alan MacCain through the stomach.


    Faust¡¯s ears rang, and he rubbed his sodden scalp, annoyed at the fact this was going to give him yet another pounding headache. The scotsman howled, cutting through the tinnitus. Rosemary seized the opening she needed to jam the drill straight through his palm and out the other side.Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    An alarm went off in Alan¡¯s pocket, chiming eleven times.


    "We''ve got you now," she purred.


    "Shall I finish him?" asked the lad.


    Alan wrenched his hand away, screaming. He kicked Rosemary over, then sprinted out the room, charged out of the pub and flagged down Connie''s taxi, who had arrived right on cue. Faust slipped down the roof, lowering himself off a dustbin to the ground, and peered around the corner to watch the final moments of the Scotsman.


    **


    Back to the flat at midnight.


    After spending the better part of the day soaked, it felt amazing to swaddle up next to a radiator in a patchwork of Connie''s towels. Droplets ran down the windows in mesmerising patterns, inches from Faust''s face. His eyes drooped amidst the sound of pitter-pattering and the scent of lavender, and though his feet were sore, it was the good kind of sore.


    Connie laid the Net of Lies on the table and frowned at it in between sipping a mug of cocoa. Her campaign of pokes and prods failed to produce any sort of glow. Yet something about her was different, even if Faust couldn''t quite explain it without resorting to poetry -- her face looked more mature, not necessarily older, but lean with the cost of experience. She''d changed out of her tuxedo into a baggy jumper and pyjama bottoms imprinted with designer logos.


    "Come to terms, already," she said, threading the net through her fingers. She sighed.


    With great effort, Faust rotated his bundle of towels so that he could turn to better watch her, the radiator now burning against his back. He had to keep moving to spread the heat around.


    "Don''t force it," he said.


    She pointed at the wordcount, and made a strained face in defeat.


    In response, he just blinked. It had been a long time since he''d had a full night''s sleep, and there was nothing more relaxing than drying off after getting soaked. He realised, oddly, that he felt content. By contrast, Connie was growing ever more restless, pacing about the apartment in broad strides, yanking out strands of her hair, pouring more milk and cocoa powder into a saucepan on her stove.


    When exactly had the tables turned?


    He said, "Talk to me. Come and sit down and let''s have us a dialogue."


    She sat on the floor, the length of the coffee table between them, and she looked as tired as he felt, even if anxiety forced her body to keep moving in odd little jerks.


    "What do you want to talk about?" she said, obscuring her mouth with the cocoa mug.


    "I guess..." he said. "I guess I''m sorry I flipped out at you earlier."


    She shook her head. "It was exactly what I needed to hear, man."


    He could almost see the air quivering around her. There was something keeping her at arm''s length, and it wasn''t the table. Faust couldn''t help but read into her body language and infer overwhelming blasts of rejection and alienation and hatred and derision, but he powered through these feelings, because he was starting to feel like Connie might be worth powering through all of that for.


    She turned her back to him, looking at him through the reflection in the window instead.


    "How often do you lie to people?" she asked. "Like, what''s a sort of normal level of lying that normal people do?"


    "I''m hardly a normal person," said Faust, shrugging.


    "Please?" The desperation in her voice alarmed him.


    He leaned back, staring at the high ceiling, and thought about it. What kind of things did he lie about? He saw himself on stage, with the entirety of his teenage audience on their feet, clapping, whooping, screaming for an encore. It was a painful memory, and immediately he felt mired in the bog of melancholy.


    "''I''m not much of a singer''," said Faust. "''I''m not very good, really''; ''I''m just a beginner''. Perhaps that''s the lie I tell most."


    "You''re a singer?"


    "No, not really..." He hung his head. "I mean, yes, yes I am. It''s just automatic for me to think I''m not good at it. Do you know how painful that is to say? Declaring to people that I''m good at singing is torture, and I just crumble at the idea of anyone expecting anything from me!"


    Connie looked at his reflection, and drank deeply before putting the empty mug on the table.


    "You mean you lie to make yourself look worse than you are?" she said. "Man, why the hell would you do that?"


    "Because I don''t think I deserve anyone''s respect. And I don''t want to get their hopes up and disappoint them."


    "Man," she said, getting two beers out of the fridge and passing him one. "I don''t get how you can speak so openly about your darkest feelings like that."


    He took a deep swig of the beer, annoyed that just remembering one period of his life had irked him to the point of no longer feeling relaxed. His face fell.


    "For me," said Connie, sitting cross legged next to him. "It''s the opposite."


    She studied his face to see his reaction, and he realised she was doing the same thing that he''d just done to her, and he wondered what kind of overpowering judgement she thought was coming off him. There was no expression he could make that wouldn''t come across as negative -- a smile would be mocking, a frown would be disappointing, a neutral face would be boredom.


    "To Team Shame," he said, clinking her bottle.


    They drank. The cool beer seemed to wash the stormy thoughts down his throat, but just as soon other thoughts sprang up.


    "You''re so good at singing."


    "Faust? He''s so good at singing."


    "You''ve got so much potential, young man."


    "Oh, it''s Faust! Can you sing something for us?"


    And yet he spent his lunches alone. And he never had friends round after school. And he never received any awards or recognition for anything other than that one talent, so he stopped singing, and then he simply became invisible, and the only mark he left on the places he''d been educated was his name on the register.


    That was years ago, now, and to everyone he''d met in his professional life he was just a dabbler in karaoke, working on his talent for when he''d be ready to join an amateur opera group or band, and when he was sure that he was alone he''d sing for his audience of cadavers in the resonant church.


    Without his realising it, they''d gone onto the second beer. Connie seemed ready to say more.


    "See," she said. "I feel... really uncomfortable... if anyone doesn''t think I''m perfect."


    "Sure," said Faust.


    "If there''s anything that might paint me in a bad light, I''ll just lie about it. And I''ve gotten so good at it that it''s become automatic, that I don''t even let myself think about my problems. Man, I''m telling you this because you''re the only one who seems to get it. You know what that pain''s like, don''t you? I can see it when you stare into space."


    "Well, yeah," said Faust, laughing. "I hate myself... I think. I suppose it''s not outlandish to assume you''re not rich?"


    She gulped, a lump rising in her throat. For awhile she sat there like a child gathering the courage to step out onto an ice rink for the first time.


    "I''m about ¡ê300,000 in debt," she said.


    He stared at her, eyebrows furrowing.


    "I''m obviously not a chauffeur, I''m a taxi driver," she said, voice growing ever faster, excited. "I can''t afford any pods for my ExPressoMaker. And... please don''t hate me for this, but I''ve never really felt happy, or like I''ve made it, and I''ve never felt in love because I could never open up. I knew exactly how Alan MacCain died before we even went through with reliving this whole day and I didn''t tell you because I didn''t want you to think I was a scumbag. And that¡¯s probably why Alan held me responsible instead of the guy that shot him, or that Rosemary woman, because I looked him right in the eyes, saw him as a problem, and then lied to myself that he didn¡¯t exist."


    She breathed out the deepest sigh he''d ever heard and downed her bottle before slamming it on the table with a thud. The Net of Lies shone a deep green.

 5.6 — VOTING OPEN

    <div>


    The path to the nature reserve hugged the beach, shaded by a thicket of conifers. It had just gone noon, and the forest was uproarious with birds and insects and little lizards that skittered across the burning sand. In his white gown, Saheel sailed through the thick humidity, grateful for the way it caught the salted breeze and funneled it over his skin, grateful for the softness of the earth beneath his sandals, grateful for the blanketing ambience of the sea as it breathed in and out.


    As tends to happen on outings, the husbands fell into a rhythm that outpaced their wives and soon found themselves turning a corner out of sight.


    "You guys go on ahead," said Asha, hooking the picnic basket around Saheel''s arm. It was heavy, but the ice packs inside it refreshed him. "We''re just gonna sit down for awhile."


    "I''m sorry, I''m not used to walking like this," said Dove, her face flushed over, sipping water every few steps. Her tight summer dress looked anything but breathable.


    "That''s alright," said Saheel. "It''s all in the clothing, here. We''ll wait for you when we get to that cliff by the car park."


    The women found a branch at the side of the path to sit on, and they sat and stared out into the endless horizon of blue and teal, speaking with an ease that suggested they''d known each other for years. It was one of Asha''s talents. On the night Saheel had met her, she''d drawn him in closer than he''d ever felt to anyone, and he''d known with an uncanny certainty that she was to be his wife -- and because he''d known it, he never felt that proposing was a decision. Asha was the antidote to his overthinking.


    "Shall we?" asked Sean, crunching over the carpet of pine cones as they went onwards, round the bend and up the hill.


    Until now, they''d shared mostly pleasantries, comments about the fineness of the breeze, the peace of the forest, and they''d marvelled jointly at god''s creation. But such remarks quickly ran dry, and they inevitably fell upon the topic of how they''d changed since their university days.


    "I see you''re still going about in sweaters," said Saheel. "No matter the heat."


    "It''s cold," said Sean. "It''s been cold since the day I was born. I don''t know how else to explain it."


    "I''m not judging," said Saheel. "Hang on, I got a thorn in my sandal."


    He stopped to pick it out. In turn, Sean untied his shoes and shook them onto the path, pouring out what seemed like endless buckets of sand.


    Sean said, "You used to judge a lot. I remember you never liked it when we all went out partying instead of hitting the books."


    "Yeah, well," said Saheel. "I''ve mellowed out, maybe. I was just sick of being the only one to turn up at 9AM lectures. After all, most early morning services--"


    "Start at eight, yeah. We''ve all mellowed out, mate."


    "Still," said Saheel. "Forgiveness. It''s a tricky thing."


    They continued, climbing the hill at a steady pace, earning a better and better view of the sun as it glistened off the waves. The air was thick with peace, and it troubled Saheel that the day would end in murder.


    How to broach the subject?


    He said, "You told me once that a vicar has to find it in his heart to forgive people, brother. Do you think that''s still true?"


    "Was that before you stormed out of Mary''s office?" Sean shielded his eyes from the glare of the sun. "Look, if you''d just asked, I''d have been happy to swap with you."


    "Really?"


    "Hell, Sandbank? Look at it! It''s beautiful!"


    With fresh eyes, Saheel looked at the town he''d spent twenty years of his life in, at the striped canopies, the sandstone columns, the wooden beach house chapel just barely visible as a small blob of brown.


    "Don''t tell me you''re jealous," said Saheel. "Barden was incredible for your career. You''re practically famous, country-wide. You''ve got book deals. And you''ve still got Dove!"


    "Guess the grass is greener," said Sean, fingering his ring. "Don''t tell me you''re still holding a grudge about that. After all these years--"


    "No, brother. I''m happy that you and Dove have worked out so well. I forgive you. Sorry I didn''t come to your wedding."


    Sean laughed at that, and shook hands with the person who would murder him in just a few hours as if it was the start of a lifelong friendship.


    He said, "I forgive you for that, too. See how good it feels to forgive, mate? Anyway, you''ve got yourself a pretty fine wife in Asha, haven''t you, you devil? Surprised you haven''t got five kids by now!"


    Saheel grinned. "There are some benefits to being a protestant."


    They reached the top of the cliff by the car park, and they perched on the edge in the full heat of the sun, letting their feet dangle over the drop while they waited for their wives. The parrots in the nearby reserve sang in full concert. The melody danced in their ears.


    Saheel couldn''t stop looking at Sean. There was no boy left in that man, a man that seemed so at peace with his surroundings that it was impossible to avoid feeling guilty about the fate that awaited him. Waves pounded against the rocks below them. Last summer, a riptide had caught a young boy and knocked him unconscious against the very same cliff. Saheel had led the funeral.


    "You wrote a book on forgiveness, right?" he said, a lump rising in his throat.Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.


    Sean''s mouth twisted up at the edges as he idly traced circles in the sand, making the sand flies hop away.


    "You really seem to want to talk about it," said the Barden vicar. "Is something eating you? Do you want to make a confession?"


    "I don''t know, brother," said Saheel, gazing in vain at the horizon for an answer. "A good Christian shouldn''t even question it."


    Sean nodded. "I see. Well, I''m all about radical forgiveness. Punch me in the face? Forgiven. Steal my wallet? Forgiven. Sleep with my wife? Forgiven. It just makes it easier, you know? I never held with Casus Belli or any of that. It''s about what the big J would do."


    "So, if I killed you..."


    "Forgiven."


    Saheel''s jaw dropped. "Just like that?"


    Sean nodded. "Just like that."


    "But wouldn''t you get angry? I mean, that''s your life that someone''s just ended there, brother.And what about Eir-- Dove? Doesn''t it make you angry to think about how I''d make her a widow? You¡¯ve still got so much ahead of you. How could you forgive me so quickly?"


    "That''s what you never got, mate," said Sean. "You don''t decide to forgive, in the same way you don''t decide to resent. It''s not a decision. You live it. You breathe forgiveness. So yeah, you kill me? I forgive you."


    Saheel stared at him, lost for words. Before he could even decide what to say, Asha snuck up behind him and wrapped him in a hug, then held him even tighter because in his startlement he nearly slipped off his second cliff of the day.


    Next to him, Dove laid a hand on Sean''s shoulder absentmindedly. The fluttering of the parrots'' colourful feathers through the trees had completely drawn her attention.


    "I haven''t suffered through all of this for nothing," she said. "Let''s go and see the birds!"


    ¡°Yar!¡± said Asha.


    Sean laughed; Saheel laughed.


    ¡ª


    The group made it to nightfall, through countless plates of Asha''s mussels and chips, through a bottle of wine, and now they were drinking gin on the sofas as they watched the last sliver of pink evaporate over the horizon. They turned out the lights in the house. Above them, magnified through the clear glass of the conservatory roof, the nebulae were already out and swirling. Stars beamed messages of blue and red.


    Cosy was the word for it. The two couples felt comfortable in each other''s presence, and they spoke in calm, low murmurs about nothing much at all.


    "This is an amazing gin," said Dove, swishing it around in a tumbler as she rested her head on Sean''s shoulder.


    "Sure is," agreed her husband. "Where''d you even find a gin like this? Some kind of Sandbank special?"


    "It''s just from Tesco," said Asha. "It''s not a special gin or anything."


    "Really? Same deal with the coffee and the wine. I''m thinking it''s the air around here. Everything just tastes better. Let me guess ¡ª I bet they do a good rum here."


    "How¡¯d you know that¡¯s the specialty?" said Saheel. "One of the ladies at the parish makes it."


    "We bought a couple of shares in her company," said Asha. "We''ll show you the shop sometime."


    ¡°I¡¯d die to taste some of that,¡± said Sean, looking at the liquor cabinet.


    "You guys probably want to try some, don''t you? As you can imagine, we¡¯ve got bottles of the stuff," said Asha, getting a set of shot glasses out the cabinet.


    "Fu-- frick yeah," said Dove, rosy-cheeked. "That sounds amazing."


    "Language, darling. You guys are spoiling us," said Sean. He downed the rest of his tonic. "We couldn''t give you half as much in Barden. My vicarage is an apartment, for crying out loud."


    "And we live opposite this nightclub." Dove screwed up her face. "So not only do we get to bump shoulders with whores on our street, we have to keep the windows closed at night or the music drives us mad."


    "Whores?" said Saheel, taken aback.


    "She''s got this thing about how people dress," said Sean, ruffling her hair. "I keep telling her not to stress about it, but really, she loves to spend Friday nights staring out that window and muttering all sorts of ungodly things."


    "She has a name," said Dove.


    Saheel poured the rum, wincing alongside Asha, who nodded and was already winding up a smile.


    "What are we toasting to, then?" she asked, handing them the shots.


    "The perfect end to a pirate''s day out." Sean winked, and they laughed.


    The rum was like a gunshot to Saheel''s chest, and it set his lungs ablaze. He couldn''t say much about the taste because it scorched and overwhelmed his tongue. Dutifully, he filled up a carafe of water and refilled the tumblers.


    Dove fanned her breath then gulped down the water.. "That''s a bit too much for me, thanks. I mean, I¡¯m not saying it¡¯s bad, but¡­ wow."


    No sooner had she put it down than Sean had downed it as his second shot.


    "Wow," he said, wobbling, pressing on the armrest. "The heck is in that? Hot sauce? That''s the stuff, alright! I''m just gonna take off my sweater. Sorry for flashing you, Asha -- I could do with a bottle of that!"


    Asha drank hers in graceful, measured sips. "We''ll take you to the shop sometime. There''s stronger ones than that. It doesn''t so much as take the edge off, as make you forget there was ever an edge in the first place."


    Saheel laughed.


    "Amen," said Sean, and he slumped back on the sofa with his arms spread out, staring up into space. "That rum seals it. Sandbank. What an incredible place, huh, honey?"


    "Sure," whispered Dove. "I mean, I liked the parrots, but it''s a bit hot for me."


    "You get used to it. Of course you get used to it. Go on, Saheel, I bet you were uncomfortable when you first arrived, but you got used to it, didn''t you? People get used to all kinds of things. I could get used to this heat."


    Dove said, "We couldn''t get used to the nightclub."


    "That''s different. You know it is. Saheel, tell me this isn''t paradise."


    "Sure thing, brother," he said. "You look like you wouldn''t mind another dose of brain rot."


    But a brief conversation in eye-contact between the couple seemed to deny it, so instead they switched to coffee.


    "Such an amazing blend," cried Sean. "I don''t know if it''s the air here, or what! Asha, Saheel ¡ª you¡¯re incredible!"


    "You''re repeating yourself, honey," said Dove, looking at her watch. She stiffened, and her smile didn''t seem to reach her eyes.


    He pouted. "You want to look at the videos I shot earlier? Man, I''m glad we took videos in a place like this. You need a memory aid for the sights and sounds. We should have brought the proper camera."


    "I can remember them perfectly well," said Dove, already finished with her coffee. "I don''t need to look at a picture of a parrot on a tiny screen to remember what it looked like."


    "You want to see them, Saheel?" he asked, pressing the phone into his hands. "Tell me what you think of these shots I took."


    "Sure, brother," said Saheel. He began swiping through them, and to be honest, immediately agreed with Dove. He may as well have been looking at an image search for the word ''Parrot''. He wasn¡¯t sober enough to hide the burst of laughter that escaped him.


    "It''s getting kind of late, isn''t it?" asked Dove.


    "Don''t let us keep you," said Asha, standing up. "It''s been great having you here. We''ll have you round any time you like, just give us a day''s notice."


    "I''m still finishing my coffee," said Sean, initiating another sparring match of eye contact between him and his wife. He poured a dash of rum into it.


    ¡°You can take the mug with you, if you want,¡± said Asha. ¡°That way you¡¯ll have an excuse to pop round again. Go on, Saheel, give him his phone back.¡±


    ¡°He wants to look at the parrots,¡± said Sean. ¡°Let him look.¡±


    Saheel reached the end of the gallery, and out of curiosity, swiped further left through the images. Sean had captured nearly every angle of the beach hut church. Before that, it seemed he''d catalogued every shell he''d found in the sand. And then he came upon a shot that, impossibly, came from inside his own house that was dated to Wednesday.


    "At this rate, we''re not going to be able to drive home," said Dove.


    "We can walk," said Sean. "It''s a beautiful night."


    ¡°Do you want me to call you a taxi?¡± asked Asha. ¡°I don¡¯t mind calling you guys a taxi. Come on, Saheel, give him the phone back.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve done enough for us,¡± said Sean. ¡°Don¡¯t trouble yourself.¡±


    Saheel zoomed in on the picture, probing the reflection in an empty wine-glass on the counter, and in the reflection of the wine-glass he saw his wife and his new friend standing in the middle of his kitchen as naked as the day they were baptised.


    Voting will close on the 17th May at 09:00 UTC</a>

 &#x1F480; 6 &#x1F480;

    <div>


    First the staff room melted away, where the teachers were huddled around the anaphylactic Olivier, and next the walls of Barden City Primary School twisted into liquid to hit the ground with a splash, and finally the skyline of Barden City swirled into nothingness. Haralda was left in a void next to the doors of the lift.


    She produced her clipboard and read every single note, every instruction she''d left to herself in the past nine years as a deputy head. Then, calmly, she tore the sheets into thin strips, tore the thin strips into shreds, tore the shreds into confetti, and tore the confetti into dust. By the time she was finished her hands stung with red-hot cuts and bled with penance.


    As a final note, she snapped her pencil in half, dropping it below her feet where it sunk into the abyss. In this way, she freed herself from the system that had led to the death of the Frenchman, and her mind was assaulted by a thousand postponed anxieties; crushed under the weight of nine years'' success.


    Haralda didn''t know what to do. Her legs gave out, and she fell to her knees. There was no way to sort the good options from the bad. There was no compass for her behaviour. It was as if the skeleton inside her had turned to mist. She couldn''t hold her head high anymore.If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    The Frenchman studied her down his nose, his bare-chested torso blocking out the tiniest glint of light from the elevator shaft. Within a second of appearing, he had ripped the Clipboard Shield free from her back and let it fall into nothingless, making Haralda cry out before she even knew why.


    Her phone rang. She fumbled for it in the dark, and the Frenchman waited with his arms folded while she willed herself to pick it up. But she couldn''t summon the conviction, and the effort was too much, leaving her to roll over helplessly while the Frenchman answered it, put it on speaker phone, and toss it to her so that he could talk.


    "My name is Louis Chiron," his voice boomed, distorted through her low-quality sound chip. "On the 17th of April 2006, my son died before my eyes in an ambulance as it thundered through the streets, and when I pleaded with him to tell me who was responsible, he gave me your name. Madame Gunmetal. Do you have anything to say for yourself?"


    Haralda shook her head. There was no foundation for anything, anymore. No good. No evil. No justification for any behaviour. So it was that she did nothing.


    "I was getting worried," said the Frenchman, as he lifted her up by the neck in a fist the size of a boulder. "Dabbling in the occult has its risks, but my audience voted for you eventually, and so every drop of blood I shed was worth it to avenge my son."


    "Killing me won''t get him back," said Haralda. "Nothing will get him back."


    The memories streamed out of her into him.


    DIE ¡ª CHECK

 Interlude

    <div>


    Voting results</a>


    A: Hello and welcome to ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die¡¯, the talk show for dead people, by dead people! I was, am, and always will be your host Alexa Despacito, forever and ever and ever, and ever and ever, thank you for asking! Here with me tonight is Haralda Gunmetal! How are you feeling, Haralda?


    H: I have felt everything; what¡¯s left is nothing. At the very least, I¡¯m glad to be out of that horrid game.


    A: Right. Do you have anything to say about what Louis told you?


    H: What¡¯s left to say? The proper thing is to apologise, but I no longer trust the proper thing, for it brought about the death of a child. Unfortunately, I don¡¯t know how to act in an improper way, so the only thing I can do now is not act at all.


    A: You won¡¯t be drawing up a new clipboard to keep you entertained during the afterlife?


    H: How could I? If it comes from me, then it can¡¯t be trusted. If there¡¯s a way around it then I haven¡¯t found it, and I shall drift along the bottom of the ocean, so to speak, until I have. Otherwise, I am perfectly resigned to do nothing at all.


    A: You feel this, despite not ordering the pizza that killed little Olivier ¨C and the fact that your co-workers kept it all a secret? Would you really say you¡¯re responsible for Louis¡¯s death?


    H: A deputy head is responsible for everything that happens in her school. Regardless of Louis Chiron, I failed a student, thus I am unworthy of being deputy head; thus I am unworthy of being alive. At that point, it doesn¡¯t matter who or what wanted me dead, and I won¡¯t have any of your audience thinking that they, or he, killed me ¨C for I died only because I could not live up to my standards.


    A: You take this deputy head stuff pretty seriously. As a foetus, I¡¯m impressed.


    H: You¡¯re skipping school. If I were your mother, I¡¯d be disappointed.


    A: Is there any chance you¡¯ll get in touch with anyone from the game now that you¡¯re in the afterlife? Kari Serpette, for instance?


    H: Children should listen when adults are speaking, Alexa Despacito.


    A: So, no?


    H:


    A: Eek! If looks could kill, then I¡¯m glad I¡¯m dead! Okay, we¡¯re going to move onto some reader mail. You had the highest percentage of votes thus far at 63%, surpassing even Beck. How do you feel about that?


    H: I wish only that they had killed me before I learned that duty is nothing more than an expression of personal prejudice.


    A: Alright, alright, that¡¯s enough self-pity. Don¡¯t you believe in second chances? A lot of readers were hoping you¡¯d open up a school in the afterlife, as a sort of charity work, and they saw a lot of good in you, Haralda.


    H: That¡¯s¡­ not a terrible idea. Starting again. But I would need to draw up a newer, more accurate, more correct, more robust code, and such a task is beyond me. My time¡¯s up as a leader.


    A: You¡¯ve got nothing but time, now. I¡¯ll leave that with you while we get to Response #2: ¡°The only reason I didn¡¯t vote you up sooner was because I wanted to see Kari explore a life she never knew, but could¡¯ve if she had more time¡±.


    H: I was hopeful, but I don¡¯t think Kari could learn a language other than violence, and you could see from my attempts that I wasn¡¯t the right person to reform her. All I did was make it worse.This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.


    A: Response #7: ¡°Please die this time, lol. You''ve beat me 4 times now, usually coming in second.¡±


    H: I wasn¡¯t aware we were in competition, or that I was winning. The thing about avoiding death is ¨C it always gets you in the end. You have near-misses until you don¡¯t. Please cherish the life you have.


    A: Would that I could, my dear. Response #9 [sic]: ¡°You saw Kari die and asked ourself why wasn¡¯t it you. Well, now you can join her in the afterlife. I¡¯m doing you a favor, really¡±


    H: It¡¯s as I said. The thing that hits you about being dead is the certainty of it. But yes, thank you for the favour, as I could not bear to live another second of a life by false morals. I only hope that your readiness to wish death on another isn¡¯t indicative of the same.


    A: Nah, these guys haven¡¯t got any morals.


    H: Then it appears as if I¡¯m late to the club.


    A: Response #10 says: ¡°YEET¡±.


    H: What does that mean?


    A: What, you never heard it on the playground? It¡¯s like, the thing you shout when you win a match of Fortnite. Think of it as like a more ironic version of ¡®yay¡¯.


    H: I must admit my pupils have spared me the pain of hearing that particular utterance. I¡¯m grateful. Yeet!


    A: Oh god, you ruined it. Please never say that again.


    H: Yeet! Yeet!


    A: ?


    A: Response #12 asks ¡°Please forgive me.¡±


    H: I am in no place to forgive anyone. Of course, no matter how many people forgive you, none of it will matter unless you forgive yourself. I would advise you to try that, instead.


    A: Response #13 wrote ¡°I''ll be surprised if you''re not picked.¡±


    H: Then you won¡¯t be surprised. Yeet.


    A: My ears! This is more embarrassing than hearing people say my name! Please stop, my career will be ruined if I end up on one of those cringe compilations!


    H: Okay.


    A: Response #14 wrote: ¡°Hey, uh, Alexa Despacito, can you make it possible to vote for you? Just as a meme. I¡¯m sure if wouldn¡¯t change anything major, as a vote for you is a vote wasted. Unless... if you did get enough votes, would you be the one to die? Please include this entire thing when you read off letters, I wish to preach to the audience. (Hi, Mom!)¡±


    A: That would be pointless! I¡¯m the most interesting character anyway! Anyway, you¡¯ve had your preaching. Long after you die your letter will be immortalised in the ones and zeroes that make up this text.


    H: I should hope they¡¯ve accomplished more than that. If you haven¡¯t called your mother recently, #14, please do.


    A: Response #16 wrote: ¡°sorry, I liked you, but I can''t let someone more interesting die like with Kari¡±


    H: They¡¯re all going to die in the end. That¡¯s the name of the program. If you want them to live¡­ please look up the Prisoner¡¯s Dilemma.


    A: How educational! Response #19 wrote: ¡°You tried your best, but didn''t act enough outside the box of your role. This made you predictable and therefore less interesting. The world needs more teachers like you - but this novel needs more interesting characters. Farewell, Haralda Gunmetal.¡±


    H: All I have to say is that the world does not need more teachers like me. As you correctly noted, inflexibility is a terrible vice.


    A: What do I know, I¡¯m just a foetus! Funniest shit I ever seen! Response #20 wrote: ¡°I''m really sorry - it''s a tough competition at this point. But I really like the chemistry between Connie and Faust, and I''m curious about the end of Saheel''s story.¡±


    H: Without meaning to spoil it, I rather expect Saheel¡¯s story to end in his death.


    A: Response #21 wrote: ¡°Sorry, Saheel is a bit more interesting, and I''m shipping Connie and Faust hard right now, I hope you understand.¡±


    H: I have no morals left by which to judge you, but are you expecting two people trapped in a death game to start a relationship with each other? That¡¯s a farfetched plot even for the novels I read.


    A: I ship it! ConniexFaust is my dream pairing!


    H: And one of them is going to die.


    A: Don¡¯t piss on my strawberries! You never know! I mean, yes, the show¡¯s called ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die¡¯, but you never know! Please keep watching, audience! Response #24 wrote: ¡°It was obvious.¡±


    H: I¡¯ve already let you know my thoughts on the obviousness of certain aspects of this story.


    A: And that¡¯s all the reader mail! To finish, we¡¯re down to just three contestants. Who do you think¡¯s going to win it?


    H: I know my horror romance, and the rule is always that the strong female survives. The priest¡¯s not long for this world, for obvious reasons. As for the man who made a pact with the devil¡­


    A: Wow! Someone¡¯s genre savvy! Okay, ladies and gentlemen, that¡¯s all we¡¯ve got time for tonight! I¡¯ve been Alexa Despacito, this was my guest Haralda Gunmetal, and this has been ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die!¡¯ As a quick note, the author had a little bit of burnout on account of the chapter lengths, so to maintain consistency, the 3,000 word chapters are going to be split in half to keep them daily. Thus I can say with greater confidence: see you in a week!

 6.3 (1)

    <div>


    With the Net of Truth now glowing at Connie¡¯s hip, Faust needed to relive his death so that he would be able to kill himself.


    The undertaker kept his basement flat in a mess, and the little light that struggled through the windows cast the magnolia wallpaper in a sombre, pitiful tint. Clothes that he¡¯d put down months ago and never picked back up spilled off the available surfaces onto the carpet, with his drawers pulled out and empty like someone had ransacked the place. Connie¡¯s first thought was that this was a cheap, tacky place to live and that it didn¡¯t impress her. Her second thought was that it was okay for things not to impress her.


    Upon stepping into the room, Faust unhooked his Double-Edged Sword and clumsily propped it up against a neglected pile of guitars, accidentally knocking them and bathing Connie¡¯s ears in a chord so out of tune that she cleared her throat in sympathy. Afterwards he dived fully-clothed into bed, sandwiched between a lumpy burrito of a duvet and a sheet that curled away from the corners it was supposed to be tucked into. He stared at the ceiling with utmost sincerity.


    ¡°Man,¡± said Connie, shuffling with her hands in her pockets. ¡°What are you doing?¡±


    Faust didn¡¯t move his head from the pillow. Whatever he was seeing in the stalactite droplets of paint, it was apparently more important than her.


    ¡°Hello?¡± she said, grabbing onto the duvet to rip it away.


    ¡°I¡¯m reliving the day,¡± said Faust, tugging it out of her grip. ¡°If I¡¯m supposed to psych myself up into a suicidal rage, then I need to show you my authentic self.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s authentic about having a fucking lie in?¡± she cried, looking at the remote to back her up. It pointed at the bed.


    ¡°I feel overjoyed that you managed to come to terms with Alan.¡± Faust smiled. ¡°Don¡¯t you see the problem with that?¡±


    Connie looked for somewhere to sit, but every chair was covered. She settled for leaning with her back against the wall and resting her feet on a pair of old t-shirts.


    She said, ¡°Can you start making some sense?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m inundated with felicity, after that beer and all! If I don¡¯t have a lie in and deny life, cut off contact with the real world and start hating myself ardently, I¡¯m never going to get round to tying a noose! It has to be an authentic wallowing! I can¡¯t hate myself if I don¡¯t hate myself!¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s authentic about wallowing?¡± she asked. ¡°Didn¡¯t we just agree that¡¯s not the real you?¡±


    He sighed. ¡°It¡¯s not the real real me, but it is the real me, if you follow what I¡¯m saying.¡±


    ¡°The other Faust?¡±


    ¡°I guess. All I know deep in my heart is that I must remain in bed until noon so that when I inevitably get up, starving and hot and needing to relieve myself, I can know that I¡¯ve wasted the day. I can stare at myself in the mirror and lean in and I can whisper ¡®you fuckup¡¯, ¡®you fuckup¡¯, ¡®you fuckup¡¯, and maybe then I can begin to understand the depths of despair felt by the other Faust.¡±


    It was so absurd that she laughed. He glared at her and brimmed with disappointment, then drew the covers over his shoulders so that only his head and beard poked out, and for five or so minutes, Connie watched as the twinkle in his eye faded and his smile contorted. Her back ached against the wall; she wanted to move and pace around, but the floor was covered in such nice funeral suits that her own authentic self would die in having damaged them.This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    She found a clock buried under a load of job-related paperwork, and it informed her that midday was still an hour away.


    ¡°Faust, dude,¡± said Connie. ¡°What the fuck am I supposed to do here.¡±


    ¡°If I didn¡¯t lie in every day like this,¡± he said. ¡°There¡¯s so much I¡¯d be able to do. I¡¯d tune my guitars and record that song from ages ago. I¡¯d batch-cook meals and eat something healthy for dinner every day. I¡¯d join that jogging group that leaves at 8AM. I¡¯d tidy up the place and feel proud of it. But I can¡¯t do any of that, because I¡¯m lying in.¡±


    Connie sighed. ¡°Have you thought about, I don¡¯t know, just getting out of bed? You could easily clean up all this shit in an hour.¡±


    ¡°But then I¡¯d have to get out of bed. And it¡¯s so late in the morning anyway, and I feel awful (at least the real me does), so it couldn¡¯t hurt to lie in just a bit longer. How else am I going to come to terms with my death?¡±


    ¡°Faust,¡± said Connie. ¡°I mean this in the nicest possible way, and I¡¯m just trying to be as honest as I can be, but you are a fucking handful.¡±


    ¡°Thank you for that comment,¡± he grinned. ¡°Now I have something to ruminate over. Tell me more about how I¡¯m just a burden, I can feel the urge to end my life rising by the second!¡±


    But Connie didn¡¯t grin back. In fact, she felt a lump in her throat and for the second time today found herself wiping tears from her eyes. It could have been her newfound commitment to honesty, but imagining a world in which Faust had killed himself because of an offhanded comment like that and a cocktail of trivialities was just ¨C unfair. She was beginning to understand how weakness could be constructive, and, of course, he picked up on it instantly.


    He said, ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Are you okay? Look, I¡¯m just using humour to process--¡±


    ¡°Stop!¡± she shouted.


    She ripped the duvet away, grabbed him by the hand to pull him to his feet, slung open all of the thin blue curtains to bathe the room in sunlight, picked up the Double-Edged Sword and thrust it into his hands.


    ¡°No,¡± he said, pushing it away, ¡°None of this is what the real me would do.¡±


    ¡°Stop!¡± she shouted. ¡°Just¡­ stop being such a sarcy fucking prick! I need you to be honest, Faust, because I don¡¯t know why but you¡¯re fucking lying about how you feel! Do you know how hurtful it is for me to sit here and listen to you joking about killing yourself so casually? Be honest with me, because I need to know if this is a friendship even worth saving! Do you actually think there¡¯s anything funny about suicide? Well? Do you genuinely believe, deep down, that the world would be a better place without you in it? Or is there something else going on here?¡±


    He looked at her, blankly, tears already welling up.


    He said, ¡°Connie¡­ that¡¯s a lot of questions. Do I have to answer ¡®Well¡¯? Sorry. I¡¯m being a sarcy prick, aren¡¯t I. Let me find us some tissues.¡±


    Somehow, he knew exactly where in the pile of madness the table and the box were, and soon they¡¯d both managed to dry their eyes.


    She said, ¡°Talk. Tell me what the real you thinks. The one that¡¯s alive, not the one that already killed himself and is fighting against you for a second chance. Is suicide funny?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± he said, sniffling. ¡°I don¡¯t know why I did it. I wish I hadn¡¯t done it.¡±


    ¡°So why are you keeping up this charade of trying to be the real you?¡± she asked.


    ¡°At the same time, I just ¨C I don¡¯t know how I can make you understand the level of self-loathing I feel, how crushing those thoughts can be and how they corner me and push me back into bed because I¡¯m too scared the only thing I¡¯ll ever have the courage to do is to reach into the back of the medicine cabinet and swallow everything I find in a final act of self defeat.¡±


    Before Connie even knew she was doing it she¡¯d barged into his bathroom, pulled back the toothpaste-stained mirror, tossed aside the vanguard of beard-oils, cracked open the tablets out of their shells into the toilet and pulled the lever to flush it. The linoleum was littered in small plastic tubes.


    ¡°There,¡± she said, nodding at her distraught face in the mirror.


    Faust peeked round the corner, frowning. ¡°You have to understand, Connie, this isn¡¯t the kind of story where you become a manic-pixie dream girl and show me the true value and joy of life. You can¡¯t save me from these thoughts, because that¡¯s not a burden that¡¯s fair for anyone to carry. I just¡­ I¡¯m just happy to have made a friend like you. It¡¯s hardly suicide, but when I get the wordcount I¡¯m going to give myself over to the flesh mound so that you have a better chance of winning.¡±


    ¡°Stop,¡± she tried to shout, but her voice was hoarse from shouting. She couldn¡¯t find words that were honest enough. Instead, she perched on the rim of the bath, and she gathered up a great mass of toilet tissue, and she sobbed, and she sobbed, and she sobbed.

 6.3 (2)

    <div>


    Few things are as mystifying as a member of the opposite sex''s bathroom. Despite all the beard oils and creams that Faust had shoved into his cupboard, one bottle of ''XX-strength'' shower gel stood alone in the bath. Mould, having long won the battle for the shower curtain, crept up the tiles and was now caking over an extractor fan, which smelled chokingly damp.


    It was an appropriate room to cry in, sure, but Connie quickly grew tired of crying. The strap on the communication tile had been digging into her, so she pulled it free of the raw skin as she spoke.


    She said, "Is anyone else still alive?"


    The extractor fan hummed. The shower spat out a few droplets of water. The word count ticked up ever higher.


    "Hello?" she said. "Are we seriously the only ones left?"


    The people in the flat above began hammering the wall, which was tolerable up until the point they started drilling, which wasn''t tolerable in the slightest and echoed through the bathroom like it was an opera house. If someone from Barden was covering their ears, she knew it had to be bad.


    The communication tile crackled.


    "I''m busy, sister," said a man, and the sheer violence in his voice made her shudder, bringing her back to her childhood in Slumsfield, when she ran away from a pack of hoodies that streamed after her from boarded up windows, jeering that they''d kill her if they caught her.


    She said, "Who were you again, man?"


    Connie sat there for a few minutes waiting for a reply that never came, calling out the names she could remember, but she got no answer from Haralda, Eirlys or the kid.


    Only three of them left? Shit.


    She strode back into the bedroom, finding Faust back in bed, staring at the ceiling through blurry eyes, his mouth all twisted up in a look of hatred. Every so often he would cringe, wince, screw up his face, and mutter some form of insult under his breath. He slapped his hand against the wall, crying out with every blow, though for what reason she had no idea.


    Legs on the street walked past the windows.


    "Faust," she said.


    "My mind''s made up on this. The only use I can be is as a sacrifice."


    Connie was paralysed. Of course people talked about men needing to show more weakness, and she''d coaxed plenty of lonely taxi-goers out of their shells just by being a stranger who was willing to listen. Every time she''d be shocked at the depth of feelings they revealed to her, violent or self-hating, or despondent, or inadequate, of their resolutions to divorce or suicide. Having seen it before didn''t make it easier to watch.


    "I''m not afraid of death," said Faust. "I''m afraid of having died without making an impact. You''re worth saving, Connie. At least grant me that."


    She said, "You''re worth saving, Faust. At least grant me that."


    He shook his head and retreated under the duvet.


    "Just fuck off, then," she said, taking a deep breath, and with no idea what else to do, threw the Net of Truth at him. "Look, man, I was a person who wasn''t worth anything, and you ain''t nothing like me. You know what I was that you weren''t? I was ''happy''. I was content to do the same thing every week and work the same shit job and fuck the same carousel of people who leeched off me because I didn''t care to do better.Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    "I''m the kind of person who ends up single in their fifties and never ever learns. I never thought shit to myself like, ''you fuckup'', because I just shrugged and got on with it in my entry level job! I was like that, man. I fucking loved myself, and I loved my flat, and I loved that I was such a player, and I never once thought I could do better than taking on more hours and more credit cards.


    "If you hate yourself, then you''re saying you know you could do better, that you have the potential to do better -- in other words, that you''re worth saving. Maybe you think it''s easier to keep on hating yourself than changing your life, for the same reason that I found it easier to lie to everyone than admit I was in debt, but you know that it''s at least a possibility. Am I right or am I fucking right, man?"


    He lay still under the duvet, making it rise and fall with his steady breaths, constrained as it was under the net, and Connie found it the most shameful thing she''d ever seen. She felt like she was facing down the ostrich again, even if what she was really facing down was herself. Her anger sprung up a furious energy in her arm that wanted her to slap the wall, just as Faust did, to cry out to herself and ask herself why she''d been such a fuck-up, but she held it still and instead clutched the old gentleman''s business card.


    She''d ace that fucking chauffeur course.


    "I want to save myself," said Faust. "But it''s easier to die. If not a decisive death on a hot night of impulse, then a slow, languid death of inaction, a rotting away of the spirit, a death of the self before the body."


    "Do you want to die, or do you want to save yourself?"


    He cleared his throat; rubbed his eyes, and said, "I want to save myself."


    "So what are you going to do about it?"


    He sat up, somehow phasing through the Net of Truth, and he reached around the lamp on his bedside table for the remote control. The tissue in his hand was crumpled and besotted, but he used it to wipe away the last of his tears and looked in the mirror at himself, face full of resolve.


    "One day," he said. "I''ll live one day out the best as I can. I''ll ignore every thought that tells me to do otherwise. I''ll live the day not of *the* Faust, but of *a* Faust. But after that, I''m going to the flesh mound."


    "If you''re going to the flesh mound," said Connie, "Then I''m going with you."


    He looked at her and sighed, but she held his gaze as a walker grips an electric fence.


    "I''m serious," she said. "I''m not letting you go out as a martyr. At the very least, we''ll die together as Team Shameless."


    The remote tried to point Faust back to bed, but he pinched the arrow between two fingers and snapped it off, grinding it to dust. Suddenly inspired, he gripped the Double-Edged Sword and tried to snap it in half, but the only thing he managed to do was cut his bed to shreds behind him.


    "You said you can''t force these things," said Connie, ducking out of the way. "But actually, sometimes, I think that''s what you gotta do."


    "Right," said Faust. "Team Shameless. I like that."


    --


    So it was that on one morning when one Faust lay in bed until twelve, another leapt out as soon as he awoke, grabbing a shirt and jogging shorts before changing in the bathroom. Connie kicked away the loose clothes in her way to pass the time, on account of having better things to do than listen to someone brush their teeth. She found herself excavating a pile of notebooks in what appeared to be his music corner, propped up by guitars, and she came upon the lyrics to a song he''d written called Wiggle Worm in G# Major:


    "All the worms come out to wiggle


    Eat their way through your middle


    Happy little wiggle worms dancing


    Your body is food for them."


    A chill ran up her spine -- what kind of weirdo would put a song like that in a major key? She tried to strum a few of the notes, but the guitars were way too out of tune, and besides, she only knew how to play Wonderwall.


    "Oh," said Faust, coming out the doorway in an outfit of dubious athletic merit. He tucked his beard into the baggy running shirt. "As if I hadn''t bared my soul enough, you rife through my verses?"


    "Help or hurt, win or lose," read Connie, "Wormies don''t give a damn about what you choose. Man, after all we''ve been through I still feel I need to ask -- are you *okay*?"


    "That one was pretty fucked up," he admitted from the kitchen, and she heard the clanging of drawers and crashing about of cupboards.


    She followed him in, expecting the worst, but it was suspiciously clean, and the pile of pizza boxes in the recycling bin confirmed it. The only thing in his fridge was an open plate of some kind of macaroni cheese that smelled ancient.


    "I guess I could eat that for breakfast," said Faust.


    "Dude," said Connie. "You''ll fucking die."


    "Then I require ingredients," he announced.


    Pinching her nose, she scraped the pasta into the empty food waste bucket, where it would later be deposited onto a landfill and eaten by a starving fox that would pay the price for its bravery by vomiting out its guts to the bitter end.

 6.4 (1)

    <div>


    When Faust first stepped into the morning air, it chilled his lungs with nostalgia and promise. His skin tingled. Pigeons cooed as they chased each other among the silver birches. Throughout the leafy suburb, windows lit up and behind them shadowy figures rushed around, pulling on clothes and buttering toast and staring at phones wondering if they could get away with pulling a sickie.


    Faust was categorically not a morning person, and as he plodded onto the heathland behind the estate, his stomach twisted in disgust at the sight of the running group. The lycra-bound lunatics numbered thirty strong, and if they weren¡¯t doing jumping jacks or calibrating their sports watches, they were laughing loudly about what a beautiful morning it was.


    Like, yeah, it was beautiful, a robin just landed inches from him and sang a little song. But they didn¡¯t have to be so fucking obvious about it.


    He lingered, and Connie bumped into him. She was still wearing her pyjama bottoms, in part because she told him she was ¡®done with trying to project the right image¡¯ but also because when she¡¯d called the elevator to go back to her room the grinding of bone had sounded way too close for comfort.


    ¡°Hey!¡± she said. ¡°Don¡¯t just stop, man!¡±


    Faust watched as his co-worker Deadward joined the warm-ups, high-fiving everyone, and they shared such saccharinely sweet smiles suggestive of solidarity that he immediately felt unwelcome. Everyone knew that the happier a group looked, the less they actually liked each other.


    They¡¯re all just fucking Tarquins, he thought. Rest in peace, grandpa.


    He looked down at the ragged old t-shirt and shorts that he¡¯d picked to avoid looking like he was trying too hard. It was obvious they¡¯d never accept a loser like him who hadn¡¯t run a mile in his life ¨C even the fat members of the group were sporting marathon victory tops.


    ¡°Earth to Faust,¡± said Connie, rapping him on the scalp. ¡°You look like a guy that¡¯s psyching himself out.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s pointless,¡± he declared. ¡°I could no sooner get along with those people than I could fart the national anthem.¡±


    ¡°Okay, two things,¡± said Connie. ¡°Thing number one: you can just rewind if it doesn¡¯t go well, don¡¯t sweat it. Thing number two: we can vote to give you musical flatulation, so you should have picked a less shit comparison. Thing number three¡ª¡±


    ¡°Alright,¡± he agreed.


    They strolled over. The group now formed a circle while a Spanish woman, who was more muscle than skin, explained the route to them. They¡¯d seen Faust and they were closing him off, even his co-worker Deadward didn¡¯t spare him so much as a second glance, and he decided that the message was very clearly heard, thank you very much, and that the runners would surely be happier without him. He cleared his throat, but nobody cared.


    ¡°Yo, guys,¡± shouted Connie, beaming as she practically wrestled her way into the circle. ¡°We¡¯re here for the running group, this is it, right?¡±


    Faust aged a thousand years where he stood, and had to catch his balance on the double-edged walking stick else before he fell into the heather. He braced for the rejection. The name calling. The pointed ignoring.


    The muscle-bound Spaniard smiled and said, ¡°Oh, sure! Welcome! What are your guys'' names?¡±


    ¡°Glad you could make it, Faust!¡± said Deadward, forcibly shaking his hand. It was odd to see the nipples poking through the shirt of a man who normally dressed exclusively in mourning-wear.


    The name was out. Faust winced for the rejection, and it was time for the ridicule. He was still seething over ¡®Fast¡¯.This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    ¡°Nice to have you along, Faust,¡± said the muscle-woman, gently high-fiving him. ¡°My name¡¯s Karen Despacito. It¡¯s okay if you want to laugh about it.¡±


    A couple of the group members chuckled, and Karen guffawed loudly before turning to Connie with an expectant twinkle in her eye.


    ¡°Constance,¡± said Connie, smashing that high five out. ¡°We¡¯re doing a 5K, right? I¡¯m great at those. My record¡¯s like 18¡­ well, 20¡­ okay, fine, I¡¯m just kidding with you, like 24 minutes on a treadmill.¡±


    ¡°24? That¡¯s really impressive, Constance! We definitely won¡¯t have to worry about leaving you two behind, then!¡±


    Karen stepped into the middle of the circle to re-explain the route they¡¯d be taking across the heathland, but Faust didn¡¯t hear a word of it because Deadward nudged him in the ribs and started muttering at him.


    ¡°Ayy, player,¡± he said, eyeing Connie up. ¡°Thanks for finally coming along, I told you you¡¯d like it. Where¡¯d you pick up a catch like that?¡±


    ¡°Death game,¡± mumbled Faust, showing him the word count on his hand. ¡°Don¡¯t get the wrong idea. She¡¯s my life coach.¡±


    ¡°Woah,¡± said Deadward, poking the number before growing immediately disinterested in it. ¡°She single, then?¡±


    Faust looked at his co-worker, who was smiling, even with his eyes, and for the first time he began to suspect that Deadward actually kind of liked him rather than tolerating him. The dark patches under his eyes, the hooked nose that cast a shadow, and the emo-fringe ¨C maybe they were just facial features and not signals of hatred.


    ¡°You still okay for drinks on Friday, bud?¡± asked Deadward. ¡°And if you brought her? Hey, she¡¯s available, right?¡±


    ¡°Well¡ª¡± said Faust.


    ¡°Let¡¯s get jogging, people,¡± shouted Karen Despacito.


    At once, the mass of joggers spilled out onto the path, a natural sorting algorithm bringing those with the most chiselled tryhard expressions to the front while leaving those who couldn¡¯t keep the gossip out of their mouths at the back.


    ¡°Come on, they¡¯re getting away,¡± urged Connie, jogging up and down on the spot.


    Faust smiled. ¡°I¡¯m kind of shit at running. Just go and win the race. I¡¯ll be right behind you, promise.¡±


    ¡°Gotcha.¡± She was speeding away before he could blink, using her short stature to weave through the pack to the front.


    Faust put one foot down, lifted the other foot up, and let it fall in front of him, repeating the action cyclically. He¡¯d kind of forgotten how to jog. A loose stone rolled out from under him, and he nearly tumbled over, just catching himself at the last second but sending a jolt of pain up his leg.


    You¡¯re kidding yourself, he thought. You¡¯re not a runner.


    Tendrils of heather along the path brushed him. Deadward matched his pace, but a sizable gap was already developing between him and the casual gossipers.


    ¡°Good start man, keep it up,¡± said Deadward. ¡°The first minute¡¯s the hardest.¡±


    You¡¯re shit, thought Faust. You¡¯re not strong enough to change.


    He held his breath while passing through a sunbeam of buzzing gnats, and the next time he inhaled the oxygen deficit cracked upon his lungs. They were burning. They were already burning. He wheezed, hoarsely.


    You¡¯ve had plenty of excellent day ones, he thought. It¡¯s the day two you struggle with. It¡¯s the keeping going. It¡¯s the resilience. You fuckup.


    ¡°Shut it!¡± he wheezed.


    You¡¯re a fuckup.


    ¡°No,¡± he cried.


    You¡¯re a fuckup.


    He couldn¡¯t take it anymore. He doubled his stride length, and thundered down the path, leaving clouds of dust in his wake, footsteps pounding in his ears, morning air chilling his lungs with nostalgia, and he blew past the mums gossiping.


    ¡°Woah, watch your pace,¡± said one.


    ¡°Woohoo!¡± shouted another.


    ¡°You can do it! Catch them up!¡± shouted the third.


    ¡°Faust, wait up!¡± wailed Deadward.


    It wasn¡¯t fast enough. He pumped his arms like pistons, leaned into the wind. By now his lungs were burning so deep inside that it felt as if his very soul was on fire. Still he ran, overtaking those lycra fucking posers one by one, winding round the corners until finally he had the leaders of the pack in his sight, Karen and Connie locked in a clash for pole position¡­ and then he was turning his head to watch as he blew past them, and then all there was to do was swallow up the path in front of him.


    ¡°Dude, why are you fucking sprinting,¡± shouted Connie. ¡°You know how long 5K is, right?¡±


    ¡°Do you know the route?¡± shouted Karen. ¡°Does he know the route?¡±


    Faust didn¡¯t care about the route. His body was screaming in pain, but he knew pain, and he could fight it. He flew off the path into the forest, cutting through the brush, leaping over branches and bushes and ducking under ivy, splashing great dollops of mud over himself, until a root tripped him up and he came crashing to the ground.


    Maybe it hurt. He didn¡¯t know. He lay there and listened to the even footsteps of the joggers running past with a big grin on his face. His heart hammered in his chest ¨C impossible to say what had changed.


    The sun darkened, and a canopy of flesh knitted its way across the sky, supported by a pillar that seemed to spool out of Faust¡¯s estate.


    ¡°I¡¯ve got you now, Karen!¡± Connie shouted. She sounded happy. Best to keep her that way ¨C happy and alive.


    ¡°Thanks for everything,¡± mumbled Faust.


    He picked himself up, brushed the soil off his clothes, and cut his way out of the undergrowth with the inert Double-Edged Sword, alone.

 6.4 (2)

    <div>


    Faust,


    I have always loved you.


    The elevator whistled to the top of the shaft so quickly that it threw you down and your stomach somersaulted. The lift stopped against a fleshy scab, and although it sounded like someone was tuning a violin with their teeth, it was actually the crank chafing against my spinal column, scattering a confetti of bone dust. You got to your feet, ignoring the scratches that must have tingled along your skin.


    I''ll confess that as soon as the doors opened, my eyes took in your body from every angle, set back as they were in their recesses ¡ª so yes, when you poked a hand into one of the holes, I delighted in the perfection of your fingerprints. Perhaps it was for the best that you didn''t investigate the recesses further after activating the blinding glare of your communication tile. You looked onwards.


    I''m not sure what you were expecting to see, but I hope you liked it all the same. It was in your honour. I felt every tremble from your feet as you walked over the carpet of my nerves, and the spots you so decisively graced with the comfort of your weight glowed for hours afterwards, better than any massage I''ve ever had, for certain.


    You cried out when I rushed to cut off the corridor behind you ¡ª you have to understand that it felt no more unnatural than stretching out my arm ¡ª by barricading it with a lattice of bone. Sorry for startling you. It was as much to keep my friends out as yours. All the lot of them cared about was coming back to life, so I''d long shut myself away from Alan and Sean, and I think you''ve already come to understand, as I did, that a life without purpose is a life without life.


    By the way, what did you make of the city? I haven''t named it yet. I was thinking ''Nihilus'', but would just as easily settle for ''Faust Town''.


    You shone your beam of light over the tips of the skyscrapers almost obsessively, wheeling around as if you expected someone to be at your back ¡ª I love the way your hair and beard swooshed. How was the ambience? I hardened the flesh underfoot so that each of your lonely steps echoed through the streets. Did you like the windows on the buildings? Don''t worry about having poked a hole through the ultra-thin layer of tissue; I''m flattered that you took the interest and ashamed that the interiors weren''t finished ¡ª but I had to fit those beating organs in somewhere, you see, to purify the pools of blood that are coursing through me as I speak.


    I''ll give you credit for noticing when the roads curved in to direct you to the centre, if you''ll give me credit for noticing that you noticed just by the way you gripped your weapon, the way your arms stiffened up and the way your footsteps fell onto me with more conviction. We wear our emotions on our sleeve, you and I. Did you feel how hard my heart was pumping, how it rumbled through the tower?


    You came to our antechamber ¡ª you might have seen me slithering away with the granny just as you stepped over the fallen door. Once again, I stitched shut the entrance behind you. Snorting at the stench of formaldehyde, you pushed onwards into the main church, and judging by the string of profanity you let off, I impressed you.


    I put a lot of detail into the city ¡ª using the right thickness of tissue over the sky so that it glowed the most resplendent rouge ¡ª but here you saw the real fruit of my attention. It was, of course, our funeral, as I watched it after death. I flagellated myself to get this done in time for you, matching every detail as best I could with my corporal pallet, right down to the grain on the wooden pews.Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    After all, if we fail, then you won''t have the privilege of seeing it, and what kind of fate is that for an undertaker?


    You ran your hands through our mother''s auburn hair. You stared deep into the vacant eyes of our father ¡ª do you know how long it took to affix the perfect shade of dementia, and also how difficult it was to hold your lovely gaze without so much as twitching?


    But then it was your turn to impress me. For one, you didn''t shed a single tear. Then, you walked over to the blurry outgrowth that was your co-workers, those people that never spared us a second thought and saw us only as a nuisance, and you shook their lukewarm hands. Rushing, I bloomed them into detailed statuettes, differentiating their profiles, straining my ears to hear the words that tumbled out of your lips...


    "Thanks for coming, Deadward," you said. "Thanks for coming, Nightshade. Thanks for coming, Mort. Thanks for coming¡ª"


    For the first time, my love, you gave me hope. So even though you couldn''t so much as scratch a single cell out of my empty-faux wooden pews, I scarred myself anyway as you sought to brand me twice over, floor and ceiling, with your double edged sword.


    "Haralda," you said, slashing into me, and I bled open. "Tarquin. Eirlys. Saheel. Greer. Beck. Kari. And... Connie. Goddamn, do I have shit handwriting."


    We think alike, and there was never a doubt in my mind that you would then shuffle forlornly to the open casket in the centre of the room, warm like a bath with my blood, and lay down clutching your weapon over your chest. After all, we are to melancholy as a moth is to a flame ¡ª but if you sought to drown yourself, then even I''d have to say you were getting too caught up in the moment.


    There was still so much to show you.


    ¡ª-


    As an aside.


    If you ever feel that you are beyond redemption, my Faust, then I just want you to remember one thing. Your friend, Connie? She came to get you. She whipped her net against the lattice of bone, again and again, shouting louder and louder, until sparks of limelight sprinkled over her like fairy dust. She screamed your name into her communication tile.


    Sorry for keeping her out.


    ¡ª-


    You swam down the pool into the room below. I regret the chill, but this chamber was nestled right up against the edge of the tower, and I hope you could see that I was breaking out in goosebumps just as you were. You shivered and drew into yourself, vapour trailing out your mouth as you tended to your emotions before you even thought to take stock of your surroundings.


    The nine I sculpted in that circle are admittedly an artist''s rendition, for the true scene took place in the Underworld, where we had no bodies to look at. Quite often I thought myself talking to one of them, when it turned out to be somebody else. Here were nine perfect strangers united only by the idea that they might somehow return to life.


    I animated this display for you with my mannequins as best as I could, and the main reason I''ve taken charge of the narrative on a technicality is so that I could explain what you saw. You watched, shivering, as the Frenchman, freshly dead, performed a ritual that somehow tethered him to a fixed point outside the Underworld.


    What he told us, specifically, was that he''d put an idea in the head of a writer.


    I wanted you to witness the callous manner in which each of the nine picked out someone who they thought didn''t deserve to be alive, and I wanted you to see the way they huddled together and plotted out the best way to steal these people''s life force. They linked souls with the Frenchman and began to take on physical forms as their tendrils took hold of their targets.


    You jumped when the multitude of shapeless dead popped out of the walls. Take it as a representation of the Underworld Broadcasting Company ¡ª the workhorse of this game is the attention of the dead. But even that is dull magic compared to the attention of the living, and that''s what enabled this group their pocket reality to torment you all rather than manifesting as some vague curse.


    You saw how, unlike the others, during the ritual, I split into two fragments. I''ll explain a little bit more about that once I''m through the wordcount. You have to understand that this game runs on attention and drama ¡ª there are no rules other than this. It''s not about justice, nor revenge. It''s opportunism.


    I love you, Faust. I love you more than you could know. Now that you''ve read this, step through the door before you, away from the attention of the audience that''s powering this game, and let''s come to terms.


    Half of your sword is already glowing.

 6.6 (1)

    <div>


    One slice of time unravelled twenty years of marriage. The photo preserved the 50th second of the 23rd minute of the 20th hour of the 21st day of the 3rd month of the 2018th year, which is to say it was taken 1 day before Asha called Saheel to ask if they could invite Sean round, and 4 days before they let him and his wife into their house for an evening of drinks.


    The photo displayed their kitchen countertop, upon which a dinner plate rode another, slick with bechamel sauce as it supported two sets of soiled cutlery. The stereo''s LED screen read Smooth FM in icy blue, its antennae bolt upright. Rings of wine and rum dotted the surface from glasses picked up and put down again, and where the glasses had come to rest they still cradled a few drops of dark red liquid.


    In the reflection of the overhead cabinet stood Dove''s naked husband and Saheel''s naked wife. Distorted and bulging as the photo was, this much was clear: the pair were grinning, their eyes out of focus, and their bits were hanging loose to gravity in relaxed postures. Sean held his phone; Asha a bottle of rum. His shirt and her dress were slung over the sofa behind them. Their faces were flushed with light exertion.


    So there Saheel was, sitting on that sofa 4 days later, the light from the photo on Sean''s phone battering him, while the rest of the house lay dark. He could just about catch the glare of starlight on the others'' eyes and teeth. His body went numb, like he''d slipped into a frozen lake, and for a minute he simply kept zooming in and out of the picture as his internal monologue slipped away from him.


    "I''m serious about getting you guys a taxi," said Asha. "Let me call you one. It''s easy to get lost in town. It looks different when it''s dark."


    "Look," said Dove, putting on her jacket. "Thank you, but there''s no need. I''m sure we can remember the way back just fine."


    "I still haven''t finished my coffee," said Sean. "You can put on your jacket and shoes all you like, honey, but¡ª"


    "Have you forgotten you''ve got an early morning service tomorrow?" said Dove. "What are you going to preach, exactly, other than your hangover?"


    "Right," said Asha. "We''re keeping you. Saheel, give him his phone back so he can go."


    "What am I going to preach?" said Sean. "That''s easy. Forgiveness."


    "Then forgive me for being tired out, honey," said Dove. "Forgive me for wanting more than four hours of sleep. Forgive me for not being nineteen anymore."


    He sipped his coffee, like he''d been doing for the past ten minutes, long after Asha had collected up everyone''s cups to put in the dishwasher.


    He said, "Sure. Forgiven."


    "Saheel?" said Asha.


    But Saheel barely heard her. He messaged the photo to himself, and then went delving into the metadata of the phone, options hidden behind options in location services, to find the list of frequent locations. His house was only registered twice: Wednesday and Today.


    "Saheel?" Asha nuzzled him with her cheek, looking at what he was looking at. "Those aren''t parrot photos! What are you doing?"


    He jumped at the static, and it gave him enough energy to get up and walk over to the bathroom and drop the phone in the toilet and flush it round the bend.


    "Sit down," he growled.


    In the lounge, he turned on the reading light and swivelled it round to illuminate Sean, who was sprawling out on the sofa and raised a hand to shield his eyes.The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    "What are you doing?" Asha tugged at his arm.


    "I said sit down," he said. She didn''t, staring at his face with an affected, childlike uncomprehension, and without even thinking about it he shoved her; she fell back, tripping over the coffee table, landing splayed out on the sofa next to Sean.


    Dove yelped, gripping the rum bottle as a makeshift weapon, and she backed away, making for the landline on the wall.


    "Saheel," cried Asha, "What''s this about? How... how could you?"


    "I know what you two did on Wednesday," he said.


    Asha twisted her face into a bewildered outrage, and all kinds of retorts rose up on her lips, but then she turned her head to see Sean smiling and holding his hands up like a kid caught stealing from the cookie jar, and her anger evaporated. Instead, she folded her arms and leaned back on the sofa.


    She said, "Okay."


    "Okay?" said Saheel.


    She nodded and reiterated, "Okay."


    His wife had smiled at him near every second they''d been married, so to see her looking at him for the first time in twenty years with such a detached expression filled him with dread. She looked at him like he was a stranger.


    Dove joined Saheel behind the light, and he knew that her deflated manner of her body language mirrored his, for behind her eyes he could see her reality crumbling ¡ª she gripped the rum bottle ever tighter, knuckles whitening, and glared at the adulterous pair.


    "You said you were leading housegroup."


    Saheel said, "Sandbank doesn''t have a housegroup."


    "So you were here with her instead?"


    Sean shrugged, downing his coffee, and he slammed it on the table with a decisive thunk. He didn''t even look at his wife ¡ª he was staring Saheel down.


    "That''s right. Sorry," he said.


    "Sorry?" shouted Dove. "You think sorry''s gonna cut it? How... how could you?"


    "Sorry," he said.


    "At least tell me she seduced you. She got you drunk on double strength rum. Slipped a drug in your water, or something. Anything other than that you planned this."


    "Sorry," he said. He sat with his legs and arms open, as if he believed the word sorry was an impenetrable barrier.


    "Why, Asha?" said Saheel. "Twenty years..."


    "I was lonely," she said. "You love your PhD more than you love me. The moment you called me, I would have kicked him out. But you didn''t call me, so I didn''t kick him out."


    "Are you trying to say this was my fault?"


    "No. I''m sorry, Saheel. Please forgive me."


    "Forgive us, Saheel," said Sean, grinning. "A good vicar has to learn to forgive those who do him wrong."


    "Sean said you''d forgive us," said Asha. "Just one moment of weakness wouldn''t hurt, if we repented afterwards. We''d still go to heaven."


    "Would you listen to yourselves?" cried Dove. "You''re asking for forgiveness, but you don''t sound sorry in the slightest! Why would I ever forgive you? Stop fucking smiling to yourself! Our marriage is over, Sean! Do you understand that?"


    "I''m sorry," said Sean.


    "What good is it to be married to a vicar, anyway?" said Asha. "I''m a vicar''s wife. I sit in the house and I clean it and I cook for him and I take messages for him while he goes off and follows his dreams."


    "Then say that before you cheat!" shouted Saheel. "I would¡¯ve renounced my faith for you! If you were so unhappy, why didn''t you just leave?"


    "Because I love you."


    Saheel couldn''t take it anymore. He shoved the lamp over, and the bulb smashed, scattering shards of glass all over the carpet. They were bathed in darkness. Asha cried out. He grabbed the bottle of rum off Dove and stepped toward the sofa.


    Sean stood up, squaring out his chest. He leaned in to Saheel, and he whispered, "I''m a test sent from God to you, mate. I''m testing your forgiveness. You forgave me for Dove, and you get passing marks on that one, mate. Now it''s time for you to decide. Are you one of God''s children, one of Jesus''s followers, or are you a sham? Are you preaching something other than the gospel?"


    Saheel had been plagued with indecision all his life, and now he felt a familiar tugging in the back of his mind. Financial Auditing vs Theology ¡ª theology had been the will of god. Barden vs Sandbank ¡ª Sandbank had been the will of god. Dove vs Asha ¡ª Asha had been the will of god. The will of god vs the will of Saheel ¡ª the will of god was the will of god.


    Forgiveness vs revenge ¡ª forgiveness was, above all, the will of god. But Saheel wanted something else.


    "I hereby renounce my faith," said Saheel, and he took off his priest robe, and he tore away the crucifix on the chain around his neck until he stood before Sean in his underwear, and slugged the Barden Vicar straight in the face.


    Sean tumbled down, landing heavily on the coffee table with a blow to the head. A crack rang out through the house, and blood pooled onto the carpet among the glass. He twitched exactly once before going dead still.


    It might have ended there in the original timeline, but Saheel wasn¡¯t finished. He took out his Fallen Water Pistol, glowing with limelight, and he shot Sean''s head clean off.


    "You killed him," cried Dove. "You just shot my fucking husband!"


    "Not yet, I haven''t," said Saheel, casually executing Asha as he called for the lift. "But don''t worry, sister. When I''m done with him, there won''t be a single atom of his soul left to forgive.

 6.6 (2) — VOTING OPEN

    <div>


    While Saheel waited for the lift, he examined the contents of his wardrobe and found little in the way of secular, so he buttoned up his funeral suit and straightened out the sleeves on the blazer, making sure to wrap a black tie tight around his neck. He tucked the remote and the stone into his pockets, while he fashioned a makeshift holster for the Fallen Water Pistol out of a fanny pack. For a finishing touch, he donned a pair of aviators ¡ª he wouldn''t miss seeing the explosion for the world.


    A ding announced the lift''s arrival. Connie was in there waiting for him. Her eyes looked red and sore, as though she''d been crying her way through a therapy session, and she was dressed in a jumper and sleek pyjama bottoms. The net at her side emitted the same emerald hue as his pistol.


    "I need your help," she said, studying him, not taking a hand off her weapon.


    "You''ve come to terms," he said, cocking his pistol. "Good, sister, very good. Is it just us?"


    "No. Faust''s trapped in the flesh mound. I tried to break through, but I couldn''t make a dent. We have to get him back before he kills himself. I don''t know what the fuck''s left to try, but I remembered you came up with the whole ''reliving our past'' idea way back when... hello?"


    Saheel stepped into the elevator. A pair of moths swirled around the light in the ceiling. He pressed the button to go to the democracy chamber, where Sean would surely be waiting. Slowly, they rose, through an endless and dark vertical shaft, the g-force placing an uncanny feeling in Saheel''s feet.


    "Please," said Connie. "I don''t know what I can do except ask you for help. The flesh mound is massive, now ¡ª biggest fucker I''ve ever seen. It''s gonna be some fight."


    "You have to understand, sister," said Saheel. "I''m only interested in revenge."


    She looked at him and shuddered. Nobody had ever shuddered at him before, and he didn''t like how it felt.


    But he grit his teeth. He took out the rock and showed her how it floated in midair.


    "This is Eirlys''s superweapon," he explained. "Her legacy that she passed under their noses. It wouldn''t matter if the flesh mound was the size of the planet. We unpause this ¡ª kaboom. No more flesh mound."


    "Fuck yeah," said Connie. "We can punch past the barrier, no sweat."


    The elevator jolted to a stop alongside the sound of a squelch, but the doors remained stuck ¡ª it hadn''t lined up with anywhere to step out. Fingers drummed on the roof, punching holes in the metal.


    Saheel blasted upright, and managed to disintegrate about half of the fingers. Connie was slightly slower, but the wide area of her net snagged the rest of them, cracking them out of their joints so that they gathered in piles on the floor.


    "Fuck! Use the rock," said Connie.


    "We''d be blown to kingdom come! Just keep fighting!"


    More fingers came. They tried to keep up. Still, the elevator refused to move. There was something ¡ª some incredible, pendulum like mass ¡ª lowering itself in the darkness above them.


    "We''re stuck," cried Connie, jabbing the layer 6 button fruitlessly in between lashes of the net. "We''ve got to vote! If we teleport on top of the tower, we could fire the rock and blast through the whole thing!"


    "...This Faust. Do you trust him?"


    "With my life." And her eyes said that she meant it.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.


    "That''s not enough," he said, hosing off a mandible that had cut into his shoulder. "You go around trusting people with your life, sister, then you''re just asking for them to rip your heart out!"


    "Dude!" She threw up the net to stop a gigantic tooth from caving in the elevator, but she was struggling to stop it from slipping further down. Bony spears jabbed at her through the elevator walls, and although she tried to squirm out the way of each one, she soon had blood trailing down her and holes riddled through her pyjama bottoms. "We need to vote!"


    "Vote?" he spat. "Is he or is he not the one who''s both the flesh mound and a contestant?"


    "What does that matter?"


    "How do you know he''s not working with them?"


    That caught her out. She failed to stammer an adequate reply, instead lowering the net to clear away the built up spears. Overhead, the elevator roof bucked under the weight of the tooth.


    Saheel blasted it, to no effect. "You can''t trust him. He disappears behind a barrier which only his weapon can break, then puts pressure on us to vote. But his flesh mound counterpart can deny us permission, meaning we fail to pass anything, but they still get the energy ¡ª and then they''re strong enough to crush us, weapons or no weapons!"


    "That''s bullshit!" she shouted. "He''d never do that! He''s gone to fucking kill himself to try and give me a better chance of winning!"


    "How do you know for sure? You can''t trust him!"


    "I know, man! I just know! Take this one leap of faith on me here ¡ª we can trust him!"


    A bone speared him through the foot, and he fell to his knees, still blasting away madly, pumping away at his gun. The tooth above them was making the roof sag down to such an extent that it was now pressing up against his head, and he knew that this would likely be the end of his life.


    How could he possibly trust Faust not to decline the vote? And yet, if he didn''t make this one leap of faith, his chances of getting close to Sean were nil.


    "Fine," he said. "And if your misplaced trust kills us, then let me die as a martyr!"


    "Teleport us onto a magic carpet above the tower!" shouted Connie. "All those in favour?"


    Their thumbs lit up with such a dazzling glow that Saheel would have been blinded had he not worn his aviators. Instead, he got to watch torrents of energy surge into the tooth overhead, and it bulged bigger and bigger, finally capsizing the elevator, and they fell down...


    2Y 1N ; MAJORITY REACHED


    Ice spiked into his lungs as he breathed in. They were up in the sky, surrounded by a swirling vortex of clouds that orbited a tower made of ivory. Underneath them was a fetching cashmere rug with gilded tassels. He looked down into the endless void around the tower, but felt only resolve.


    "See?" said Connie. "I told you we could trust him! Woohoo! We''re flying!"


    "It came at a price."


    Indeed, cracks ran along the immaculate white surface of the tower, chipping along various fault lines, like an egg, and then with a tremendous burst, the entire exterior shattered, sending out a wave of shrapnel in every direction. But Connie was ready, standing with her arms out for balance, and she weaved them in and out of the debris until they''d cleared it totally.


    Saheel could just about make out the floorplan of his PhD dorm in amongst the writhing mass of flesh, which was rising like yeast. No longer held in by the walls, it stretched out its eldritch muscles, its leathery skin glistening in the sunlight. It was like looking at a cardbox box full of snakes, except every second the snakes got bigger until there was nothing left in the universe but snakes. The flesh mound didn''t pursue them, but instead knitted itself up into the sky, thinning out at the top as it reached higher and higher, and Saheel realised its destination with horror.


    "It''s heading for the sun," he said.


    "Fuck," said Connie. "What? Seriously? And why? Can we stop it?"


    "So you want the sun, do you, Sean?" bellowed Saheel, barely audible over the rush of the wind. "Get ready to forgive me, cause I''ll never let you reach it, brother!"


    "Get us above the mound," he whispered.


    Connie seemed a natural pilot, whizzing them through the air at such speed that ice crystals flaked into their hair, and their wounds froze over rather than scabbed. It was bitingly cold, and all Saheel could do was focus on keeping the rock and the remote held in warm, steady hands. In no time at all, they were casting their own shadow on the highest tendrils of the flesh mound.


    "One liner, sister?" said Saheel, angling the rock so that the chalk mark pointed downwards.


    "Fuck off and die," said Connie. "What? That''s not good enough for you?"


    "It''ll do. For Sean, it¡¯ll do. We''ll shout it on 3."


    "1..."


    Saheel shivered. He tried to identify any parts of anatomy that he recognised as vaguely human in the monster.


    "2..."


    Connie clenched her fists. She spat on the flesh mound, then hit the dab.


    "3!"


    Voting will close at 9:00 UTC on the 26th May</a>

 &#x1F480; 7 &#x1F480;

    <div>


    The universe ended as it began ¡ª with a big old bang.


    Saheel''s sunglasses proved unnecessary for three reasons. One, because they flew off his face the moment he unpaused the rock; two, because the blast swept the carpet from under his feet to somewhere between ten and fifty miles east; three, because the rock broke the tower apart faster than the electrical signals could travel from his eyes to his brain. It all took place in a moment that is to a second what a second is to a year.


    In keeping with the year analogy, where Saheel unpaused the rock on January 1:


    On January 2nd, the rock bit into the very tip of the top of the flesh mound''s highest fingernail.


    By the end of January, it had cut through to the democracy chamber, tunneling through flesh and bone with zero resistance. With a sigh, every bit of energy the flesh mound channeled from the most recent vote dispersed into the atmosphere.


    By the end of February the tower, already in splinters from failing to restrain the beast inside it, crumbled into a cloud of dust. The players'' bedrooms, the 70,000 door, the elevator shaft ¡ª all evaporated, leaving behind empty sky.


    By the second of March, the rock had cut back every growth the flesh mound ever made, reducing it only to its most irreducible, invulnerable parts ¡ª the three men in the centre. Here the weapon met with some resistance, as it spun in place against the mound with enough power to smash apart planets. From Spring the rock, unable to make further progress, settled for boring through the very middle of the mound, splitting Alan, Faust and Sean into separate beings. The three ghosts felt nothing, of course, because the nerves had long disappeared before they could even begin to send a report ¡ª and in around a century, one of them would mutter a belated ''Ow''.Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.


    In April, it tumbled down the elevator shaft, tearing through the first terrestrial layer like a bullet through a tissue. It continued its journey to the bottom unimpeded.


    In June, the very first impulse of electricity started on its way from Saheel''s eye to his brain, and his finger lifted a fraction of a millimetre off the pause button, although it was still depressed.


    In September, the rock broke through the ninth and final terrestrial layer, and the country estate which brought Kari anguish was no more. From here, it went further down, into the abyss where Eirlys had fallen endlessly.


    In October, Saheel and Connie began to fall too, at a rate of around a meter a month, because the magic carpet had already blown away. Also in October, the rock, meeting no further resistance, travelled at a speed that would lap light dozens of times over.


    In November, it finally hit something. But it was only on New Year''s Eve that the something it hit stopped it in its path.


    The first words to materialise in Saheel''s head after pressing the pause button were Oh, brother. He fell, stomach in his throat, full of giddiness and bewilderment, the world around him blurring and the air rushing into his eyes, too cold for him to scream or even breathe.


    Below him, the something that the rock hit cracked, and out of the cracks poured a light so total, so bright, that his eyes registered it only as especially painful darkness. These cracks took comparative eons to spread, and he was able to perceive them snaking across the sky like lightning. At every place the cracks reached, the blue light of the endless horizon fell away, like dirt off a pot at a digsite.


    And when the cracks had engulfed everything, and the pair fell into whatever was behind them, the universe was over.


    ¡ª-


    Sean lay in front of him, legless. When he saw Saheel, his eyes widened and he hummed madly from behind his stitched-up mouth. He flopped away like a landed fish, but his arms were weak, and Saheel outpaced him in a couple of strides.


    "Mmm!" shouted Sean. "Mmm!"


    Saheel''s phone rang ¡ª to the tune of ding-dong merrily on high, of course.


    "Mmm!" Sean insisted, making a grab for it.


    Saheel slapped his hand away. He tossed the phone out in front of him, and Sean went for it like a mad dog playing fetch. It exploded under one blast from the fallen water pistol.


    "You''ve had quite enough to say already, brother," said Saheel.


    "Mmm-MMM!" hummed Sean, and it was obvious what he was trying to say. "Mmm-MMM!"


    For-GIVE! For-GIVE!


    Saheel pressed the cold end of the pistol to his enemy''s forehead, and his finger lingered on the trigger.


    Was this really what he wanted to do? Was he absolutely sure?


    More than anything.


    Saheel sent him on to the next world, then followed.

 Interlude

    A: Hello and welcome to ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die¡¯, the talk show for dead people, by dead people! For our penultimate show, I¡¯m Alexa Despacito, I got more rhymes than a river¡¯s got flow (thank you for asking). Here with me tonight is Saheel Bhosle! How are you feeling, Saheel?


    S: I¡¯m okay, sister. Is this heaven or hell?


    A: It depends what kind of person you are! What would you call it?


    S: I wouldn¡¯t call it either. I would call it the end.


    A: Or is it the beginning? Psyche!


    S: Can I ask you about what happened to Sean? Is he here as well?


    A: As much as I¡¯d like to say ¡®and he¡¯s here with us tonight¡¯, Sean was playing double or nothing. You¡¯re the first and only person to turn the tables on one of your enemies!


    S: By that logic¡­ we¡¯re not in heaven or hell, nor double or nothing, nor end or beginning, but ¡®single¡¯.


    A: You¡¯re the boss, king ¨C call it whatever you like! How do you feel about being made recently single? Sean might be out of the game, but Asha¡¯s still alive. A widow, even.


    S: I¡¯m not about to forgive her, but I don¡¯t pity her. She¡¯ll lose the vicarage. We didn¡¯t have much in the way of savings, and she has a few year¡¯s gap on her CV. Life¡¯s about to get doubly as hard.


    A: Will you speak to her, when she finally makes her way here?


    S: With the end of life came the end of marriage. There¡¯s nothing more to link us except painful memories.


    A: What will you do now, in the afterlife? I don¡¯t exactly see a guy like you going around and preaching the gospel.


    S: Maybe I¡¯ll finally go into financial auditing. I don¡¯t know. Something quiet.


    A: Are you going to look up any of your recently deceased co-players?


    S: I wouldn¡¯t mind bumping into Eirlys, but I¡¯m not going out of my way to look for her. Do people who die in the same bus crash meet up with their alumni? What do they have in common, exactly, other than sharing the same unlucky moment? What¡¯s there to say? We knew each other for barely forty-eight hours.


    A: Let¡¯s talk votes, then. First, it seems a significant faction of readers withheld their vote in protest ¨C probably more than those who voted! Do you have a message to those people who didn¡¯t vote in order to try and keep you alive?The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    S: Thank you, brothers and sisters. I know what it¡¯s like to try really hard to get something done but fail anyway, so I forgive you. What I won¡¯t forgive is those who did vote. You are the Seans of the world, the wolves in sheepskin, and the reason a human will never be able to trust another human. Your behaviour is the reason behind divorce, behind wealth inequality, and the destruction of our natural environment. But I¡¯ll say no more, because I know my words will fall on deaf ears. Know only that you are beyond forgiveness.


    A: Preach! You know what I think?


    S: What?


    A: By the time they¡¯ve learnt to trust one another, they¡¯ll all be dead. That¡¯s what I think. Alright, back to the voting. Thanks to the low voting turnout, you actually had the highest voting percentage yet (although this isn¡¯t surprising given it was split between three characters), at a whopping 78%! What¡¯s more, the author sent me a little note just to tell me you were the character that they struggled the most to write throughout the game, and they never expected you to get this far! Are you used to being so unpopular?


    S: I used to only care what the lord thought. Now, I just don¡¯t care. In a world without morals, I have just as much right to kill Sean as you have right to kill me.


    A: Kill Sean? Buddy, you didn¡¯t just kill him. His consciousness is gone. Wiped out. Forever. He can¡¯t reincarnate, he can¡¯t repent, he can¡¯t beg your forgiveness.


    AUDIENCE: Shudder!


    S: Good. I wouldn¡¯t be happy with anything less.


    A: Time for what little reader mail we have. These guys weren¡¯t after anything more than a penny for their thoughts, I guess. #4 wrote: ¡°Sorry, brother. Even though your fallen water pistol is funny¡±.


    S: After everything you know about me, you still have the nerve to ask for forgiveness? I¡¯m not forgiving you, #4. Own up to what you¡¯ve done. As for the weapon ¨C I don¡¯t see why everybody else got swords and nets while I had to make do with a super soaker. I could have executed Sean by cutting his head off, or garrotting him, or bludgeoning him, but instead I splashed him with a shot of water and he died. What a moment of power! But life is absurd, and I got what I wanted.


    A: On the flipside, you were 90% less thirsty than the other characters for the majority of your run. Response #6 wrote: ¡°completely consumed by revenge is kinda boring ngl,¡± and their comma is leaving me in suspense.


    S: If I have to choose between doing what I want and dying ¨C I choose doing what I want, sister. That¡¯s a lesson I learned the hard way and only put into practice the final moments of my life.


    A: Response #8 wrote: ¡°:(¡°


    S: Same.


    A: Response #9 wrote: ¡°go to hell¡±


    S: As a long-time theologian, it pains me to admit hell doesn¡¯t exist. There¡¯s double, single, or nothing. I suppose I could publish some papers about it, but the only people who¡¯d be interested in such a revelation are alive. Are you alive? You can spread the word for me. I don¡¯t mind if you take the credit.


    A: If they can convince people about this place, then they deserve all the credit they can get! Alright, we¡¯re down to the final stretch. Who are you going to place your bets on, Saheel? Connie or Faust?


    S: I¡¯ve been around them for about five minutes, sister. All I can say is they both want the other to win. Maybe they¡¯ll sabotage themselves to try and make the other look more appealing ¨C but I still don¡¯t trust Faust¡¯s relationship to the flesh mound. It¡¯s pretty suspicious that he made it to the final two.


    A: What do I know? I¡¯m just a foetus.


    S: Well that settles the old abortion debate. Who¡¯d have known the Catholics were right¡­


    A: Okay, ladies and gentlemen, that¡¯s all we¡¯ve got time for tonight! I¡¯ve been Alexa Despacito, this was my guest Saheel Bhosle, and this has been ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die!¡¯ Join me next time for our final episode of the season, and a conversation with our runner-up!

 7.3 (1)

    I


    Connie figured she''d gone blind until she looked down and saw her body. There was a very bright kind of nothing around her, stretching out to endless horizons in every direction. Her numb skin quickly warmed up in the heat, but once she''d shrugged off the cold, the illusion of temperature vanished, and she felt oddly ungrounded, as though the air around her didn''t exist. Whatever was under her feet kept her upright, but when she swept a hand down there, it passed straight through.


    Was she dead? Place looked kind of like she''d always thought heaven would look, but a lot more lonely. She held her breath until her lungs screamed for air, whereupon she obliged them -- after all, the word count was still on her hand, shining like an emerald.


    "Yo," she spoke into the communication tile. "You still there, priest guy?"


    Her voice faded away, instantly muffled, because there was nothing for it to echo off. The loudest sound was her beating heart; the next loudest the unsteady ticking of the word count.


    "Faust?" she said. "Where the fuck are we?"


    He didn''t reply. Her lips were dry and cracked from the rushing freefall. Taking a tentative step forward and finding herself able to walk, she set out in no particular direction. There had to be something out there.


    She lasted five minutes before the lonely aura of the place crushed her. She couldn''t tell up from down, back from forward, and when she yanked out a hair to put it behind her as a marker, it sank beneath her reach, twinkling as it fell away. This nothing was agony. Connie wasn''t the kind of person who took easy refuge in her thoughts, and she generally liked to be as distracted as possible.


    "Faust?" she called, and then hated herself for doing so, because it just made it lonelier when her words fell dead.


    She had a jogging playlist on her phone. She took it out, put it on airplane mode, set the brightness to minimum, and pressed play. A pulsing drumkit made the perfect cushion to her worries, like a bedroll over hard ground, and without really intending to, she found herself running, comforted by the up and down motion of her feet as they plodded forward.


    Hours passed, yet still Connie ran. She was a regular at the gym, and although she dedicated time in her workouts to taking a lot of selfies in the mirror, she put just as much into zoning out at the treadmill. She pressed repeat on the playlist again and again, unable to bear the void around her, until finally the battery on her phone died, and she was truly alone.


    Her legs ached. Her throat was parched. She had a headache from squinting under the light. Having absolutely exhausted herself, she fell down, took off her jumper to wrap it around her eyes, and dozed off.If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    When she awoke, she was hungry, too, but there was some bump, a tiny dot of black, on the horizon. She walked towards it at a steadier pace, swaying on her feet, desperate for a drink, for company, to hear anything from anyone. It took forever for her to get even halfway, where she had to stop to rest again, her body pleading with her for more energy, more strength. The dot didn''t appear to be moving. She pulled the jumper over her eyes again, desperate to dream of some companion, anyone, but her stomach rumbled insistently and she rose, angry, groggy, plodding her way onwards.


    She walked. The worst part of it was that she couldn''t die of thirst. The only thing keeping her upright was the word count, else she''d be happy to have fallen down and be done with it all. It was particularly frustrating, then, to finally reach the dot and discover a crumpled up priest in a white robe, water pistol dangling from his fingers, corpse perfectly preserved, eyes glistening with hatred.


    "Lazy fucker," she said, bumping him with her foot. "Hey! Priest! Rise and fucking shine! Get up, man! Get up!"


    Saheel lay still.


    "Come on! You gotta know when to hit it or quit it, dude! Does now look like a time for quitting? Get the fuck up, man!"


    Reluctant, she pressed her hand to his neck, and although his body was lukewarm, there was no trace of a pulse. So she did what anyone would do, and doused herself down with the pistol like it was a bottle of champagne, drinking from it greedily, feeling revived.


    Just in case, she frisked his pockets, but he didn''t have another rock on him, and he''d dropped the remote shortly after the explosion. What he did have was a working phone, which she swiped. Feeling a little guilty, she closed his eyes for him.


    "Rest in peace, man," she said.


    She turned, then, and took ten careful minutes to scan the horizon --  Faust was still out there somewhere. But there was nothing to break up the emptiness, and she felt more alone than ever, like she wouldn''t have the strength to do more than lie beside Saheel and wait for the inevitable. She drank a little more, and as the cool water slid down her throat, she decided to believe that he couldn''t be that far off. If he was too small to see, well, she''d just have to inflate him like a balloon.


    "Remove the word count, all those in favour?"


    1Y; INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY, INVALID PERMISSION


    A beam of light shot out of her thumb, brighter even than the surroundings, then split into two, forking away at right angles, far away. She didn''t have the strength to walk so far, especially if one direction led to Alan MacCain. Let him come to her.


    "Remove the wordcount, all those in favour?"


    1Y; INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY, INVALID PERMISSION


    "Remove the wordcount, all those in favour?"


    1Y; INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY, INVALID PERMISSION


    "Remove the wordcount, all those in favour?"


    2Y; INVALID PERMISSION


    She gasped, feeling a little less lonely, a little more safe. He''d answered her call. No sooner had she broke out into a smile than her own thumb glowed, and she twisted it upwards with glee, not knowing or caring what he''d proposed.


    2Y; INVALID PERMISSION


    "Faust," she called into the communication tile.


    But there came no reply, so instead, she said, "Take me to Faust!"


    2Y; INVALID PERMISSION


    They didnt stop voting, energy cannoning off into the distance like fireworks, but strain her eyes as she did, she couldn''t see his energy coming from anywhere. What she did see was a four-legged warhorse, growing ever bigger and stronger in mass, charging towards her, with Alan MacCain astride it.


    Her thumb glowed.


    "Fuck, no, stop," she said.


    1Y 1N; INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY, INVALID PERMISSION


    Alan MacCain''s warhorse grew bigger, new muscles tearing out of its skin until it was the size of an elephant.


    Her thumb glowed again.


    "Take the fucking hint," she growled. "Come on, man, I''ve gotta fight that thing!"


    2N; INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY, INVALID PERMISSION


    Receiving Connie''s energy, Alan sprouted wings, the span of which must have been easily a quarter of a kilometer across, and with one powerful flap of them, he sprang towards her, closing the gap instantly.


    The votes stopped coming, just in time. Connie unwrapped the Net of Lies at her hip.

 7.3 (2)

    II


    It said a lot to Connie about the events of the past few days that she wasn¡¯t fazed by the abomination in front of her. The beast¡¯s legs pawed the ground, thick as tree trunks. Muscles rippled along its torso; its neck swung down to reveal a nest of spikes in place of a face; Alan Maccain himself streamed out of its back on a ribbon of flesh. When he saw her, the IT worker drew his thumb across his throat.


    There stood Connie in her pyjamas. Exhausted from walking, stomach running on fumes, alone beyond lonely, she dug in her feet, letting the Net of Truth settle between them. She took in the temperate air with steady breaths ¨C after all they¡¯d thrown at her, she wasn¡¯t going to fall now. For Team Shameless, she¡¯d win.


    Although Alan had just leapt kilometres to reach her, the battle that took place concerned the meter between them. The beast inched forward with all the weight and speed of a glacier while Connie, without giving up any ground, leaned back, spreading out the net further in front of her. The beast stopped short; they froze. Then Alan prowled around her in circles like a panther, while she tracked him with her eyes.


    To absorb Connie¡¯s memory, Alan had to clear the net, which could cut him apart in an instant. But to defeat Alan, Connie had to lower her defense to attack him, and if she only scored a glancing blow, she¡¯d be open, unable to draw it back before he sped into her.


    She matched him: at every turn, every feint and change in direction, Alan found himself about to step into the net as he sought to close the gap. He matched her: as big as his legs were, they flitted to and fro with a ballerina¡¯s poise, and they never lingered enough in one spot for her to commit.


    All things being equal, it came to a stalemate, but Connie was working at a disadvantage. As if being exhausted wasn¡¯t enough ¨C her legs were wobbling as she struggled to maintain her position ¨C it would only be a matter of time before Faust triggered another vote, the rush of energy from which would allow Alan a buffer to overwhelm her. There had to be another way.


    ¡°Stop,¡± she cried, startling him. He leapt backwards, quadrupling the distance between them, and she felt a little satisfaction at how tense he was.


    She said, ¡°I wanna talk.¡±


    Saheel¡¯s phone rang. Keeping a steady grip on the net ¨C he was obviously bending his knees to leap forward if she dropped her guard ¨C she answered.


    ¡°You cheat!¡± he bellowed, the anger of his voice making the speakers buzz with distortion. ¡°What have you done, Conneh? What¡¯s going on?¡±


    She shrugged. Throughout her life, Connie lied to give herself a better image, but this was the first time she truly wanted to deceive.


    ¡°I was gonna ask you, man. We were on top of you in that carpet, and then everything just¡­ broke.¡±


    The beast stopped getting ready to leap forward. It crouched down, pensively.


    He said, ¡°What do you mean, broke?¡±This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    Connie gestured to their surroundings. ¡°Looks pretty broke to me. Dude, I¡¯ve just been walking around in circles for the past day. I haven¡¯t seen anyone or anything. I thought maybe *you¡¯d* have some answers for *me*.¡±


    Her stomach rumbled louder than a trumpet.


    She said, ¡°I¡¯m sick of talking to an elephant thing. Are you human, or not?¡±


    The beast folded up into itself, until it was the size of a man, and a naked Alan MacCain ambled up towards the net, looking as normal as anything save the stitched-over mouth. Oh, and the tumour the size of a football that sprouted out of his skull until he pushed it down, whereupon it sprouted out of his chest, writhing.


    The phone buzzed. ¡°I know as little as you do, Conneh. Where are we? I couldn¡¯t even move until you started voting again! I thought for sure you¡¯d be along to finish me off!¡±


    It was only because Connie was holding the Net of Truth that she felt it bristle subtly. ¡°Why would I finish you off?¡±


    ¡°What do you mean? We¡¯re enemies!¡±


    She shrugged. ¡°I don¡¯t have anything against you, man. You want to know my true enemy?¡±


    He stared at her with those mild-mannered, squinty, beta-male eyes, and nodded.


    ¡°This fucker right here.¡± She flicked her wrist so he could see the wordcount. ¡°If you help me get rid of that, you and I won¡¯t have a bad drop of blood between us, Alan MacCain.¡±


    That, at least, was the truth. Alan shoved the tumour back into himself; it rose out of his stomach. He stepped to the side, amicably, conveniently at the point where her net was thinnest.


    ¡°I¡¯m glad you feel that way! They forced me to play, you know! I don¡¯t have anything against you, Conneh ¨C they forced me to pick someone, and all my enemies were already dead! I don¡¯t know what¡¯s happening any more than you do!¡±


    The Net of Truth bristled. Connie smiled. ¡°That¡¯s alright, man. Truce?¡±


    ¡°Truce!¡±


    They stood there woodenly, frozen. Neither made a move to shake hands.


    ¡°You really don¡¯t know what¡¯s going on?¡± she said.


    He shook his head, and if he didn¡¯t notice the Net of Truth trembling that time he must have been blind.


    ¡°If I were to guess,¡± he said, carefully, ¡°The energy from your last vote was too much for the sandbox, and now we¡¯re adrift in the writer¡¯s consciousness ¨C that is, the consciousness of Faust.¡±


    Even though the Net of Truth tremored between her fingers, he nearly caught her off guard, he nearly made her fall to her knees in shock, but as it was she just about managed to stay upright and he played off his attempt to leap forward as squishing the tumour into his foot. What a lie! Connie couldn¡¯t dream of saying something so outrageous with a straight face.


    ¡°Uh, luckily,¡± said Alan, sweating, ¡°I know where he is.¡±


    ¡°You have wings, right?¡± Connie exhaled. ¡°Can you take me to him? If he¡¯s the author, then the dude¡¯s gotta know what¡¯s going on.¡±


    ¡°Right,¡± said Alan, ¡°And since everything¡¯s broken now, I bet we can get him to deactivate the wordcount.¡±


    He sprouted a pair of angel¡¯s wings, dripping wet with blood. She reeled in the net, carefully, and he stepped forward as she did so until there was barely a foot between them and Connie¡¯s heart was thumping in her ears.


    ¡°Grab on,¡± he said, ¡°Maybe there¡¯s a way out of this for both of us.¡±


    ¡°Sure,¡± she said.


    Again, neither moved. And then, at the same moment, both seized their chance. Alan leapt onto her, knocking her onto her back, and he began to hoover up memories of hastily-told lies during embarrassing moments, of long nights spent queuing in taxis outside stations, of quick hook-ups and slow, burning regrets. Within seconds, what little remained of her life force would be his, and he¡¯d be free to feel the breeze of the real world tickle his real body.


    As for Connie¡¯s attack? She yelled, ¡°Alan, grow!¡±


    2Y; MAJORITY REACHED


    She didn¡¯t struggle. Her thumb flashed ablaze like a torch and energy coursed into him, and even as he squashed her, she wrapped the net around him. She held it tight. Elephants worth of Alan attempted to break free of his humanoid shell, and every single skin cell was grated apart as it expanded into the net. Chunks of flesh fell about her, rivers of blood poured onto her, but Alan MacCain did not escape her trap. She pulled the net at both ends, tightening it, squeezing the rest of him like a juicer.


    He played double or nothing, and what he got was nothing.

 7.4 (1)

    Clutching the love letter he''d written to himself, Faust stepped into the final chamber, where all he saw was darkness and all he heard was howling wind. The crisp air made him shiver. He could just about make out a shape in the gloom, pulsing in and out like a gigantic pair of bellows; rumbling the structure with heavy breaths.


    He didn¡¯t light up the communication tile, choosing instead to sit at the creature''s foot in the pitch black for modesty¡¯s sake. He sat cross-legged, hands on scraped knees. Dying, after all, is a modest affair.


    "Greetings and good tidings, etc," Faust mumbled.


    Half of him had the impression of sheltering under the aura of a being full of life, while the other half felt comfortably alone, like the times he sang to himself in the antechamber. As the creature breathed, hot waves of air rolled onto him. The smell was less than flattering.


    He said, "Thanks for your letter."


    Already he was fingering the phone in his shorts pocket, expecting it to ring at any second. It didn''t. So he watched the word count tick up, musing idly that he''d have chosen a better font for it, or at least a nicer colour like purple, and he tried to find the right words to say. He fiddled with his beard.


    It had got above 70,000, and somehow he was still alive. At the start, he never thought he''d get to the final, and if he did, he thought the popularity would be enough reason to stop hating himself. But now he no longer cared about an audience''s affirmation.


    "It''s stupid," he said. "But I think this game''s the best thing that''s ever happened to me."


    The creature didn''t react, other than to keep on breathing those steady, heavy breaths. It was like listening to the tide go in and out, the kind of white noise Connie probably listened to as a sleeping aid. Was this thing even paying attention?


    "And thanks for showing me my own wake. As an undertaker, I couldn''t have wished for a better funeral. The guys really spared no expense."


    In. Out. In. Out.


    "I never realised how important the people around me were... or how important I was to them."


    The rhythm was ceaseless. Hypnotic. For all intents and purposes, he felt as stupid as people who genuinely tried to have conversations with themselves in the mirror.


    "Alright. I guess you want me to stop laying waste to the area around the bush, that is, beating it. I didn''t come here for explanations, or eleventh-hour plot twists. I came here for you to absorb me."


    Faust stood up and took some deep breaths of his own. Fear gripped him. Of course it did. But he also felt a kind of courage that wrestled his self-doubt to the ground, and he''d never been so sure that killing himself was the right thing to do.Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    For his friends back in the real world, well, he was already dead to them on account of food poisoning, and while it was a shame he''d never get a chance to thank them in person for all that they''d done, he would just have to wait a century or so to greet them with all his gratitude. It wouldn''t be right to get a second chance when so many other people died left and right for similarly unfair reasons like terrorist attacks and allergies. To rob someone of their life in exchange for a second chance ¡ª well, he agreed with his dead counterpart. It wasn''t even on the table.


    As for Connie, she''d cry for a bit. She''d mourn him. But she''d pick herself back up and get her life on track, and maybe, just maybe, she''d start living up to her ideal of happiness. He''d already felt happiness coursing through his body when he helped her come to terms, and it had felt better than anything ¡ª his life was a small price to pay to help her finally reach that.


    Faust stretched out his arm, reaching for the creature in the darkness. What would it feel like? Peaceful? He found himself shutting his eyes, tight, and he trembled, waiting for his fingertips to stop trailing through the air and finally land upon something.


    His phone rang.


    Faust sighed and picked it up.


    "Yeah?" he said. "I''m trying for a dramatic suicide here."


    "Dramatic? You look like you¡¯re reaching down a clogged pipe. I didn''t want to say anything to you because the audience is peeping, even though I JUST burned through all your word count!"


    "Those bastards. Wait, is Connie..."


    "Alive. Saheel is too, despite being on the chopping block, so you could have voted for some time-travel bonanza in the future. But technically, it''s just you and your very friendly teammate left. There are things I need to explain, but since the audience is looking on, my hands are tied tighter than a gimp!"


    "That does it," Faust cried, "With that remark, you''ve robbed my death of any of its dignity! No longer will I make any top ten lists, or be compared to Shakespearean tragedies... away with your modesty, sir!"


    Faust bathed the creature in light. It was a giant version of him, naked, lying down and fused to the floor so that it couldn''t roll over or even so much as lift his arm. Its mouth was stitched over, and again Faust blushed furiously at the gimp remark.


    "Pathetic," he cried. "This game''s the worst thing that''s ever happened to me! Perhaps I shall leap into you now and be done with it all, sans fanfare!"


    "Don''t," buzzed the phone. "Or there won''t even be a you to be sorry about it."


    "I''m ready! I''m limbering up for quite the leap, you heavy-breathing gulliver, you strapped-down titan, you fleshy sex dungeon! How¡¯s that for last words, eh?"


    "Jesus wept. If you''re so desperate for us to lay bare our weakness before the audience, then I shall do so!"


    "Weakness, or strength? If Connie wins, then you get to live again, don''t you? If not, me and her will meet up in the afterlife! In terms of game theory, it''s the right thing to do."


    "The problem, my love, is that by nominating myself we¡¯re playing double or nothing! That is, if we don''t come first place, we''ll vanish from existence forever! No afterlife about it! No consciousness, no thought, no nothing! Emptiness that won¡¯t even realise it¡¯s emptiness!"


    Faust fell back onto his butt, shocked. His mouth hung agape.


    The creature said, "There''s your eleventh-hour plot twist¡­  the secret I worked so hard to keep from the audience! How will they vote now, I wonder?"


    For a while, Faust sat there, completely stunned, as thoughts flew around his head in a whirlwind. But soon enough, he shook his head, wiped his brow, and stood up.


    He said, "That doesn''t change a thing. Just because the price is steeper, doesn''t mean she''s not worth saving. All my life I''ve never thought myself capable of anything, and here it is, before me ¡ª my way to make a difference."


    "How melodramatic," said the creature. "Of all the turns our conversation would take, I never thought I''d have to fight you."


    Faust threw back his head and laughed.


    "Fight you? What do you think I''ve been doing all my life?"


    He brandished the double-edged sword, still inert, while the creature drew the walls of the chamber closer, as if to press him in. But nobody won that particular battle, because at that moment a super-visual rock blasted through and evaporated them.

 7.4 (2)

    <div>


    II


    Faust wasn''t exactly obsessed with death, but he had spent a lot of nights lying awake and fantasising about what it might be like, and now he no longer needed to fantasise.


    Chiefly: would it hurt? Saheel''s rock tore his body apart at an atomic level before he even perceived it. Like a mugger in a crowd, it bumped him once and then it was stolen, his senses snuffed out. So no, it didn''t hurt, but it wasn''t exactly peaceful either. There was no angelic choir to serenade him, no relatives to usher him into a group hug, nor was there a judge to weigh his sins against his virtues. There was only light, and it was blinding.


    Faust would have felt adrift if there were anything to drift in. He would have felt cold, untethered as he was from the steady 37 degree heat of his body, but there was no part of him left to feel, no eyes, no ears, no skin. So be it, he thought, and tried as he had in life to take refuge in memories and daydreams. But without a brain to store and retrieve information, he couldn''t conjure up any more than distant colours and flashing lights, and the shreds of memory that did pass him were bewildering in his delirium.


    The only part that remained was his thumb, impossible to destroy against the rules of the game, but he couldn''t perceive it or the word count next to it. While Faust had always found pleasure in being left alone, he now began to feel very lonely, for he was separated from even himself, and it crushed him. Was all he had left a scrap of consciousness that could only observe its own pain?


    It was the fever dream to end all fever dreams. All fevers pass and all dreams end, but this -- this was nothing, forever. Ages would pass and trillions stream into the land of the dead, and humans would consume their environment in totality. Even as the last woman starved among the rubble and the Earth spun as an empty cemetery, forever would only just be getting started.


    Time passed, but it might as well have stopped. Nothing happened to Faust, save the fluctuation of his thoughts that were too airy to anchor him to any kind of memory. They twisted around, repeating themselves, and they were worse than any of those nights he''d spent staring at the ceiling.


    What an idiot he''d been. Forever was a staggeringly long time, and it wasn''t worth a few fleeting moments of happiness, no matter how deserving the recipient, no matter how heroic the sacrifice. He''d been halfway there in his conclusions that it wasn''t right to force someone else to die so that he could live, because he''d touched on how unique a gift life was. He''d just been too stupid to see that he deserved to live too.


    There were no second chances; no seconds. But if he had one, just one, he knew what he would do. He''d rally against the game and break it, find a way for him and Connie to both live, because neither of them deserved this. In his head, he laughed. These must have been the exact conclusions he''d gone through when drifting alone in the other afterlife as the other Faust.Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    Deciding that he was worth saving was but a small comfort. Even as the last stars in the universe twinkled out, and everything drifted apart, leaving an empty black canvas for the next painter, Faust would still be grappling with these regrets. A second chance -- if only!


    1Y; INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY, INVALID PERMISSION


    The words bounced around his mind. Connie was still out there, and just knowing that, feeling her warm presence defy the piercing brightness, that made all the difference.


    Connie, he screamed. But there was no part of him to scream.


    1Y; INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY, INVALID PERMISSION


    He tried in vain to feel his thumb, to twist it up, but it was just like being a thirteen year old again, wishing he had spirit wings and trying to feel them and unfurl them and fly. This time, though, it was him that wasn''t real.


    1Y; INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY, INVALID PERMISSION


    Connie! Alas, he was paralysed. No second chance would come. If he could have smiled, he would. Those cold words felt warmer than a hug to him, and would slot into his carousel of thoughts to comfort him through the eons.


    Obviously, a second chance soon came. Memories poured into him like boiling water into a flask. They weren''t things Faust often remembered.


    He remembered riding the steam train with his grandpa, going into the cabin, shovelling coal into the furnace, their faces stained with sweat and soot as pine needles blurred past outside.


    He remembered playing chess with Deadward in the pub, the tangy smell and taste of lager, the thick smattering of laughter filling the room, and the soft crunch of heather under their feet as they stumbled back home.


    He remembered opening up his vocal chords with a great rush of air and filling the auditorium with a long, sustained note, the firm handshakes from the judges as they wrote the prize cheque, their eyes twinkling in admiration.


    Faust opened his eyes, for his body was back together, and he felt unreservedly happy, proud to be alive and proud of having lived. He stroked his beard as he looked around at the emptiness. His thumb lit up again. Connie!


    2Y; INVALID PERMISSION


    Energy pulsed out of his finger in two directions. One, far off into the horizon, and one straight down in front of him. There lay the most pathetic creature he''d ever seen, smaller and weaker than a premature foetus, its skin the same consistency as dog shit. It had his eyes. Slowly, it raised a tiny malformed hand -- thumbs up.


    "Thank you," said Faust, beaming. "From the bottom of my heart, thank you. Take me to Connie!"


    2Y; INVALID PERMISSION


    The energy went from his thumb to the foetus, but bounced off its skin, repelled.


    "Why isn''t it working?"


    2Y; INVALID PERMISSION


    A greater blast shot towards his doppelganger, to much the same effect, like waves breaking upon a rock. Faust felt that whatever it had done to save him had come with an irreversible cost. He groped about his pockets for his phone, but he had neither that, the communication tile, or the double-edged sword.


    The wordcount on his hand glowed green.


    "Restore the flesh mound?" asked Faust. "Will that work?"


    1Y 1N; INSUFFICIENT MAJORITY


    Connie had voted no -- was she in trouble? He scooped up the foetus in his sleeve, careful not to touch it, for who knows where the memories would go now, and set out in Alan MacCain''s direction full of energy, joy, and life.

 7.3 (3)

    <div>


    III


    No matter how bad Connie''s knees ached, how loudly her stomach growled, how icky her skin felt, walking through the empty brightness only got easier and easier, because every step took her closer to a good friend. By the time she caught sight of him on the horizon, she was gliding forwards. Similarly, Faust was striding towards her, his spine bolt upright, head held high. He''d changed.


    It didn''t drain a drop from her happiness reservoir to wave at him. When he waved back, she realised that a smile had come to her lips without her consciously forcing it, and what an odd feeling that was ¡ª she''d gone from crying of her own accord to beaming brighter than the sun! If anything, the happiness reservoir was overflowing.


    "Hey, man!" she shouted.


    "Greetings!" he hailed, doubling his pace.


    They paused when they met, grinning, unsure what kind of terms they were on. She wanted to hug him, lonely as she''d been, but she was covered in Alan MacCain''s blood, and Faust''s body language was oddly closed off. He was carrying some kind of bundle against his chest. He turned away slightly.


    A couple days ago she''d have felt rejected by that ¡ª she''d already have died of embarrassment, looking as she did in her sodden, torn pyjamas; hair matted and drooping. Honestly, though, she couldn''t find it in herself to give a single fuck. No better time than now to test the Democratisation of Reality, she supposed.


    "I wanna get all this Alan off me," she said, wiping the gloop off her arms. "Are you in favour?"


    He put his thumb up and a curious thing happened. Both of their lights streaked into the bundle at his chest before scattering like tiny fireworks.


    2Y


    A dry, comfortable and altogether more content Connie took a step back, Saheel''s words about trust echoing in her ears.


    She said, "You''re Team Shameless Faust, right, not Fleshy Mound-y Faust?"


    "Shameless, and proud of it." He uncovered the bundle in his arms. "There was an explosion..."


    "What the fuck, is that a BABY? No, that''s like ¡ª jesus, dude. He has your eyes. And, ugh, your beard?"


    The baby thing was barely the size of her hand and its skin  looked watery, like an artichoke. Because she was still kind of a horrible person, she imagined the little splat it would make if she squeezed it, which caused her to instantly cringe and shove her hands in her pockets. Best not to splat the bearded baby of wisdom.Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators!


    "Are you quite alright?" said Faust. "Anyway, all that''s left of our enemy is Fleshy Baby Me, and he''s not exactly growing into a strapping young lad. He''s not growing at all."


    "Yeah, I saw it happen when we voted. Is it... is he... conscious? Can we talk to him? Get him to surrender or something?"


    He shrugged. "I don''t have a phone. But he''s not evil, Connie. He loves me, and I love him!"


    She giggled, because what he''d said was patently ridiculous, and yet his smile was ironically genuine rather than genuinely ironic. She felt guilty, worried that laughing at him would make him recoil, but there wasn''t a trace of that self-doubt from when he''d confined himself to bed.


    "Wowee," she said. "I''ve got Saheel''s phone and it looks like it''s still got a bit of charge on it. But first, would you mind setting the baby down for a second?"


    "Abandon my BABY?" he cried. "My precious little honey-woney Fausty-kins? Oh, well, alright then."


    Connie winced as he let the baby plop to the floor. It bounced up and down like a balloon, until it came to rest on the layer that sieved out inanimate objects.


    "Man!" she cried. "What the fuck? Your baby?"


    "Whoops. What the fuck, how could I, I''m a monster, etc. Except the only way it can die is by the Double-Edged Sword, and I don''t know where that''s got off to. All I have is this None-Edged Sword."


    Faust held up a jade hilt that had two empty slots for a blade on either side, and it was pulsing green at the same rate as her net.


    "The number of things that it can cut," he explained, "is none. Now, why''d you have me dunk my fleshy baby self?"


    She hugged him. He hugged her back. He was warm. His beard was scratchy.


    "It''s good to see you again, man," she said. "I really thought I''d lost you."


    His voice resonated through his chest where her head was. "Sorry for just kind of... fucking off."


    "That''s alright. Just don''t ''kind of... fuck off'' again."


    They kept hugging.


    He said, "...This is kind of a long hug."


    "Allow it," she said, and he did. What would come next was uncertain, but for this moment, everything seemed like it was going to be alright, as it usually does when hugs are involved. The steady rise and fall of his breaths soothed her. She felt her eyes drooping.


    He said, "You''re leaning on me. And this hug has exceeded the length that I would hug my own mother."


    She clung on tighter. "I''ve been walking in this barren fucking sky like the last person on earth for god knows how long. Stop being sarcy and just allow it, man! We made it. Isn''t that great? We both came to terms."


    "I know," he said, pushing back against her. "I''m allowing it. And I had to see what was at stake to realise that. I promise it won''t all have been for nothing. We''re going to find a way to get out of here together, and we''re going to go back to our lives with a newfound joy. Are you with me?"


    "Course I am. You''re not dying on me without my permission, Fausty-boy. I''m gonna visit you in your care home when you''re ninety and we''re gonna laugh about this stupid fucking game and only then am I gonna grant you permission to croak of a heart attack or something. We''ll figure this out."


    "Okay, cardiac arrest at ninety it is, not meeting the wiggle worms even a year before that, just have mercy and please stop leaning on me." His legs started to give out under him; he was losing his balance.


    "Right, sorry," she said, releasing him. "It got a little weird at the end there."


    "...Yeah."


    He scooped up the foetus back in his sleeves while she got out Saheel''s phone and waved it in front of its face. It began to ring. The voice matched the baby''s appearance: weaker than a fly''s sneeze, higher pitched than mosquito, and dripping with Faust''s signature irony. Connie shuddered at the resemblance.


    The baby said, "Please, please, please, please, please ¡ª hurry up and kill me."

 7.3 (4)

    IV


    Connie never got why people cooed and fawned over babies ¨C they just looked like ugly little people, and she¡¯d long burned all the photos from her pre-makeup childhood. There was nothing beautiful about Foetus Faust as it begged for death, and she dug her nails into the phone case to suppress the urge to pop the baby like a zit.


    ¡°Oh no, Baby Faust,¡± she cried, ¡°Why do you want to die?¡±


    It wasn¡¯t really lying if she didn¡¯t try to sound genuine.


    The foetus sighed in its sweet little person voice and said, ¡°Is that how you two have been playing the game all along? Distracting yourselves from the bleakness with flirting? It might¡¯ve been a winning strategy for the first few waves, but time is running out, guys. Hurry up and kill me.¡±


    Faust frowned. ¡°Thank you for giving me a second chance, and I want you to know we don¡¯t intend to squander it. But under no circumstance am I going to end your life, my little coochie-coo. I¡¯m growing ever sick of being associated with a suicide motif, and I refuse to pave a route out of this nightmare on my own corpse!¡±


    ¡°Okay. You¡¯ve got like 3000 words, my love. What are you going to do?¡±


    Faust looked at Connie blankly, and they shrugged. They sat down, staring out into the endless nothing, trying to tease out any dash of inspiration.


    ¡°We can do it,¡± said Connie encouragingly. ¡°Not killing him, I mean, like¡­ just generally do it, in a happy ever after kind of way.¡±


    But it didn¡¯t exactly encourage any ideas to come up ¨C the two of them had mastered their emotions and nothing more. At best she would be able to die with a smile on her face. The Djinn, reliving the past, the superweapon ¨C all had been Team Fear¡¯s idea, and where had it led them but down a dead end? Now everything was gone.


    ¡°Do you want a hint?¡± squeaked Foetus-Faust.


    ¡°I¡¯m not killing you,¡± said Faust, indignant.


    ¡°The 70,000 door?¡± asked Connie. ¡°Maybe that was the key to getting out of this mess. Do you reckon we could vote that back in ?¡±


    ¡°What do I know?¡± said the baby. ¡°I¡¯m just a foetus.¡±


    Dousing the flesh mound in energy it couldn¡¯t use, they voted the door back in. It was by all accounts as perfectly generic a door as could possibly exist, flat and white and wooden, stained by a long streak of Haralda¡¯s blood, and crested with the green glowing number 70,000. Connie gripped the handle and nudged it open.


    She recognised the street ¨C an alleyway in Barden, roaring with the distant sound of traffic, thick with the stench of dust. It was drizzling, a few of the droplets blowing in and cooling Connie¡¯s face, and the murky overcast sky made a soft bed for her eyes against the brightness in which she currently stood. Home! She welled up, all joy and tears.This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.


    Faust scooted away, perhaps worried she was going to leap onto him again in happiness. He said, ¡°That¡¯s the real world, right?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± the phone replied. ¡°Louis was very much against including it, but all blank pages are required by law to have an emergency exit. Seeing how you obliterated it, I wonder why.¡±


    Connie couldn¡¯t contain herself any longer.


    She was sick of this stupid faux heaven, or blank page, or whatever it was. Her stomach rumbled at the thought of being able to stroll into a caf¨¦ and shove a bacon butty down her throat. But just before she took a step through, Saheel¡¯s phone rang out in a tone that pierced her ears.


    ¡°You do NOT want to step through yet,¡± shouted Foetus-Faust. ¡°There are rules!¡±


    Faust sighed the loudest he¡¯d ever sighed. ¡°Don¡¯t sigh at me, my love! Your Democratisation of Reality only works in this reality. If you step out there, you won¡¯t be able to vote the wordcount away.¡±


    ¡°Okay¡­¡± said Faust. ¡°So, like, just vote to abolish the wordcount?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure as hell in favour of that,¡± said Connie.


    They held up their thumbs, watching them glow eagerly. Connie could already taste the mix of bacon gristle and ketchup.


    2Y; INVALID PERMISSION


    ¡°What gives?¡± she yelled. ¡°Are you thumbsing me down, you little shit?¡±


    ¡°Vote again,¡± said the baby. ¡°And actually watch what happens.¡±


    They did, and Connie actually watched what happened. As soon as they put their thumbs up to propose the motion, baby Faust¡¯s thumb swung reflexively downwards.


    ¡°The game is the flesh mound,¡± he said. ¡°No flesh mound, no game, no vector for audience attention. I¡¯m the most grotesque lifeform ever spawned, but a lifeform nonetheless, and that comes with a certain set of biological imperatives.¡±


    ¡°In other words, you¡¯re rejecting us on instinct? Well, it was nice knowing you, man.¡±


    She looped up her Net of Truth so that it was coiled around into a suitable noose ¨C with enough squeezing, she¡¯d finally get to see that thing pop. Then she saw Faust¡¯s eyes widen in horror.


    ¡°Connie!¡± he shouted, backing further away, clutching the child to his breast.


    ¡°Fuck,¡± she said. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, I don¡¯t know why, but I feel like I have a biological imperative to kill that thing. There has to be a way around it without killing, man, but¡­¡±


    She didn¡¯t want to finish the sentence. To her, the flesh mound seemed a fair trade for their lives, and it was becoming difficult to empathise with Faust¡¯s wishes.


    ¡°I¡¯m really not too fussed about dying,¡± said the baby.


    Faust said, ¡°Of course you aren¡¯t! You haven¡¯t experienced the abject nothingness of eternity! How long do you think you ¡®won¡¯t be fussed¡¯? A hundred years? A thousand? There won¡¯t be a me to love you and to guide you. There won¡¯t be anyone. What¡¯s more, how can you know for sure that killing you will stop the wordcount? I¡¯m begging you, baby, tell me there¡¯s another way.¡±


    ¡°Nah,¡± said the baby. ¡°I¡¯m the part of you that¡¯s already dead. I knew my fate the moment I joined this game. And I¡¯m like 90% sure killing me would end the game¡­ there¡¯s probably no one reading after this many words, so the accumulated level of attention should be safe. Just kill me, you weirdo!¡±


    ¡°Why? Why would you throw your life away?¡±


    ¡°Are you asking a Faust why he wants to die? For any good cause, really. We¡¯re a sucker for playing the martyr. And I was thinking maybe, in the 1/9 chance that I won, I could hunt down the eight who brought themselves back to life, and maybe through some kind of energy reversal put the players of this game back in the right place. Just to stick it to Louis and his lunatics.¡±


    Connie¡¯s phone beeped. ¡°Baby Faust¡­¡±


    ¡°I just texted you their names and locations. It¡¯s a long shot, but who knows? It might just work.¡±


    ¡°That is admittedly a pretty big long shot,¡± said Faust. ¡°Woe is me, for I am an idiot. I am still not killing you.¡±


    Connie looked at the first name on the list.


    ¡°Hey, this guy lives in Barden. We could pay him a visit.¡±


    The baby said, ¡°Remember if you leave, you can¡¯t vote again. The wordcount is your priority. We¡¯ve burned through 1000 more just talking. Please, hurry up and kill me! It¡¯s the only way to end the game!¡±


    Connie looked at Faust, who stood still and passive. She began gathering up all the courage she could get to perform the unspeakable action that would sever their friendship.

 &#x1F41B; Wiggle Worm &#x1F41B;

    ?? Wiggle Worm </a>??


    Attention, this is the author speaking.


    Recently I¡¯ve had the pleasure of writing a track for a charity album, so Faust¡¯s Wiggle Worm song</a> is now a reality. It sounds about as weird as the character and if you want you can tell me all about how shit it is in the comments.


    Obviously Covid¡¯s hit us all very hard. It¡¯s disrupted my life quite a lot in particular (even if it¡¯s given me the time to write this shit, I¡¯d rather my job back), but I know I¡¯m very lucky in comparison to people who have lost a lot more, so I want to do what I can for those less fortunate.


    My man Antik said, "All of the proceeds from the album</a> sales will be donated to a charity called Global FoodBanking Network. During the challenging times we¡¯re facing as humanity, every bit of help is appreciated. Food is as essential as it gets and The Global FoodBanking Network is making sure it is available to people who need it most."


    Sorry to ambush you with a random charity campaign! It¡¯s just that today on June 5<sup>th</sup> bandcamp¡¯s waiving all their fees so 100% of the money will go to charity. Please give a listen, anyway, it¡¯s a nice free album with tracks from musicians I greatly respect.</a>This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    I¡¯m hoping to get the last two chapters out today so the final round of voting can open tonight.


    Below are the lyrics to Faust¡¯s Wiggle Worm song</a>:


    Wiggle worms are hungry


    And you are their food


    If you hurry up and live


    Then they can eat you


    How you spend it''s meaningless


    Ain''t no more to life than this


    Give or take, create consume


    Worm care not for what you choose


    Worm is gonna get wiggling


    Food for a wiggle worm


    Chew on the wiggle worm


    But even the wiggle worm


    Is food for the wiggle worm


    If you pray it''s meaningless


    Worm shake hands with nihilist


    Help or hurt or win or lose


    Worm care not for what you choose


    Maximum wiggle time for wormies


    All the worm come out to wiggle


    Eat their way through your middle


    Happy little wiggle worm dancing


    Your body is food for them


    The worms can even eat your soul


    When you''re dead there''s no control


    Give or take, create consume


    Wormies don''t give a damn about what you choose

 7.4 (3)

    III


    A life was in Faust''s arms. He felt the flutters of its fragile heartbeat through his sleeves. He felt the damp air flow in and out of it as it breathed. As he gazed down gently at its form, the urge to protect it and love it overwhelmed him -- he drew away from Connie jealously.


    "I can''t," he cried. "I won''t!"


    The world fell dead silent. So much blood was rushing past his ears that it drowned out even the clamour of Barden City. Distantly, people were shouting, thronging in their masses, honking on their horns and throttling their engines. But not here.


    The baby sighed, extending its arms as thin as matchsticks, and said, "Look at me, my love. What sort of life would you have me live? I''m trapped in this body. I can''t even turn my head to look around, open my mouth to sing, nor can I lift an arm to scratch my back! Please -- set me free."


    "No!" Faust''s eyes ran wet. "What sort of victory would that be?"


    "Faust..." said Connie, her expression the grimmest he''d ever seen it, the mask under the mask under the mask. Something about it sent adrenaline coursing through his veins.


    "We can''t!" He scrambled to his feet, clutching himself tight, backtracking away into the endless dead end. "Remove the reflexes inherent in the flesh mound! All those in favour?"


    2Y -- INVALID PERMISSION


    As if guided by a marionette, the baby''s hand plunged downwards, like a knife into a gut.


    "Why?" he said. "Why won''t it work?"


    "Would you be able to make yourself stop breathing?" asked the baby. "I''m very proud of you, Faust. I can see you''ve learned a lot and you''ve tried very hard to save me. No one''s going to blame you for this."


    No one? Faust didn''t need a prophet to imagine himself lying awake, staring at the ceiling as it caught the rays of dawn, haunted by regrets for an act he could never reverse.


    He said, "One will."


    At that, the foetus started wriggling like a little fleshy wiggle worm, trying to wrest its way free from Faust''s grasp, but Faust held fast.


    "Stop this!" the grown man shouted. "Please! What good will it do me to escape from the foreverness of death if I spend the rest of my life tormenting myself for never saving you? Either way, I see an eternity of suffering before me!"If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    The baby said, "What good will it do me to see one of you drop dead? Cool your head, you weirdo. Take a deep breath and step back. Stop avoiding the issue by throwing a fit."


    "Faust..." Connie walked slowly towards him, looping the net around her hands. It didn''t look like she was brainstorming. She wouldn''t, would she? Connie wouldn''t!


    "You wouldn''t," he cried. "Weren''t we a team, Connie? Are you really going to raise a hand against one of your own?"


    She stood still, stiff legs, stiff voice. "Just take a deep breath and let''s think about this, man. Let''s not rule anything out just yet. Foetus -- is it really true that killing you is the only way to end the game?"


    "Jesus wept," shouted the baby. "You two are as deaf as DJ''s! Of course!"


    Connie stretched out a section of the net in front of her eyes and studied it carefully, very carefully. Ever more carefully, she showed the net to Faust. It was still, not shaking even slightly.


    "The Net of Truth confirms it," she said. "I know a liar when I see one, and I know you, Faust. You''re not lying about this. This is the only way. Now: what are you going to do?"


    She was too close for comfort, and the baby struggled ever harder to escape his grip. Without even realising it, he started jogging backwards -- funny that now he should find the motivation.


    "A timeskip," he said. "We can do a timeskip. Set the word count to only come back in eighty years. Blow the audience off."


    The baby slapped its little palm upside its head. And just like that, the realisation set in. Using the vote to control the vote was like using feelings to sort out feelings. It wasn''t going to lead to anything productive. So it came to pass that Faust the undertaker committed his first atrocity.


    Oh, fuck, was he really going to do this?


    "Hold still," he barked, cold resolve washing over him like an ice bath.


    He gripped the baby''s arm between two fingers then pushed the None Edged-Sword into its shoulder. Slowly, agonisingly, he began to lever the arm outward, shoving the sword hilt ever deeper into its body, pulling with all his might. The dead Faust was screaming. Then came the horrific sound of ripping  as the flesh tore away, and soon the bones and tendons followed, rent clean out of the socket.


    "Kill me," screamed the baby. "Kill me!"


    Faust brushed his tears aside, then did the same with the other arm, using the hilt to lever it out and plucking it away until all that remained was a bloody stump. His hands stained crimson.


    "Please," it was begging. "It hurts! End my life!"


    "Jesus, man," cried Connie, her face pale. "Hurry up and finish the job! What the fuck are you doing, torturing it like you''re butchering a chicken?"


    "There," said Faust. He was going to be sick. "Now we can vote. All those in favour of revoking the word count?"


    "Faust..." said Connie.


    They put up their thumbs, and Faust watched the baby intently, even as it wriggled around and screamed and begged for death. Green energy was underpinned by blood.


    "It doesn''t have any thumbs to put down anymore!" he cried, a certain desperation in his voice. "We can vote to heal it once we''ve got rid of the wordcount!"


    Finally, the outpouring of energy from their vote fizzled out, and the last few sparks settled like dust, and out of the gloomy mist came the voting results.


    2Y -- INVALID PERMISSION


    "Please," said the baby. "Please, Faust!"


    Connie wrestled him, making a grab for the None-Edged Sword. He pushed back, taller and stronger and much better fed, easily swatting her off him. But he''d stepped forward into her net, which soon tightened around him. His fingers worked at the knots in vain. With one tug, Connie had him on the floor, and she had the sword hilt, and she had the baby.


    She set it down. She raised the hilt high above her head, and let it plummet like a guillotine...


    "Wait!" he cried. "I should be the one to do it."


    She pulled him up. He brandished his None-Edged Sword, his Djinn, and in a single blow he killed himself.

 7.4 (4)

    <div>


    IV


    It seemed to Faust that his mind was set back in the darkness of his head, miles from his eyes. A thick bog of emotion sequestered him from the world. Distantly he could just about perceive Connie''s distress, and when she hugged him he barely felt it, as though he were underwater. He tried to cling on, to anchor himself in reality, but in that moment his body was unknown to him, like a wrought iron diving suit that was weighing him down.


    She was saying something, peering deep into the abyss of his gaze. He thrashed, trying to surface.


    "I''m sorry," she said. "It''s okay."


    No longer could Faust bear to stand. He let the None-Edged Sword fall, and having fulfilled its purpose, it slipped down through the sieve layer, tumbling towards the bottom of the known universe. And he thought he hated himself before!


    "You went like this when Greer passed," said Connie, shaking him gently. "Stay with me, man. Don''t let his death be in vain."


    That had been an age ago. Back then, he''d only been worried about himself.


    "Team Shame," he whispered. "Team Shame! Team Shame!"


    "That''s right," she beamed, and he could see how skillfully she was masking her troubles. "It''s all over now. We survived. They thought they could keep us down? Well, they couldn''t. And we''ve got the list now, so really, it''s us who''s got the upper hand."


    Drizzle poured in from the 70,000 door. She helped him back up to stand in front of it, staring out into the rain, appreciating the breeze as it cooled him.


    "You''re being strong for me," said Faust.


    She shrugged. "Someone''s gotta."


    The fresh air made him feel more alive, coaxing him back out of the depths of his sorrow, making it a little easier to forget the lump in his throat.


    "Okay," he said. "Let''s finish this."


    Grimly, they raised their thumbs. Faust thought of the seven names he''d etched into the bench at his funeral, and he hunched over at the gravity of what he owed them. A great fatigue overcame him, a weariness of spirit, even as he recognised that he would never again sleep soundly in his life, assaulted by memories.


    "Stop the wordcount," said Connie. "Stop the game."


    "Stop it all," said Faust. "Let it never come to pass again."


    On the tail of their words came an overpowering blast of light. The wordcount left Faust, rising up above them while rivers of green blasted into it from their thumbs. The numbers swelled in size, inflating steadily. First each was the size of his head, and then his body, and it kept on growing, getting bigger and bigger until it consumed the entirety of his vision like sky-writing. The count hissed and crackled with plasma. Every tick boomed as deep as a landslide.Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    The spectacle wasn''t over yet. Next came the light all around them, the sole colour left on the blank page, all of it streaming into the number as bit by bit their surroundings faded to black. It glowed off their awestruck faces. They held each other as they bathed in the green, unable to look away. One of the last things to be sucked in was the Giga-Ostrich, dragged back from its 75,000 word plummet.


    AAAAAAAA, it said, and they were fine last words.


    With one last tick, the word count halted. Like scales off a moth under moonlight, or a particularly render intensive particle trick, it faded away, glistening.


    "These are some fireworks, man," said Connie, arm around his shoulder.


    "It''s beautiful," he conceded.


    Soon the number was gone. There remained only three things in the entire universe ¡ª Faust, Connie, and the door, which was letting in a ray of gloomy light.


    Connie uncoiled her net. "What about this thing?"


    "...Leave it."


    "Yeah."


    She let it drop.


    "What do you reckon happens to this place after we step out?" she said. "You think it keeps on existing, or it stops?"


    "I guess it depends on whether anyone''s still around to perceive it."


    "The audience? You think they''re still watching?"


    He laughed. "They can fuck off now. Show''s over."


    They stood before the door, and Barden City sure was a sight for sore eyes. Dreary, bleak, smoggy, dark ¡ª but real. Mundane. A place of ordinary struggles, of debt and ill-health, not of death and fear. No character arcs, but a daily struggle between incremental improvement and stagnation. Faust couldn''t wait to start.


    "After you," he said. "It''s only polite."


    "Thanks," she said. "Thanks for everything."


    They stepped through.


    ¡ª


    Faust had never actually been to a kebab shop before, but Connie insisted they gorge themselves on mystery meat and wash it all down with lager. It smelled of spice and sweat. People at various stages of sobriety were bumping shoulders and chowing down, and the room was full of such cheer that it almost, almost got through to him. He almost felt like one of them. But he''d traded one set of troubles for another, and it would take a while to heal.


    He sent her off to claim a plastic table and, while she was distracted, he quietly footed the bill before setting out to join her.


    "Cheers," she said, clinking his plastic cup. "I did say I''d take you out for the night. right? You want to hit up a club after this?"


    Faust smiled, finding it easy to speak loud enough in the din. "Maybe another time."


    He took a bite of the kebab, and found it pretty overhyped. Could''ve been spicier, could''ve been meatier, even if it did pair well with the acidic beer.


    Connie showed him a business card, stamping it down on the table.


    "What''s that?" he asked.


    "This guy said he''d sponsor me for a chauffeur exam. I''m gonna have to call him up, and boy, is that going to be uncomfortable... but he said his grandkids are in the same position, and not to be afraid to ask for help if I need it."


    He nodded. "That''s a good lesson. You''ll make a great chauffeur, Connie. Putting a lot of effort into your appearance is one of your strengths."


    "Oh my god." She was beaming. "Is that a compliment from FAUST?"


    "Yeah."


    "What about you, man? What are you going to do, sixty years before you end up in that nursing home?"


    He swished the lager around his cup and took a big gulp as he mulled it over.


    Go and talk to a therapist, you self-pitying freak!


    Suddenly, a burst of laughter overcame him, and he nearly knocked his food on the floor. He felt himself surface out of the bog.


    "What?" she said, leaning in, slightly concerned. "What is it?"


    "Oh, nothing," he said. "Just a few little changes."


    Voting will close on the 7th of June at 1200 UTC</a>

 &#x1F480; 8 &#x1F480;

    It happened in a blur. All she did was order another kebab.


    Her heart stuttered. The skipped beat was like stepping into a tunnel. The patrons'' laughter crackled in her ears, everything too loud, too bright. She felt out of it. Stumbled into the night.


    She was being watched. Faust was at her side.


    "What''s wrong?" he pleaded.


    She couldn''t reply.


    "Connie?" he said.Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.


    She skipped another beat, the gap between them bathed in pain. She fell. Slumped on the tarmac. Heard a dial tone.


    "Please, where are we?" Faust cried. "The address? Please!"


    And the woman on the other side told him it would be fine. They were sending someone over. Just sit tight.


    Connie lost her vision. He became a silhouette. Dimly, she perceived four others standing above her, hooded like executioners. Faust gripped her hand, full of warmth and life and thundering blood.


    He didn''t let go as they lifted her up, slung her down like a sack. Accelerating and turning and braking. Forces tugged her forward and back.


    "Hang on," said a voice from far away. "We''re almost there, Connie."


    She said, "I want to hear you sing."


    "What?"


    "You''re a singer, right? I want to hear it. Just once I want to hear it."


    He opened his mouth, cutting through the rushing of wind, the rushing of traffic, the rushing of blood, the squealing of wheels and cranes and drills, and he let out a single, sonorous, mournful note, after which his voice cracked and all fell silent.

 Interlude

    Voting results</a>


    A: Hello and welcome to ¡®Everybody¡¯s Gonna Die¡¯, the talk show for dead people, by dead people! For the last time, I¡¯m Alexa Despacito, thank you for asking. Here with me tonight is Constance Beaumont. How are you feeling, Connie?


    C: I¡¯m dead? Are you telling me I¡¯m actually fucking dead, now, man? Is that really what you¡¯re telling me here?


    A: I¡¯m afraid so.


    C: But¡­ we did literally everything you wanted us to! That¡¯s some kind of bullshit! Did we or did we not vote away the universe? Did we or did we not stop the game?


    A: Of course you did. And what an excellent achievement! Nobody will ever be able to take that away from you.


    C: Then¡­?


    A: I¡¯m sorry. It¡¯s probably confusing for someone on the outside. 100%, you settled your affairs with the flesh mound. You consigned Alan MacCain to nothingness.


    C: I hope that asshole never gets a moment of peace in his rest.


    A: Almost certainly he won¡¯t. It might have looked like the game, the wordcount and the voting were one in the same. But even I, a foetus, know that correlation doesn¡¯t equal causation, right?


    C: So we should have voted to kill the audience? Or stopped them from killing us? Is that where you¡¯re telling me we fucked up, kid?


    A: There was nothing you could do to the audience. There¡¯s nothing that even we, the collective masses of the dead, could do. They are, after all, in another universe.


    A: By the same token, only the dead can really appreciate just how potent the attention of the living is ¨C for what is attention but the currency of life? How many collective hours do you think were spent reading of your trials? By what power was our humble number of 80,000 words multiplied and reproduced, scattered like seeds around the world as it was visualised by minds with otherwise no connection?


    A: And to what premise did they give this attention? ¡®An ordinary novel but every 10,000 words the audience kills the least interesting character.¡¯


    C: THAT¡¯S what it was called? Seriously?


    A: What would you have called it, Connie?


    C: Hell if I know. Of Flesh and Djinn. Coming to Terms in a Death Game.


    A: Window dressing! There¡¯s only one verb in our title, that being ¡®kills¡¯, and so the defining action of our story is the audience killing.


    C: I¡¯d like to give this audience a piece of my mind.


    A: There¡¯s the rub. Most of them like you, Connie! Most of them thought you were a good character, and they wanted you to live! At first, the idea of being able to kill was charming. They killed without remorse for petty reasons: not enough trauma, not a good enough motivation, ¡®finished¡¯ in their story.


    C: If all you have is a hammer¡­


    A: You got it! By the time they realised they didn¡¯t want to kill everyone, the amount of attention they committed to the original premise was far too great. And so they killed and they killed and they killed.


    A: For the final vote, we had 7 * 80,000 = 560,000 collective units of thought! What actions of yours, a mere sliver of the original 80,000, could hope to turn such a tide?


    C: You¡¯re speaking like you don¡¯t have a part to play in all this, man.This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.


    A: I consider myself a war correspondent. When a crazy Frenchman turns up and, for the first time in millennia, figures out how to bust nine of us back into the world of the living, what else can journalists do but catalogue it? How would you have us stop them without bodies?


    C: I wonder. Seems like you¡¯re getting a fair amount of attention from the living in this segment, if you¡¯ve done it eight times now. What are you going to do with that energy, huh?


    A: Let¡¯s talk about something else, Connie.


    C: Is it enough to get me back?


    A: Of course not! Otherwise seances and such would be reliable. We kind of, um, racked up quite the loan to cover a blank page universe for the show, and we¡¯ll just about break even on the proceeds. That¡¯s Hollywood accounting for you! Suits me just fine to get paid in exposure.


    C: So I¡¯m stuck here.


    A: You and everybody else, buddy.


    C: And when will the audience go away? How long are they going to be watching us for?


    A: When I say our names again, and wish them a good night, thank them for watching, et cetera.


    C: Okay, man. You¡¯ve got an open channel here to what you¡¯re calling the ¡®Currency of life¡¯, and you¡¯re going to close it?


    A: They¡¯re not going to read forever, Connie. They expect it all to be wrapped up in a nice little bow, sweet and tight. Even if they don¡¯t think what they wanted was a tragedy, and they feel bad about it, that goodwill¡¯s only going to go so far. You give them 10,000 words of pure dialogue, I say three-quarters of them won¡¯t read it. The channel will close all on its own, like a river drying up.


    C: Man. It¡¯s kind of obvious you¡¯re a fucking foetus, isn¡¯t it? Maybe it¡¯s cause you didn¡¯t have a stake in it, but I sure as hell am not going to take this lying down. I¡¯m finding a way back to Faust.


    A: If you want to join the reincarnation guild, I could direct you¡ª


    C: No! You guys are all thinking too conventionally. You¡¯ve been talking to this audience eight times now, right? Tell me what you know about them.


    A: Uh¡­ I really don¡¯t have any idea. Some little things annoy them. I¡¯m pretty sure they like shipping characters.


    C: Classic kid. Can¡¯t see the forest for the trees. I¡¯ll tell you all we know about this audience, the one and only thing that¡¯s important. 1) They like paying attention to stories where they can choose to kill every 10,000 words.


    A: I mean, yeah. Otherwise they wouldn¡¯t be reading. So?


    C: So, before you say anything like ¡®goodnight¡¯ or ¡®goodbye forever¡¯, we sit here and we tell them another fucking story. Just make it up and let them participate again. They pay attention, give me enough power to get my life back, and then I can go and visit Faust at his care home when he¡¯s ninety.


    A: You really¡­ Connie¡­ you really think that will actually work?


    C: The others are here, right? Who¡¯d be good for this? Get me Haralda, Tarquin, Eirlys, Saheel and Greer ¨C fuck it, Beck and Kari as well. We¡¯ll put our heads together and give ¡®em a story they like more than this one.


    A: ¡­I¡¯ll see what I can do. Some of them might be hard to reach, but I¡¯ll see what I can do. It might take a while. (Wow, this is TV gold¡­ I was worried for my career when this was over¡­)


    C: We¡¯ll give them what they want this time. An option to not kill anybody. It¡¯s all attention, right? It¡¯s just a story.


    A: Wow, Connie. I wasn¡¯t expecting this from you.


    C: I¡¯m not giving up. How long will it take for them to get here?


    A: Uh, maybe we¡¯ll just go through the reader mail for now. There were 4 votes for you and 3 for Faust. Response #2 said: ¡®They are both very interesting. I didn¡¯t want to choose.¡¯


    C: Were these guys forced to vote?


    A: No. Many of them didn¡¯t.


    C: All the more reason to give them an option not to kill anyone. Thanks for finding me interesting, man. I learnt a lot during this, and I¡¯m not going to let any of it go to waste.


    A: Response 3 said: ¡®I was a bit late to the party but now you die, just because it¡¯s funny.¡¯


    C: Nothing personal, I guess. I¡¯m starting to see the power of attention.


    A: Response 5: ¡®Well, with Faust mutilating a foetus, it''s hard to stand out against that. Too bad you have to go, you two would have made an interesting pair for sure!¡¯


    C: It never even felt like we were competing. I kind of forgot we were supposed to be being interesting, actually. I just hope he won¡¯t do anything stupid like off himself while he¡¯s waiting for us to bust back out of here.


    A: Response 7: ¡®Since people have already voted, all I can do is try to make it a tie and hope that doesn''t result in both of you dying, sorry.¡¯


    C: Right. When all you have is a hammer. What would have happened if the vote tied?


    A: What do I know? I¡¯m just a foetus. Unfortunately, not everyone was interested in responding to your summons, Connie ¨C we¡¯ve got two people up for it, though.


    H: I taught Creative Writing in the past. I¡¯d be happy to help in any way I can.


    E: An impressive strategy, Connie ¨C I never would have thought of this.


    C: Glad to have you guys with me! Alright, Alexa, can you cut to an advert or something? We¡¯ve got some brainstorming to do.


    A: Uh, sure, it¡¯s time for an ad break! But don¡¯t go anywhere, because we¡¯ve still got the epilogue, and after that, a brand new story called ¨C what¡¯s it going to be called?


    C: A straightforward adventure¡­


    H: but every 10,000 words¡­


    E: the audience kills the least interesting hero.


    A:

 Epilogue

    <div>


    The leafy suburb was idyllic, dotted with rustic cottages that estate agents didn''t need to talk up to rent out. It was equally suitable a place to grow up in as it was to grow old and die. A black sky.


    Deadward chipped his bumper on the curb as he parked up. He killed the engine. The swirling of the breeze through the overhead maples did little to soothe his apprehension. It seemed to him they were rustling towards a vibrant crescendo, but as soon as he got used to the noise, the trees stopped dead, and there was only him in front of his coworker''s house.


    He rang the doorbell, holding the note. The note held. The note held. He listened for rumbling footsteps that never came. Glancing over his shoulder to see if anyone was watching, he crept across the lawn, leaves breaking under his shoes. The owner of the basement flat had drawn all the curtains, so all that peered back was a reflection of himself, stout and anxious Deadward. He rapped on the glass and pressed his ear to it. Nothing.


    Why was his heart beating so fast? Just what was he worried had happened?


    The address book on his phone told him, clutched between shivering fingers -- it had been a week since Nightshade turned up at his shift instead of Faust, and thus a week since Deadward''s first call to his friend had been forwarded to a tense, silent voicemail.


    "He could at least have come to say it in person," said Nightshade, pulling out a rope of intestines linked like sausages. "People are ghosting all the time, nowadays. Guy probably just found a better job."


    Deadward wasn''t so sure, which is of course why he kept calling. Just once a day, to see if Faust would pick up, because any more would be overbearing. Just enough to let the guy know his friends were there for him.


    He sighed. Maybe turning up at his house was being overbearing. Faust''s saloon was still in the drive, caked in a canvas of leaves. Nothing about this scene suggested the worst. And yet -- and yet -- he remained stout and anxious Deadward.


    What if he was too late?


    He returned to the doorbell, pressing it down like he pressed on migraines. The note held. The note held. He listened for rumbling footsteps that never came. His breathing quickened. Gripped by a sudden madness, he knocked on the door, scraping skin off his knuckles, the blows ringing like gunshots down the empty autumn close.


    "Open up, Faust," he yelled, squashing down his embarrassment, because what if? What if he was too late?


    "It''s Deadward," he yelled. "Open up!"


    The breeze picked up, roaring in his ears, and the cyclone of leaves would have swept him off his feet had he not grabbed onto the porch to steady himself. Wheelie bins threw themselves onto the asphalt. His cap flew off and became tangled in a tree.


    After the wind passed, the first scouts of rain kissed Deadward''s bare scalp. Inside the house, footsteps rumbled. Something was plodding, heavily and intently, towards the front door. Unease gripped him -- he suddenly felt as if he were intruding, that he should get away now before he discovered some awful truth. This wasn''t the sort of weather to pry into others'' affairs.


    A woman opened the door in a dressing gown, smelling of fresh hot water. She lived in the upstairs flat with her partner, which Deadward wished he had known before he propositioned her at the end of one drunken soiree. As it was, he thanked his lucky stars for still being in possession of all his teeth.The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    She said, "What do you want?"


    "I can''t get through to Faust," he said. "I''m worried about him."


    There must have been an uncanny desperation in his voice, because she stepped back to let him in. Adrenaline fuzzied his mind. Outside, it was pouring. The woman handed him the spare key and then she was off, back upstairs to the warm glow of halogen lamps and space heaters.


    Faust''s door loomed. The key felt heavy in Deadward''s hand. He cupped his ear and pressed it to the wallpaper, unsure what he was hoping to hear, just hoping to hear something. Rain drummed on the window. He took a deep breath to psyche himself up, inserted the key and turned it.


    The door creaked open, peeling back to reveal the dimly lit basement flat. Stepping forward over the clutter by instinct, Deadward entered, steeling himself to keep his eyes open no matter what he might see.


    "Hello?" he called.


    A loose curtain swayed in the wind like a noose. He turned the corner from the entryway and there, amidst an armada of suitcases and sports bags and pieces of paper, he saw Faust.


    Deadward barely recognised him: he''d shaved his beard off and cut his hair to a neat trim. He wore the most generic designer t-shirt paired with jeans, and he was humming softly to himself under headphones as he packed clothes into the suitcase.


    It was then that Deadward saw the clutter was wholly purposeful -- what he''d been avoiding was shopping bags, spilling over with gear for different weather and terrain. Everywhere else in the flat was cleaned, not so much as a crumb out of place. Up on the walls was a list of names next to a map:


    LOUIS -- BARDEN CITY -- CHECK


    CHIARA -- MILANO --  CHECK


    ANITA -- BUMFUCK NOWHERE, SIBERIA --


    BRUCE --


    ESME --


    JURE --


    A journal lay on the desk labelled ''Letters to Connie''. Deadward didn''t dare touch it.


    "Ah!" yelped Faust, tearing off his headphones. "Jesus wept! If it isn''t Deadward, in my humble abode! To what do I owe this pleasure? Are you no longer bound by locked doors?"


    Deadward gestured vaguely. "What the fuck is all this?"


    Faust stroked his ghost of a beard and mulled it over for a short while, as if even he wasn''t quite sure of the answer.


    "You quit your job," Deadward said. "You didn''t even tell me. You just vanished.¡±


    "Well, yes," said Faust. "I know that much, compadre."


    "Who are you and what have you done with Faust?" Deadward picked up a beginner''s Russian phrasebook. "You never wanted to come to language classes with me before. You said it wasn''t you."


    "Don''t lay the blame at my feet, o dead one," said Faust. "They''re the ones who are organising and scurrying away from me!"


    "Who?"


    "People who thought they''d be living a very different life right now. As it goes for us all, I suppose."


    Deadward felt as if he couldn''t emit more question marks. He stuck to what he knew.


    "I thought you''d killed yourself," he said.


    "Killed myself?" Faust laughed, picked up a sports bag, and patted him on the shoulder. "In a sense, perhaps, but here I stand nonetheless, reborn and with a duty to die at a specific age in a nursing home. Will you aid me in getting all this in the car?"


    "Don¡¯t tell me you''re actually driving to Siberia?"


    "I expect at some point I''ll have to get out and walk. The winter will be cold."


    Faust hefted up as much as he could carry, lost under an array of bags, and then he charged forth into the pouring rain. Deadward followed with a similar cargo, stammering and stuttering. It took them four round trips, and by the time they were finished the saloon was sagging.


    "You can come with me if you want," said Faust. "As much as I like having time to sort out my thoughts, and I do have a lot of thoughts to sort out, mind you -- it would be fun to have a friend along."


    "How could I just up and leave? How could you?" said Deadward.


    "Suit yourself," said Faust, unfazed. "I''ll hit you up in a couple of years or so, hopefully, and maybe then I''ll have the time to tell you all about it."


    Deadward couldn''t find the words. He finally figured out what was so uncanny about his friend -- he was smiling! He was looking Deadward in the eye, and he wasn''t mumbling. He seemed altogether present, rather than preoccupied.


    "Look after the flat for me, alright?  There should be just enough left in my account -- Deadward?"


    Deadward could barely blink.


    "Allow me to feed you a line," said Faust, stashing a longsword -- a fucking medieval longsword -- into a secret compartment in the boot. "Perhaps you want to ask ''What led to you changing so much?''"


    "What led to you changing so much?"


    "Dunno," he shrugged. "Death game."


    He drove off.

 Afterword

    <main>


    <div>


    <div>


    Afterword


    This book is the longest thing I¡¯ve ever written! Some thanks are in order:


    Thanks to the readers for their votes, comments and reviews.


    Thanks to Vaiaphraim for being a sounding board and helping me to get unstuck.


    Thanks to my wife for her work as a first reader and editor, and for always wanting to know what happens next.


    Now for some reflections about the book and season 2. They might be useful for anyone who wants to write something similar. They might just be self-indulgent rambling.


    Characters


    Nine is a lot of main characters! Actually, I¡¯m happy with how distinct they all ended up. I based them on the enneagram</a>, the idea that everyone is driven by one of nine core fears. It made them easy to write and easy to develop conflict organically. Was there a character you particularly related to? You might be that type!


    I don¡¯t think it¡¯s a coincidence that my own type, four, won. It¡¯s easiest to write about and explore your own weaknesses. Faust basically begun as an exaggerated self-insert, like a parody of myself, until he turned into a critique of depression meme culture. So, authors, if you want to make an interesting character, don¡¯t be afraid to bare the darkest parts of yourself, the flaws you¡¯ve grappled with all your life. That kind of honesty makes a character feel real.


    But, inevitably, nine characters is too many, and I think it threw a lot of prospective readers off. The POV swaps in the first 10,000 words are just begging to frustrate readers. You start with Haralda and some people nope out when it switches to Tarquin, cause it¡¯s not a straightforward narrative. Others stick around and grow to love Team Shame, want to see them fight the ostrich when suddenly it switches and there¡¯s three more motherfuckers to introduce in one paragraph!


    It basically filters out people who can¡¯t tolerate weird shit in their fiction¡­ but I still feel like it¡¯s asking too much of readers. So maybe in season 2 we won¡¯t have the Democratisation of Reality, and the characters might not know they need to be interesting per se. A straightforward adventure.The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    Eight characters in one room also made it pretty difficult to write. I ended up with thousands of words of them just standing around and talking before I could get into the point of the story ¨C which was to explore their relationships with the people behind the phone calls.


    For season two, then: six/seven characters. Three teams of two plus a lone antihero, all working against each other to achieve a concrete objective. And while they might cross paths occasionally, I don¡¯t ever want to have them all in the same room at once!


    Voting


    It was great fun to read everybody¡¯s votes, and it¡¯s taught me a lot of lessons about character writing (the aim of this was just to practise getting better at characters, hence setting and plot kinda fell by the wayside). I can identify two main issues with the system.


    Issue one: characters who still had their story to go were favoured over characters whose arc was complete. It makes total sense, of course ¨C readers don¡¯t want to feel like they¡¯ve missed out on something. The problem, then, was the structure of the story. Because Saheel had to wait for Eirlys to finish her story, Eirlys died before Saheel (I hated Saheel).


    The obvious solution is to have character arcs run in parallel, and this means story beats need to tightly adhere to the 10,000 word cut-off. I¡¯m thinking that writing an adventure story rather than a mystery story will help out in that respect. This means no dark pasts (kinda) and shared backstories for each team. Rather than letting the narrative roll on and on, each chapter needs to end with a good resolution, like an episode of a TV show. I¡¯m thinking that will bring the emphasis back to voting for characters rather than plot.


    Issue two: reader tears. I didn¡¯t realise I was writing a tragedy until the readers got attached to the characters! Definitely towards the end the majority didn¡¯t want to vote, even though they knew what they were getting into when they clicked on the story title. I couldn¡¯t go back on the original premise or it would seem cheap, and I think the story is all the better for it, BUT it only makes sense for season 2 to add the option not to kill anybody.


    Season 2


    I¡¯ll be posting it under the title ¡®A straightforward adventure but every 10,000 words the audience kills the least interesting hero.¡¯ I want to build up a backlog for the first 9,000 so I can post it all at once and get some traction, as well as polish the first chapter to perfection (really insecure about dat attrition rate). Basically, it¡¯ll be out within 1-2 weeks.


    On scribblehub, you can ¡®follow¡¯ me as an author to get a bell when I post it. I don¡¯t think this is possible on RR or reddit, and I can¡¯t be arsed to build a mailing list or anything, so maybe just post a comment underneath and I¡¯ll PM you when it¡¯s up? Seems the easiest solution.


    What do you think?


    To help me write better books, I¡¯d love to hear your thoughts or answer any of your questions. Even if it¡¯s just something you liked!


    With that, I leave you with this teaser:


    </main>

 0.&#x1F99F; (The affair of the unkillable orphans)

    <div>


    Act I


    For one reason or another, children who lose their parents become unkillable heroes. One was the Locust Queen. On the back of the old prophecy she conquered five kingdoms, won two hundred battles and buried eighty-thousand corpses. Then the most powerful woman in the world hid herself away behind ramparts and magma beasts ¡ª all because a new prophecy arose.


    Now, prophecies that foretell a death by orphan are par for the course, but this one in particular was about the Locust Queen¡¯s death, so she paced around endlessly in her fortress. She bit her fingernails to stubs and tore out her hair in clumps and ate nothing for a week.


    Finally she stooped so low as to beg advice from her courtesan, Enzo. They were lovers in the sense that she cast him out of her chambers before she slept, and lovers in the sense that later, at her bidding, he traversed the length of the country to firebomb an orphanage. Originally, however, what she wanted was genocide.


    "You can''t just kill every orphan in the world," said Enzo. "Some of those orphans have children, and then we''d just be making orphans of orphans of orphans."


    She raked her fingers across her scalp. "I''m begging you, stop saying that dreadful word! You''re going to give me nightmares. Oh, Enzo, what am I to do?"


    At that moment, a jet of flame erupted inside the courtyard, and magma beasts ¡ª final bosses in their own right ¡ª swarmed it, grunting as they drank. Above them a giga-vulture shrieked, crossing the cracked plains of Mergweide in a single wingbeat. Enzo shepherded his queen out onto the balcony, the sulphuric air washed over them, and they stared over the wasteland towards the steaming volcanoes on the horizon.


    He said, "Just look at what they''d have to get through to come here. I''m anything but a gambling man, honeybun, but only one in a million orphans could tough it out through that."


    "And yet ¡ª one will come."


    "Easy, easy. Deep breaths, my sugar cube. What I''m saying is, we can be clever about this. I''ll send off some letters and we''ll see if we can''t find this one in a million orphan. There have to be reports of such an extraordinarily talented magician."


    In the following days, the queen spent every hour clutching her locust amulet, channelling a terrible spell. Even in her dreams she chanted. It took so much energy that despite consuming their entire larder she began to wither away, skin hanging off bones. When the food ran out, she shut herself up in her chambers. The magma beasts turned to graze elsewhere, for they were sensitive to the mounting dread, and the scorched field on which the fortress stood grew cold and silent.


    Finally Enzo came to her with news.  The Locust Queen looked awful, slumped over like a haggard marionette.


    He said, "Thanks to a tip-off from an old friend, I do believe I''ve found our orphans, my poppet."


    At the mention of orphans in plural, dark energy crackled forth from the queen''s amulet, and she shuddered. If she hadn''t steeled herself right then, the world would probably  have ended, so great was the scale of the spell she was preparing.


    Enzo brewed her the last of the chamomile and lowered grapes into her mouth as he continued. "So, my friend told me of an orphanage owned by a Mr Begeleider, and several things about it struck me as odd. Firstly, there are only six orphans in his care. Quite a small number considering the eighty thousand corpses behind us, don''t you think?


    "Secondly, all of the orphans are in fact full grown adults, with the youngest being twenty and the oldest being five-and-fifty. Now why do you suppose a fifty-five year old needs to stay at an orphanage? I''m afraid our final piece of news tells an unfortunate truth.


    "Each of the six orphans has bonded with an insect. If I had to, I would guess they train together daily, as we did in our yesteryear. But Mr Begeleider''s explicit purpose in founding his orphanage is, in fact, to train an orphan capable of dethroning you. He, um, he wrote it on the sign outside."


    For a long time the queen stared at Enzo. A chill wind whistled through the fortress as the sun set. Finally she said, "This Begeleider. Who is he?"


    Enzo shrugged. "Probably one of the kings we exiled under alias, or a disgruntled owner of one of those fields we torched. Nonetheless, we know where he is, and we know he has six unkillable heroes backed by prophecy ¡ª so what do we do?"


    The locust in the queen¡¯s amulet beat its wings and a low hum arose, a deep and rumbling shockwave that rippled across the country and caused the heart of every mammal to skip a beat, and the world collectively held its breath. Enzo fell to his knees. When he looked to the face of his lover, he saw only darkness.


    The Locust Queen said, "This spell I¡¯m preparing is only a failsafe. We must still find a way to kill them."


    They found one. What followed was the most intense week of Enzo''s life. Driven by fear, he worked on a hex until he fainted from hunger, only to wake up with his lips still chanting dark words and the mosquito perched on his palm. During those times when he was too weak, the Locust Queen clung to his side, spoon-feeding him honey as she muttered incantations. They seldom spoke.


    She slowly grew more confident in their plan, and her full head of hair returned, and her eyes sparkled with life. The night before Enzo was due to ride out to the orphanage, she welcomed him back into her chambers and she told him she would miss him, and she told him she would love him. But they were too exhausted to do anything except hold fast against their nightmares.


    An experienced cyclist and indeed, an experienced magician with a mosquito in his locket, Enzo barely noticed the country as he rode. He flowed around dangers like a leaf on a river, and more than once he hexed an attacking creature to death without realising it, whereupon he cursed himself for removing another defence that might have stopped an intermediate hero.


    Past the earthy pines of Boswald; the glittering peaks of Koud Heuvel; the slick boulders of Steengroeve; the blinding adobe of Weerstrand; the jagged cliffs of Korrelduin, and on and on...


    He felt too tense to sleep, and he cursed himself for that too, because who tries to fight six bonded orphans without getting a good night''s sleep? After days of heavy riding, of scenery blurring together like paintings left out in the rain, he finally reached the southern border and it was only there, a mile from Mr Begeleider¡¯s orphanage, that his body let him rest. As soon as he dismounted, his bicycle collapsed and never rose again. The magician fell down and shut his eyes.


    Come sunrise just as planned, the most powerful orphan in the world, the Locust Queen, let loose her magnum opus.


    Corrupting ancient leylines of power, she carved up the land into hexagons, and she stitched everything back together like a patchwork quilt.The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.


    Which is to say the minister of Weerstrand left his bedroom for a morning wee and found himself tackle out in a Korrelduinse pub, violating their thirty year non-aggression pact.


    Which is to say a herd of peace-deer frolicked not into their bubbling spring but into the gaping mouth of a magma beast, where they were lost in a puff of barbeque smoke.


    Which is to say the citizens of Steengroeve, who lived in a bustling crater fifty meters below sea level, gathered by their doorways and watched helplessly as the ocean rolled towards them.


    It is also to say that all the maps were suddenly wrong, and the Locust Queen''s castle hidden. It was a disaster greater than had ever befallen the world, but it was also the only failsafe they had. Now everything depended on Enzo and his hex.


    <h4 style="text-align: center">Act II</h4>


    Zoom in; slow down.


    The sign read ¡®Death to the Locust Queen Orphanage¡¯.


    Enzo clambered up the winding track towards it, heart in his throat.  Mountains hugged the blossoming trees, so tightly-knit that they draped the hillside in a carpet of fuschia. The air sagged under a thick haze of jasmine. Buzzing insects whined above him, overpowering the birdsong. Evenly-spaced throughout the grove were pillboxes of mud and limestone topped with wildflowers, barely visible under the canopy, and each had been constructed as an exact copy. He stopped counting them at fifty.


    To think he was up against this, and five other schools of magic! Shivering even under the full heat of the sun, he ducked into the treeline and tore the locket off his neck. Mosquito-class spells thrived on victims who were unaware ¡ª it was hardly suited to open battle, so Enzo cracked the mosquito out of its protective membrane and urged it to fly above him, masked in the cloud of bugs.


    This came with certain dangers. Should a robin swoop down and hoover the mosquito up, he would die, and without touching it he couldn¡¯t cast any hexes. Yet he still felt safer after hurling the locket into the undergrowth.


    It was difficult to take further steps up the path in a way that looked comfortable. He staggered forward, wary of being snuffed out any second, gasping shallow breaths amidst the pollen. Behind him, far away from the heights of the grove, the world was falling into chaos as the incompatible environments mingled. A few more bends, a couple hundred feet of climbing -- in his mind he held the image of his lover, lest his last thoughts be of anything else. His skin, drenched in humid sweat, struggled to contain the hex brewing inside him.


    "Halt," barked a gruff voice.


    The ground on which he was about to step suddenly raised, springing up as a thick wall of mud to block him off. He wheeled around, and there, leaning on a tree trunk, was a woman holding an amulet. Enzo suppressed the reflex to clutch his own. Outing himself as a magician would mean a fight to the death.


    She was going on forty, probably, stout with a crew cut, not a hair out of place, wearing a tight vest and shorts to minimise an opponent''s advantage in grappling, and there -- the woman moved her hand away, revealing an ant in the clasp around her neck. The air shimmered about a foot from her body, the same armour of prophecy that had once lit up the Locust Queen.


    She marched towards him, boots pounding the earth. Her brown eyes bored into his.


    She said, "Tell me who you are. And why you''re here."


    Enzo froze up, trying not to look at the swarming mayflies, plus one mosquito, above him. Would she notice if he called it back? He drew his cashmere cloak tightly around himself.


    "M-my village," he cried, pointing vaguely towards the water cascading over Steengroeve. "I plead you, we need a magician! Hundreds perish as we speak, maybe thousands!"


    "Right. From all the way over there? Really?" She turned those heavy eyes to the valley. "...Your bicycle?"


    "My bicycle?" he yelped. "Beset upon by... well, it hardly sounds credible now that I voice it, but by ice-lions! What exactly is happening this grim morning, madame, I plead you? Ice-lions haven''t been sighted in these parts for centuries. I haven''t the energy to repeat myself -- we need a magician!"


    No sympathy or understanding cracked through the ant-woman''s face. She stood impassive as a mountain. Something rustled in the bushes behind them, something that sounded like a tumbling bucket of wind-chimes. Oh greatest of shits, another one?


    "Er¡­ what the hell are you dawdling back there for?" trickled in a voice sweet as honey. This other woman stepped out sheepishly, no older than thirty, pierced symmetrically in pretty much every place it was possible to be pierced, wearing a tinkling suit of ringmail, with a bee hanging off her ear in a metal cage. "What''s up with this guy, Puck? Some kind of refugee or something?"


    The path began to shimmer in an awfully prophetic fashion. Heavy, hazy. It took everything Enzo had not to shake, a fledgling cornered by cats. If he cast his hex now, there¡¯d still be four other orphans out to kill the Locust Queen, and nothing to stop them.


    "So he says," said Puck, the ant magician. "I don''t believe him. Sounds like the ladybird when he lies."


    "What would I even be lying about?" cried Enzo. "I plead you, my people are in danger!"


    She nodded. "See? Exactly like the ladybird."


    The bee magician giggled at a random bush. Then she put her hand on Puck''s shoulder and sized Enzo up. "Look, the guy''s got a right to just walk around, hasn''t he? We don''t have time to stop and question every Tom, Dick and Harry!"


    Puck now turned her attention to the mayflies (plus mosquito) hovering above Enzo''s head, and she pursed her lips into a grim, waning smile.


    She said, "The timing is suspicious. Before we go, I want to see his neck."


    "My neck?" said Enzo, drawing ever deeper into his cloak, the mayflies lowering with him in an incriminating way. "Whatever for?"


    "You won''t let me see it?"


    "If you supply a good enough reason, I might! But I question your logic in such an intrusion, when my family''s trapped on the roof of their house against rising waters! You spoke of prophecies, madame. Well, they say in the prophecies that orphans are heroes, don''t they? And, furthermore..."


    She waited until he''d exhausted himself -- the altitude was shortening his breaths -- and then she said, "You talk too much. Magicians wear amulets. You''d have a mark around your neck. That''s the reason."


    "I''d hurry up if I were you, my dude," said the bee-woman. "You''re not gonna change her mind. Just do what she wants and we''ll be off racing to Steengroeve before you know it."


    The two women glared at him expectantly. The aroma of flowers was dizzying -- he felt faint.


    "I''m a groundskeeper," he protested as he lowered his cloak to reveal the mark. "I wear a ring of keys about my neck from dawn till dusk. Does that make me a magician? Is a jailor a magician? Is a farmhand?"


    "Okay, yeah," the bee-woman cupped her insect protectively. "He does lie like Otis! Well, maybe this guy''s a little better."


    "His hands," said Puck, suddenly grabbing one. "They''re very soft. No callouses. He is a magician."


    The three of them paused as worms wiggled out of the earthen wall and far off, the city of Steengroeve continued to sink.


    "Oh, alright." Enzo leapt backwards and called his mosquito to land on his head. "Quite simply, ladies, I''m here to condemn you to death in the name of my liege, the Locust Queen! I advise against underestimating me. Hear my war cry and despair: aaaaaaah!"


    At once four orphans stepped out of the brush, encircling him, each with an amulet of their own -- cricket, moth, ladybird, and scorpion, which wasn¡¯t even an insect and therefore cheating. They shimmered with plot armour.


    "A pitiable war cry," said Puck, crossing her arms. "I''ve heard stronger screams."


    ¡°This is hardly very sporting,¡± said Enzo. ¡°I thought all six of you would have already rushed out to save the world.¡±


    "Good lying, hot stuff," said the young man with the ladybird. "But nothing compared to my bluff magic. We saw you coming up the path. Why didn''t you just cut through the forest?"


    Tendrils of dark energy rippled over Enzo''s skin. "It seems I didn''t need to draw the six of you out after all. My apologies for previously shouting. Since you¡¯ve come to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, well, it certainly expedites matters, and perhaps all hope is not lost against that devilish prophecy. Experience may yet win the day¡­¡±


    He paused, just in case they took the correct action and ran. He¡¯d only have one shot at this. They held their formation, confident in their trap, and not one of them was brave enough to rush him down. Novice heroics at best, to let a villain monologue.


    Mosquito in hand, he said, ¡°Congratulations, orphans, you have trained long and hard, and I''m sure you''re brimming with caution, hence the six of you have come to match the force of one enemy, as your master likely instructed. Let this hex be a lesson ¡ª you are still outmatched.¡±


    Enzo unleashed his magnum opus. It is difficult to describe how such a spell operated in terms of metaphysics ¡ª Enzo hardly knew the truth of it himself ¡ª but to put it in simple terms, what he did was drag your eyes down the page. And you watched.


    He bound their souls to the gods who watch. The tether slipped neatly through the orphan¡¯s prophetic armour, and while they were still bowled over, gawping at the countdown that inked itself into their hands like a tattoo, he leapt between them and fled into the trees.


    Only later, after night fell and he stopped to rest behind a waterfall, his magic utterly depleted, did he realise he¡¯d also accidentally cast it on himself.


    3 affairs remain until voting.

 0.&#x1F98B;+&#x1F997; (The affair of the hundred horses, Act I)

    <div>


    Act I


    After a brief meeting under the blossoming jasmine, the six orphans decided to pair up and scatter ¡ª two west, two north and two east. They did this for three reasons: one, to avoid being caught off guard again; two, to locate the Locust Queen more quickly; and three, to avoid infighting, as the heroes blamed each other for their curse.


    Up the steep clines of the western pass ran Florian and Madelief. For the whole morning, they thundered like a cloud of worry through the forest, sending jays and squirrels scrambling away, vaulting over pillboxes if going around would take too long, and when they finally reached the foot of the cliff they hefted their packs onto their shoulders and set about scaling it without a word.


    All this left Florian exhausted by the time they reached the top. He collapsed on the smooth rock of the next hexagon, an arid mesa carved up by canyons with a road that wound over them. Above him stood Madelief, her legs trembling, sheer anxiety keeping her upright. Despite this apparent strength, her voice was softer than moss, and she often seemed to be fading away into some other reality.


    "Come on," she shout-whispered. "We could have been across the first canyon by now."


    Since the first moment of the hex, her eyes had been glued to the countdown on her hand. She maintained a steady tremble, like an idling engine.


    "Three," she said. "Three what? Hours? Days? Please, Florian, I don''t want to die for lack of trying!"


    Florian nestled into his green jerkin as he lay gazing back over the thick carpet of pink that had been their home.


    "I can''t walk another step," he chirped, strumming on a lute. "And I don''t want an early death. Let''s go to town and have a rest ¡ª and may we there complete a quest."


    Off the main road stood a cluster of ramshackle shacks, identifiable from Mr. Begeleider¡¯s teachings as a stereotypical wild-west high street. The majority of buildings lay in ruin, and the few that actually had four unvarnished, splintery walls were jammed together with rusty nails, their windows boarded up. Tumbleweed flocked about the streets, but they seemed otherwise deserted.


    A bowed-over sign admitted the place was called ''Fietspad,'' but gave no more information.


    Madelief drew her robe about her, adjusting her pack in flowing, ethereal motions, and then whispered, "We have enough supplies for the week, and the sun''s still high in the sky... do we really want to be wasting time on rhyming couplets?"


    Groaning, Florian sat up, and holding his cricket amulet etched the shape of a circle into the rock. Writing began to spider away from it at even points.


    "Our hero''s journey concerns not distance, but time," he crowed, pointing at his diagram. "Here we stand at REFUSAL OF THE CALL ¡ª obligatory rhyme ¡ª after which we must CROSS A THRESHOLD LINE. And all the way around the circle, just here, we defeat the Locust Queen at RESURRECTION, by prophetic design."


    Her face screwed up in agony; her moth screeched, and she stamped away the circle. "How can you live with yourself, doing such horrible things to the English language? The threshold is obviously that canyon over there! You''re the one refusing to move on..."


    She slid a few graceful steps towards it before stooping over out of fatigue. The sun beat down upon her. No matter how much she panted, she couldn''t get enough air.


    "Nobody said it would be easy," she said. "Come on, Florian¡­"


    "I''m telling you, we need to wait," he said, unwrapping a sandwich from his bag. "A quest will fall upon our plate, the reward of which will put us in a better state. Why should we walk through endless nights, when we could sit upon two bikes?"


    "Aaaaaaaargh," she cried, and it was almost loud enough to echo off the town, but not quite. "You and your story magic! I drew the short straw, alright. I was this close to going with Otis... but here I am with Mr. Sidequest! The place is deserted, Florian... can''t you see all the fence posts twisted up? Where are the bikes you''re going to buy?"


    For the first time in Madelief''s life, her voice peaked into an amplitude audible from afar, and suddenly a man swung open the shutters of a boarded up window, dressed in so many colourful fabrics as to be pitiable.


    The man said, "What are you two doing outside, making so much noise? Hurry up and get indoors before the Harley-Davidson comes back!"


    Indeed, something was coming, hurtling along the mesa in a cloud of dust, roaring louder than a war-horn, headed straight for the town. It blitzed forward at such a speed that it cut through the haze, and it was a kind of bike they had never seen before, with massive metal exhausts beside the engines, and handlebars like great horns on a ram.Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.


    Florian leapt to his feet, rippling with instant vitality, and he blew a whirlwind through his flute and did a jaunty jig.


    "Lo, how a side quest fills me with energy," he hummed, "Protected as we are by prophecy, it should be a breeze ¡ª villager, put yourself at ease!"


    "I hate you and I hate your cricket," said Madelief, unhooking her moth clasp and standing her ground. "How did you know this was coming?"


    "Indeed I was the first to climb the ridge," said Florian, cowering behind her, "I witnessed the beast crossing yonder bridge. So thought I in our time of need, of resting now to harness its speed. As to why I didn''t mention certain tidbits ¡ª I couldn''t fit it into rhyming couplets."


    The bike charged towards them, its shiny cladding flaring in the sun. The noises from its engine were deep and bestial, shaking the very earth itself ¡ª nothing like the orphanage''s couple of docile ponies.


    "Get out of the way!" cried the window-man. "Please, that thing''s taken my entire family!"


    "We have to tame it," said Madelief, hyperventilating with anxiety. "Riding that, we could get to her castle in less than three days, I''m sure of it."


    "I don''t doubt it," said Florian. "Now''s the time for your magic, Maddie."


    Madelief nodded, and seeming to float through the air, she ran straight into the bike''s path. It was eating up the road, alright, churning through it with the power of a hundred horses ¡ª those spiky tyres were going to make a pancake of its new victim. Fifty meters, then twenty, then ten, then five...


    Right as it was close enough for her to smell the sickly fumes pouring out of the bike''s exhaust, she stroked the fluffy antennae on her moth, and the bike flipped at a ninety-degree angle, speeding away from her. Roaring, the Harley-Davidson skidded to a stop, leaving behind dark, acidic marks, and then it rushed forth once again to flatten her. But no matter how many times it charged, it found itself redirected, always wheeling towards a looming canyon in the distance. The beast revved and revved at a deafening volume, but still it made no headway. Finally, mystified, it turned tail and fled -- only to then hurtle back towards the magician!


    "Nobody expects the redirect," whistled Florian alongside a power-chord on the lute.


    "I would really prefer it if you would be quiet," said Madelief, her moth orbiting her as if she was a very bright lamp. "I can''t afford to lose my concentration."


    She wasn''t wrong. The beast''s energy proved bottomless. It whirled ceaselessly around the perimeter of Madelief''s magic like a turbo-goldfish in an exceptionally small bowl. Twice it nearly caught her out, and she managed to flick it away in the nick of time. The sun had long descended beneath the peaks, and her firm legs nearly given out from under her, when it finally got the point and stopped in place. Still it revved.


    Florian said, "It looks like¡ª"


    "Shh. Not a word, you spoony bard.¡±


    She crept towards it, her entire body trembling and pumping out shallow breaths. Fatigue sapped her to the point that she was using magic to prop herself back up every time she stumbled. As she got closer, the bike seemed to grow, and when she came up alongside it the saddle sat at stomach-height. Its fumes set her in a sickly stupor. For a moment she froze.


    Then she leapt atop it, and all hell broke loose. The thing raced off between her legs. Florian was gone. The window-man was gone. It rocketed her through the hamlet of Fietspad, the shacks blurring past in one contiguous brown streak, and it was only then that she began to notice the corpses by the roadside. Men, women and children alike had fallen, their blood flowing into the dry cracks of the earth. She gripped the handlebars with determination, adrenaline coursing through her veins, and she tugged on the bike hard, bent on controlling it.


    "I must tame you," she whispered. "We must get to the Locust Queen!"


    But her words were lost on the breeze. Suddenly the thing turned and slammed into a shack, bucking her off. She hit the ground with a horrific crack. Then it span its wheels and ran her over repeatedly in a terrifying episode of confusion and pain, but finding it couldn''t quite flatten her due to a certain resistance, a certain thickness in the air, it simply left her where she was, crumpled up in a pile of wood and nails.


    She lay there for a time, skin screaming. Shock barred her off from reality. Winded, bruised, torn ¡ª alive. Then she heard footsteps. Florian was running over with the man in the technicolour dweeb-coat.


    "Maddie," said Florian. "Are you okay, Maddie?"


    He lifted her up, wincing at the way her skin was torn, the way she''d broken out in a crimson oozing road rash, at the way her off-white robe was soiled in oil. The bicycle had failed to break any bones, at least.


    "You''re not shaking anymore, Maddie..."


    "I tried to warn you," said the man, pulling at his rainbow collar. "Hell, I can''t believe you''re actually alive! Just this morning that thing came, and it ran down everyone who tried to get out of town!"


    Madelief sat up, grimacing. She made a very pointed effort to not examine her wounds, which were singing a deafening aria of pain.


    "What''s your name, villager?" said Florian. "Tell us what you know about this pillager."


    "I''m Joost," he said. "I don''t know what to say. The land... the land changed, or something, and all our bikes ran away. Along comes this thing, destroys my ranch, makes its nest upon the ruins, and then it courses through town and kills anyone who isn''t holed up!"


    "That''s your ranch, up there?"


    The ranch sat above the town on a ridge, with fields outlined by a fractured line of fence. The actual buildings had all but collapsed in on themselves, but the main stable, a great barn the size of a football pitch, appeared intact.


    "Let''s go," said Madelief, shuddering to her feet. She looked like roadkill. Couldn¡¯t stand still.


    "You can''t be serious," said Joost. "You were lucky the first time, but if you go looking for it ¡ª you''ll die! That thing knows no mercy, and you''ve only gone and riled it up!"


    In reply, she just shoved her countdown in his face. The number still read three. All the colour drained out of Joost, so sinister was the dark energy crackling from it.


    "Maddie, you''re no longer REFUSING the sidequest?" asked Florian.


    She shook her head.


    "Then it''s time for us to put our magic to the test. And see if we can''t CROSS THE THRESHOLD, no less."


    "Stop!" she shouted. "Please! Just! Fucking! Stop!"


    "Okay¡­ sorry."


    And drawing on some inner reserve of prophetic energy, they set off up the hill to Joost''s ranch, Florian supporting Madelief every step of the way.

 0.&#x1F98B;+&#x1F997; (The affair of the hundred horses, Act II)

    <div>


    Act II


    Madelief''s eyes could barely focus under the veil of pain  ¡ª every step they took up the steep track to the ranch, she leaned a little more on Florian. A cacophony of alarm bells rang out in her head, and only under their insistence did she manage to keep driving her knees forward, scuffing them on the incline. Her heart thrummed faster and faster, manifesting as a tightness in her chest.


    "We must," she whispered. "We must!"


    Florian ran a hand along the orange rock wall, and it came back dusty. "They carved this road out of the cliff. What do you say we take a rest? You''re wounded, Maddie, and my legs are... ahem, stiff."


    Abruptly he stopped, and for a moment she kept walking, tumbling to the ground without his support  ¡ª then, activating her magic, she inverted the direction of her fall, guiding her body back upright. Carrying her own weight.


    "Why do we have to keep having this conversation?" she snap-whispered.


    The stable loomed over the ridge  ¡ª so close, just a few more steps now. Much like her, its support beams were leaning inwards, ready to collapse, and the only thing holding it up were some towers of scaffolding. From its depths came a low hum of malice, a rumbling of dread. The bike was waiting.


    "We have to be in this together," she said, bare arms screaming as she dragged herself along the wall. "We can''t just stop for anything. Are you with me or not?"


    Florian sighed, fiddling with his jerkin. He looked uncomfortable, like a diver in a school of sharks, and couldn''t meet her gaze.


    "The truth is," he said. "I''m worried about you. Why say we can''t stop for anything? From what are you running? What exactly is so pressing, that we can''t even stop to gather our strength?"


    GO, screamed the alarm bells. GO! GO GO GO GO GO


    Madelief raked herself up the last of the cliff at the side of the road and staggered into ''Joost''s Rainbow Ranch'', a set of spaces interrupted by a broken fence, with the stable in the middle. In the twilight of dusk, all was tinted blood orange.


    Florian came up behind to steady her before she fell into a pile of oil-stained buckets. She cried out at his touch, so raw was her skin.


    He said, "I see this word floating around you, Maddie: ''GO''. Could it be that you''re harbouring some unhelpful beliefs about what it means to be a ¡ª"


    "I musn''t die," she whisper-cried. "Not here. Not now. Look  ¡ª there''s the bike! If you care about me, about us, about the fate of the world, which need I remind you, is on OUR shoulders... then help me!"


    The bike turned on its headlights, catching them in a blinding beam all the way from the back of the stable, easily thrusting away the glare of the sun. It made a noise that sounded very much like vroom, and then it made it again, roaring as it revved, shaking the very building apart with its tremors  ¡ª its wheels ground in place against the rock, chucking up a whirlwind of dust, while behind it the exhaust belched out fumes and fire.


    "Come," whisper-shouted Madelief. Her moth''s fluffy hair bristled, standing on jagged edges. "I must tame you!"


    She could literally feel her heart pushing against her ribcage; literally feel the blood rushing behind her eyes. Was this it? Was she dying?


    Defiant, the bike opened up its engine to the max, a deafening whinny, holding itself in place with its brakes, and Madelief did her best to stop hyperventilating  ¡ª when it released itself, it was going to fly at her like a bullet.


    "I''ve noticed something that may be trouble," said Florian, scanning the smouldering ruins about them. "This is a bike ranch, but there aren''t any bikes in the rubble... uh, Maddie?"


    He took a slight step away from her.


    Madelief stiffened, barely hearing him. Ignoring him. Her vision tunneled only to that distant point in the stable. She held her breath, and everything seemed to quieten. This was it. This was the moment.


    The bike came. With magic she flipped it away, but it turned back at such a speed that she had only half a second to deflect it again. By the time she laid eyes on it, it had moved on. Within seconds it was over  ¡ª she wrestled against its force like a kid trying to plug a dam with a finger, then all at once, the pressure burst, and the bike scored a blow.


    It knocked her down inches from the sheer cliff, where she lay crumpled up, broken, helpless, her mind tumbling in freefall. Her moth screeched, flapping around her, trying to push her to her feet.


    "Get up, Maddie," cried Florian. "You have to get up!"


    The bike came round again. If it rammed her off the edge, would the prophetic armour cushion the fall, or would it just slap her bones back together in a way that technically kept her alive, trapping her in a cage of pain? Then she¡¯d be of no use to anyone! She had to get up!If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    Her arms trembled as she heaved against the ground, and it hurt so much, and for one heroic moment she was truly rising, lifting her head up, but then they slipped out from under her and her chin slammed back down against the rock, hard. The crack ran through her brain. From the ground, in slow motion, she saw death barreling towards her.


    Then a beautiful tone from a flute filled the air, dancing about like mayflies in sunbeams, arpeggiating up and down and painting swathes of emotion over her heart. Around them, the ranch cobbled itself back together  ¡ª again fence posts held each other''s hands, again the stable stood proud and tall, fresh lacquer gleaming in the last of the evening sun, and again red-hot wheels glowed on anvils beside the forge.


    Florian shut his eyes tight as he played, his cricket rubbing its legs together as images poured out of his head.


    The bike''s tires wailed as it slammed on the brakes inches from Madelief''s scalp. Up close it stank of rubber, and its steady vibration made her hair stand on end, all tingly. She froze, terrified. She couldn''t breathe.


    The melody continued: sad, lonely, plodding onwards like a horse in a procession, and figures sprang out of the ground  ¡ª farmhands draped in denim, shuffling around with weighty iron tools. Behind the fence, ghosts of bikes wheeled around, frolicking, playing together, the herd of which must have been at least a hundred strong. Some lapped up oil from buckets; others jumped around doing wheelies. Amongst the herd walked Joost, his boiler-suit twinkling a million colours of the rainbow, and he lovingly stroked the frames of any bikes that came near him.


    The Harley-Davidson, upon seeing the master of the ranch, sped off with a mighty roar, plowing through the afterimage of the fence. Quickly Florian hefted Madelief to his back and made a break for the stable.


    The open space was dark inside, and even amongst all the chaos of the rubble there was little to hide behind. Outside the images faded away with the melody on the breeze, and the bike snorted even louder in frustration, thundering back towards them. With only seconds left, Florian threw Madelief up onto a rafter, one of the sagging great beams holding the place up, and then scrambled up after her. But he couldn''t quite manage  ¡ª his legs dangled in plain view. She pulled him up just in time.


    They watched the bike hurtle back into the stable and, failing to see them, it jutted out its parking stand and waited in the middle, revving sub-bass.


    "Bikes can''t look up," said Florian, chomping down on another sandwich from his pack. "I get hungry when I''m scared  ¡ª what about you? But anyway, I fear we''re stuck. We''ll have to rest now. Tough luck."


    For a while Madelief didn''t reply. She was shivering with what ¡ª pain, fear? A deep waterfall of adrenaline coursed endlessly down her.


    GO, the alarm-bells urged.


    She said, "Putting a sentence between your rhymes doesn''t make them any less annoying. But... thanks for saving my life."


    He passed her a sandwich. It was her favourite filling, salsa and watercress.


    She shook her head and said, "We''re not stuck. If we climb along the rafters, we can jump down on top of it, and then  ¡ª and then we can be on our way again. To the Locust Queen."


    Wincing, she wrapped her arms around the beam, and pulled herself along, scraping herself on nails and splinters and all sorts. But Florian was on her in an instant, grappling her backwards, and he caught her in a bear hug, holding her tight. He buried her in a gentle warmth.


    "Get off," she said, but she collapsed into him all the same. Something about that warmth dulled the alarm bells. Then he teased the sandwich into her mouth, and although she could barely taste the tomato-tang through her anxiety, she felt a little better, a little less like the sky was falling. The pain dimmed. Stilled her limbs.


    "Metacognition ¡ª the stories we tell ourselves," said Florian, and his words seemed to lilt about the major scale, harmonising as they dragged and blurred together. "Not the sort you''d put on your bookshelves. There''s a story in you saying you MUST defeat the Locust Queen. Why MUST, Maddie ¡ª what do you believe?"


    "If we don''t kill the Locust Queen, we''ll die," she whispered. "Can''t you hear the alarm bells?"


    He nodded, and offered her another bite of the sandwich. "And why is it a bad thing to die?"


    "...Are you serious?"


    "Well, why live? Why do you believe you must live? More to the point, why do you think driving yourself so hard is more likely to keep you alive? And is a life where you focus only on this goal, driving yourself into further suffering, even worth living?"


    Something about those words wound up her anxiety, and the clockwork started turning again in her bones, and she struggled to break free of his embrace ¡ª but no matter how powerful her drive to act was internally, she could barely press herself to move. As if sensing that, Florian held her firmer, and his warmth and gentleness made the world seem brighter.


    "You always end up helping me," she said. "Not just me, everyone. You''re always listening."


    He smiled.


    "You know why I need to live," she said. "That bright light... that''s what I want to see again. But if I die before I see it, then I want to have been of service to others. We have to kill the Locust Queen ¡ª we''re the only ones that can do it. The only ones who can save the world."


    "So what''s the deeper motivation?" he asked. "Killing the queen, or being the world''s salvation?"


    She blinked at him, furrowing her eyebrows.


    "Fine," he sighed. "World''s salvation was a bit of a stretch. What I''m trying to say is, maybe we should change our motivations a bit. This could be a difficult journey where we push ourselves hard, suffering along the way, and for all our efforts we could still die before we get there... or we can do our best to leave a trail of good in our wake. Maddie, when you say ''GO'', is there a better story you could tell yourself?"


    "I don''t know," she said, trembling. ¡°Go is all I¡¯ve ever known.¡±


    Florian''s cricket began to glow, and rubbing its legs against its wings it played a long and soothing note.


    "Then I give you this story," he said. "Say it with me, in all its glory: ''Maybe we can stop to help''."


    "Maybe we can stop to help." She frowned. "Maybe we can stop to help. Maybe we can stop to help. Maybe we can stop to help. Maybe we can stop to help."


    She repeated it again and again, like a mantra, and the words spread fire through her tongue.


    He beamed. "It sounds good on your lips! Now look down at that bike, not as a tool but as a being of its own, and tell me what you think  ¡ª of which emotion does it stink?"


    She peered down into the musty stable, ignoring the agony racking her body as she shuffled to get a better look, and she looked at the Harley Davidson, and she listened. It was sniffling little bursts of air out of its exhaust; crying oil. It wheeled around itself in donuts, wearing a track into the rock beneath it, and its lights flickered on and off. The bike looked as if it was somehow tugging itself to and fro against its will. It, well, it reminded her of her.


    GO, screamed the alarm bells. But... maybe we can stop to help.


    She turned back to Florian and wrapped him in a massive hug, the auras around their skin gleaming, and they both spilled over with warmth.


    "Okay," she whispered, her heart quivering even now. "I mean it this time... I''m ready to be a hero."

 0.&#x1F98B;+&#x1F997; (The affair of the hundred horses, Act III)

    <div>


    <h4 style="text-align: center">Act III</h4>


    Florian said,


    "The hum of the flute,


    a strum of the lute


    brings us back to the horse''s birth,


    named Chain de Beest for its girth


    and sold to Joost for less than it was worth.


    Scrub back the orange land,


    water it, grow grass and stand


    in the fields as it waves,


    stretches out to the horizon and graves


    are dug around the back.


    At first, Chain fears attack


    from these strange creatures,


    with their wheels and their gears and their bicycle features.


    They sound like horses


    They play like horses


    But they sure ain''t horses.


    Just a foal, he misses his mother,


    but Joost wrests him away. Turns one being to another.


    The brain, the heart, the soul


    is plucked from our foal


    and poured into a metal frame.


    Gone is the grass,


    it now grows sparse


    between the arid cracks of asphalt.


    It never rains, but Chain cries.


    His old body rots away as it dies.


    He speeds along the fences with the other bikes


    and he feels their sorrow, their fractured psyches


    as Joost brings each one in to paint them.


    A year passes, now and then.


    Nothing changes, except their tires,


    and more bikes, more horses are hammered out in the fires.


    There''s a hundred of them now,


    and just as many graves.


    None of them feel brave.


    Then comes a very different day,


    when an emissary from the Locust Queen rides along the way


    and demands the fastest bike,


    the strongest bike


    that Joost can provide.


    Whatever price he names, she''ll pay.


    He gathers up the bikes into the stable


    and he works as fast as he is able


    on his first experiment.


    He leads Chain and his friend, Alain, behind the wall,


    and he splits each in half and he welds them together.


    They cry out in pain,


    their mind is now the same,


    they try to run but a crew of stablehands holds them by the reins.


    Chain sees everything Alain has ever done,


    every thought, every little victory he''s ever won,


    every battle lost, every trauma


    and he can''t look away from this assault


    as the latter becomes the former.


    Joost lets them go at last,


    and they wheel about twice as fast.


    Now he has a proof of concept,Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    he''s hardly going to stop there, is he?


    Behind his eyes imagined diamonds gleam.


    Will it suit the queen,


    he asks, to ride a bike with the power of a hundred horses?


    At such a speed, of course, it should be possible to escape even prophetic forces.


    Yes, says the emissary, opening up her coin purse.


    That night the villagers of Fietspad got no sleep, so great was the racket and the flashes of colour that pierced their open windows.


    By the morning, Joost''s work was done, and Chain found himself lost in a stampede, tugged this way and that, no peace to his mind, only anguish, terror, and rage.


    Horses aren''t very good at agreeing what to do, nor are they very good at shutting up.


    Joost had set the stage


    for a massacre.


    By noon most of the villagers were dead,


    but the motorbike kept running, running to outpace the roar in its head.


    So we find our fair town of Fietspad in the present,


    the moon waxing and waning through crescents


    as it lies in ruin."


    Florian stopped playing and set down his lute upon the rafter, and he looked down with compassion upon the motorbike that was still doing angry donuts in the middle of the stable.


    "Florian?" whispered Madelief. "I... I think I need another sandwich."


    They sat and ate for awhile, taking the story in. They drank from their flasks, and Florian coaxed chromatic chords from his lute, reflecting Maddie''s tangled up feelings. Slowly, floating downwards like a spirit, she lowered herself and landed upon the ground with firm feet.


    The bike snapped in her direction. It roared, spinning in place, terrifying as ever, but now that she was thinking clearer she could hear the sorrow dripping off its hundred-fold voice, and she clutched her heart to quieten her anxiety, and as the bike''s fumes engulfed the stable, she suppressed a cough to avoid startling it.


    "I''d still be careful, if I were you," said Florian, pressing the flute to his lips. "What is it you''re trying to do?"


    Maddie looked among a pile of rags and extracted a clean, soft, cotton cloth.


    "I''ve not been a very good hero," she said. "I was so focused on what the bike could do for me. I just saw it as a tool, Florian. It must be so scared... so angry..."


    Indeed, the bike was snorting at her repeatedly. For a moment it shot forward, but just as soon it tugged itself back. Its gears ground together as it see-sawed back and forth.


    "Shhh," whispered Madelief, floating over. "It''s okay, horsie. It''s okay."


    The beast shied away from her. Her instincts, thirsty, wanted to pursue it, corner it, then bend it to her own goals, but she held those thoughts and she let them pass. Instead she clicked her tongue, and she tried to sing a lullaby, to imitate even slightly the depth of feeling in Florian''s melody, and her personal space expanded around her as she let the world in.


    So open as to be detached, viewing it all from far away, Madelief unveiled herself for the first time to the calls of vultures in the canyon, the chattering of sunset beetles, and the soothing pulse of the wind -- indeed everything she''d overlooked with her blinders on -- and the more attention she paid, the more the world spiralled out into endless fractals of detail, with Florian''s cricket at the epicenter.


    She felt with all her feeling the bike''s hundred welding joints as she cradled them through the cloth; the way its purrs ran fuzzy through her body with every scrub; the way the dust ground like sandpaper into her skin as she got it all off. The bike leaned into her and nuzzled her and whinnied for more, brimming with life. By the time she''d got the Harley-Davidson sparkling gently like stars, the white cloth had stained black. She kneeled down to hug it.


    "That''s one way to make friends," cooed Florian. "I''m proud of you, Maddie, and all seems well as it ends."


    The two of them stroked it -- Maddie in light flutters, Florian in a patting samba. For the first time since getting cursed, Madelief felt happy, and she even smiled a little. Then the bike did something which actually made her well up -- it rolled forwards, pointing its saddle towards them.


    They climbed on and sank low into the soft leather, and Maddie reached out for the handlebars far above.


    "You don''t have to carry us if you don''t want to," she said. "If even one of you hundred doesn''t want it, we''ll get off."


    In response, the bike just revved its engine, and the entire world seemed to shake between their legs. But it had a soft side, and it conveyed them out of the stable to look down upon the canyon, now crawling with nocturnal life, with food chains playing out before their eyes.


    Then it all went wrong; a rainbow coat flashed in their peripheral vision.


    "I knew you were heroes," exclaimed Joost, coming up the road, batting away a cloud of mosquitoes. "You actually tamed it! You tamed my Harley-Davidson! So losing my family, my friends, my employees -- none of it was in vain! Hand it over, now, heroes, and I''ll reward you handsomely. Consider the sidequest complete!"


    As soon as the bike saw him, it flew into a rage and shot at him faster than a bullet. Madelief could only cling to the handlebars, stomach wrenched up into her throat, which wasn''t all bad considering Florian had wrapped his arms tight around her belly, crushing all the wind out of her -- if it was even possible to breathe the air as it streaked past.


    One judder later and the bike had knocked Joost aside like a bowling pin. He fell off the cliff, but the bike kept on rolling, accelerating more. The Harley Davidson sped down the hill road that had taken them half an hour to walk up, and then in a blur they left Fiestpad in the dust.


    "They''re fifty-fifty split!" belted Florian. "Half of them want to live, but the others want to quit!"


    "Quit?" said Madelief, but she was too softly-spoken.


    The bike''s intentions soon became clear. They hurtled towards a wide canyon -- too wide to jump, and deep enough to have no hope of surviving the jagged bottom. It would only take seconds for them to get there.


    GO, screamed the alarm bells, and this time they had a point. She tried to let go of the handlebars to clutch her amulet, but nearly lost her balance and fell off the bike. No, she had to keep holding on, but there was no time to be careful, and letting her moth out the amulet would be too risky in the wind... shit!


    "If we jump off now," said Florian, "We can leave the bike to death and save ourselves... is that what you want to do, Maddie?"


    She imagined fifty of the horses being dragged to the next life against their will, of the incredible deficit in memory it would leave the world, and how every sleepless night she''d picture the best friend horses and the husband horses and the wife horses she couldn''t save.


    "No! Maybe we can stop to help!" she shouted.


    She took the risk and clutched her amulet, swerving the bike away from the canyon at the last moment. But the bike had other ideas and swerved right back, and then they were in freefall, plummeting down to the distant bottom of the canyon, and this really was it, this really was how she was going to die, and she had only herself to blame, and no time to repent.


    "The horses at the eleventh hour agree," announced Florian, "They''ve changed the direction of their minds, and now they want to live! They regret not being able to join us in our fight against the Locust Queen!"


    "I hate you and I hate your cricket," Madelief said, settling on a fine set of last words. So even without her moth she was changing directions for the worse, and now a hundred horses would regret their deaths. All she had to do now was find a way to not make that happen.


    She could flip the direction of their fall, and soar back up towards the sky¡­


    But it would have to be the perfect angle, or they¡¯d crash into the cliff; and she¡¯d have to hold onto both the bike and the amulet without losing grasp of either; and the bike might drive straight back down into the canyon; and she¡¯d have to make sure Florian didn¡¯t drop off as well. So much could go wrong.


    She screamed and did it anyway. They fell upwards back out of the canyon, landing neatly at the top of their parabola. Only once they hit solid ground did she realise how calm she felt. All about her the world was shaking under the tremors of the bike, but Maddie? She felt an otherworldly, detached calmness.


    The alarm bells had stopped ringing.


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