Day Twenty-Eight

Ah, well then. Here we are. At the edge of an abyss, and who will finally jump?

Answer: No one.

Because we are not nor ever will be brave enough. We will forever be straining our eyes, leaning over the edge and wondering where this abyss leads to. The abyss is the opportunity, and we are standing on the cliff of chance and action. We could jump off of that cliff. We could. Few rarely ever do. We’ll spend all of our lives on the edge, always wondering if we are going to jump and worrying about it, needlessly, endlessly. And yet no one does.

I suppose then that means that l am no one.

Because, once upon a time, a long long time ago, l closed my eyes and jumped off of that cliff, to the nearly certain death that awaited me below, to the uncertain future.

But l didn’t die. l jumped to live.

Because once upon a time, l walked through a set of doors with a certain group of people, to the strangest, darkest, oddest little backwater place in the universe, that seemed to contain the strangest things and the most mundane things all at the same time, in a paradox of sorts. And in there,  l saw something that everyone else did not.

l saw, in a way of putting it, the ghosts in the halls,  l saw the history of the place, if not the exact thing then very close to the truth. l looked around and l saw that these people did not not see this place the same way, for the first time, these people whom l had spent nearly a good deal of my existence with......they couldn’t see what l could. They didn't understand in the way that l did. l saw the darkness drifting through the walls, l saw the sorrow that lanced the air, almost invisible. This is an incredibly sad place.

Why? I had wondered. Why do you weep, you hallowed halls?

I still don’t know.

As l looked around all l saw were people leaning over the cliff, l saw that no one else was going to.

So l jumped

And now l'm overboard and l’m too far gone to go back now. l look back now and wonder if l would have been different if l remained on the cliff, but l know I can’t go back now. It’s too late

I suppose that everything here, well most of it anyways, is my fault.

That’s saying a lot, l suppose, but it is true.

Those mysterious strangers? All my fault. l found them and released them. All of them, l set them free. Though they look like people, as far as l know, they aren’t. They simply take on the shape and the life of the nearest nearest life form that they can find, growing over it and taking the life form over.  

On second thought, they were probably caged for a reason.  

Yesterday is where it had all began. Mirax has rushed upon us. We were sitting around, quietly, not really doing anything. Some even half asleep, others practicing rolling their eyes at the empty void. (Which is a very good skill to learn.)

I was hiding behind a fern, trying to stay hidden and keep an eye on everyone at the same time. Which is a both valuable and difficult thing to do. Plus l don't think it was working. About five people, while passing me, and stared a little too long at the fern l was crouched behind, narrowing their eyes oddly but not saying anything, before walking on. Oh well.

Anyways. Mirax leads the curious groups of nearly everyone, including me, because l had to act like a sheep and go along with everything, of course, as so not to draw attention to myself.  Plus l was curious. What had she found? Because everything wasn’t exactly my fault, for one the shirking hotel wasn’t my fault. See, unlike the odd hundreds of rooms that no one could remember or quite where they were and simply that they were there, they were all gone. There was only the main room, and doorways leading off to places, about five or so. Not very many compared to what once was. And every time you turns your back, it seemed perhaps it just got a little bit smaller than you last remembered. And then a lot smaller. And then it seemed like pudding.

Mm. Pudding.

She leads us to a small door.

My blood runs cold. Then it turns to ice. Litilerly. My skin suddenly loses all color, and l could feel the sharp, heavy ice in my veins. Why do l feel so cold? But it didn’t go away, until all l felt was simply cold and that was all okay then because l could pretend like this universe had order and reason and logic and everything was just...alright.  

Mirax opens the door. “You see,” she says. “I thought that l just saw--”

She freezes in place, going even paler, which is apparently a thing that one can do. She goes so pale that she nearly leaves the visible spectrum, before quickly scrambling back and getting into the visible spectrum. Huh. l ought to learn how to do that sometime.

“That can’t be…” Someone mutters, peering over her shoulder. The others, including, yes, me again, (l'm such a sheep) back up, leaving a wide circle around the door. Except for Mirax. She just stands there, looking at the face of someone that she never thought she would see. Her mouth moves, but she is unable to say any word. “I-l thought you were dead. No, not dead. Just not quite….real.” She nearly gasps.

The figure tilts her head to one side, at an unnatural angle, as if trying to imitate a human, but really badly over doing it. Mirax stares, or tries to, into where eyes would normally be. Instead she has the glassy pale skin of a stranger. The figure's hair is shiny brown and curly, unnatural and chillingly perfect. The figure’s faceplate clashes harshly with the exposed machinery of her neck, visible above her black cloak, her hood throw to the back.

I, in the surprise stumble back a bit. I had know that the strangers would have gotten her, sooner or later.  l hadn’t known, like that rest of us,  what she really looked liked. I still don’t, probably. Strangers remove all facial features, and she probably had some. Her face was perfectly portioned, to what a mathematically perfect female human would look like. Not pretty, per se, just perfect. It was almost sickening, it was that crisp and clean. It was a if someone had tried to make a human using only math and what was visible to them. This--this person. She didn’t look right, all angles and crisp lines. She wasn’t human.

Humans live to be imperfect.

And as Mirax stands there, the figure revolves her head, jerkily trying to move smoothly, and with the audible grind of gears, reaches out a black gloved hand reach out and touches her, clumsily, as if not knowing really how hands work, on the shoulder. She just stares, not noticing the sudden patches of glassy whintess that start breaking out all over her skin, and are slowly going to completely cover her. She didn't know until it was too late. Task apparently complete, the figure turns, and almost nonchalantly, drifts away, as she is floating a half foot above the ground.As the realization of who she is ripples through the others, their reactions are varied.

Shock. Anger. Sadness. Disbriefl. Joy at the existence of bowling balls. (wait--what?) Pure cold indifferent.

Least it say, the reaction was varied. Some people, l suppose, don’t even really like her.

l didn't, sort of.  Still hadn’t wanted to lead her to a stranger, and make her the first stranger. She had been anyway. And now she was….dead? I really don't know. Anyways. l am starting to fear for the hotel and for our wellbeing.

Present day

Fear is many things, but it is mostly universal. Anyone and everyone can feel fear. Fear is felt and understood by everyone. And so much fear

Fear because well, the hotel is shrinking more. The door that is not marked, but is huge and iron and  everyone suddenly forget who they are if they get near is gone. While being somewhat thankful for that, l wonder how long it will take until all of the room are gone. There will be only so many places that we can hide from the strangers.

Even though l unleashed them, l can’t control them. And l'm pretty sure that they’ll happily kill me as easily as anyone else. We split up. It was agreed that we should do so. We’ll survive longer, and it’d make it harder for the strangers to hunt us all down. Two down already Who knows how many left to go?

I had finally found a little out of the way place, a room that l could have sworn was a lot larger when l was last there,  and was arranging my evil plans to conquer the world, neatly a three ring binder, all organized and ready to go.

When of all people, of all people in world who could have possibly wandered in while l was shuffling the papers, was the person l perhaps didn’t want to kill as much as everyone else. It was Daisy. Poor sweet, kind, Daisy. She never knew what she has getting herself into. Of all other people, why do you have to poke about where you don’t belong?
Everything would have been okay, if l hadn't written, with a large black marker across the binder: “Evil plan to conquer the world!”

Talk about being subtle. Daisy stares at it for a few seconds before raising an eyebrow. “You are kidding, right?”

“l--why yes of course.” l stutter nervously. Daisy sees right through it. Of course she does. A clam could have seen right through it.

She narrows your eyes. “Okay,  l don't like--”

Quickly, l grab the nearest thing, which happens to be a pencil. I throw it.

This was a sharpened pencil, too. And l was very good at throwing things at people.

Daisy's eyes go wide. She doesn't seem to understand, for a moment what had just happened. Then her eyes fill with tears, and l suddenly felt like heartless person for stabbing her with a pencil.

“I don’t understand.” she, says and so clearly, falling down to her knees on the carpet, then collapsing dramatically. Arhg. why do people die so slowly? They have to bleed all over the floor while having time for a dramatic and heartfelt death scene and to have their last wishes put in stone or something. I really wish should she die quickly. Now this is just getting awkward, like over saying your stay at someone's house.

Daisy tilts her head, as so she can look at me, from her dramatically sprawled position on the carpet, hair curling on the floor like the arms of a spider, the very picture of a cinema star death.

“You know you should really take up acting after this.” I comment, absentmindedly, leaning on the desk. Daisy partly growls at me. “Excuse me. l’m going to be dead after this.”

“Oh, okay.”

This is the most awkward death ever,

“Well, l don’t know.” l say, finally. “You’re really good at not dying fast, which l wish l could say for most of you.”

She sighs. “Well….thank you. This is my first time dying. It’s pretty painful.”

“Mhm. l suppose it probably is. Any last words? Dying secrets? Don’t want them to do with you, you know. I wouldn't tell anyone.”

She gives me a sideways glance. “You know, l didn’t think my murderer would want to be sticking around to hear my last words.”

l shrug. “I've never been a normal person. Plus if l kill you, then l think it's only my duty to stick around to talk to you, certainly wouldn’t want the last thing you see is the just the ceiling or something. Sheesh. I'm not heartless. I understand that humans need other humans when they're dying.”

There is a long pause.

“Then well...you kind of seem like a nice person.” Daisy says. “Why are you killing people like this?”

Oh dang. This question. How should l answer it.”

“Well to put things shortly, this place,” l gestured around, “it’s a trap of sorts. I realized that. Only one of the people who go in are going to come out. And l saw that no one else here was going to, and that l had wanted to live. So. l need to kill everyone to escape.”

“Everyone dies so you can lives.” Daisy says weakly.

I nod, staring off for a long while. After the silence had become a bit too awkward, l turn to Daisy.

But she’s dead.

Dang, never fun when the person you’re talking with decided to kick the bucket in the middle of the conversation. I swear that happens too much.

~~~

Rest in peace, Daisy.

People don’t kill people. People never die. People are invincible. Pencils kill people. People are invincible, but pencils are invincibler.

 

 

 

(...) 

(invincibler? Seriously, Teller?)

 

Scary...... And thought provoking.

Poor Richard. You will be missed. Oh, wait, you're actually staying with CL for a bit, so I guess you won't know that you died until you come back.  

Luna says "novu". Novice? Oi, I'm not an novice at dying. I'd have you know, I've done it multiple times. 

*hmmph. Good riddance.*

Luna, that's mean. I am your creator. You would not exist without me. 

*Frankenstein. Case and point.* 

Day
Twenty-Nine

Jarvis
considers the strange paradox of that people can do extraordinary
things if they are put in the right circumstances.

For
example: if they are put on cooking show, they will fail. Or if they
are chased by alien monsters that look like people without faces,
then yes, they will run very fast and do whatever it takes to keep
running very fast.

Now,
now, Jarvis was never much of a runner. She’d watch as her older
brother and sister would proudly bring home shining trophies, and
would proudly line them up on a shelf. At the holidays, all the aunts
and uncles would ooh and ahh, and all of the cousins would pester her
brother and sister about they could do such things, and their parents
would beam proudly. If they glanced at Jarvis, their face would
suddenly go sour, and they would shake their head slowly.

“You’ll
make a runner out of her.” Her grandmother would say, shaking her
cane at Jarvis, whom would shrink down farther into her chair.
“Sooner or later, you will.”

But
as the years went on, Jarvis did not, and as the trophies gathered
dust and the Olympic gold medals hanging on the wall (why her sibling
left their gold medals at their parent's house, Jarvis never
understood) begin to lose their shine and Jarvis pretty much lost
track of time, she gave up on that dream, which is something that one
should never do.

Ha.
Jarvis thinks. I proved you all wrong, dear parents, siblings and
extended family, and even the weird uncles, l proved them all wrong,
i can run, if given the right motivation.

“Jarvis!”
Saphira scolds, tugging on her arm. “What could you possibly
thinking about? We’re being chased, hello?”

Jarvis
was rather dragged to where Paris is waving her arms, Brian standing
by her. “Hurray! I found a door!”

The
strangers, a crowd of them, are spread around the place, apparently
unable to sense them unless they are close. Which doesn’t leave
them too much time.

Paris
yanks open the door, as the stranger finally converge on them, no
more than a few feet away. She stares blankly at what is behind the
door.

Or
rather the lack of anything. The door simply leads to a wall, and as
she stares the very door melts away into mist in her hand. She
stumbles back.

“Run!”

“Yes,
very good idea.” Jarvis says, softly, with an odd smile on her
face. “Run! I can run!--”

“Yes,
okay. l really don’t care, now RUN!”

“l…….caan
nnn runnnnn….” Jarvis sings under her breath as Saphira pretty
much drags her and Paris across the room.

Sadly,
she did not look both ways, so to speak and promptly trips over a
sickeningly bright pink bean bag chair. Jarvis and Paris follow soon
afterwards.  That main room looks as if it had been decorated by
someone from the 1970’s, with carpet perhaps designed by a child
with the contents of a 1970’s refrigerator, and walls possibly
painted with artist's nightmares. Perhaps they were actually
nightmares. You never know.

Brightly
colored, fluffy chairs were placed were everyone would trip over them
and lava lamps glowing the in oddest places (annoying the radioactive
clocks out of their minds)

Saphira
stumbles to her feet, ducks a stranger, and continue dragging Paris
and Jarvis away.  They rush through a bead curtain, ending up
with a mouthful of plastic.

Wild-eyed
and panting, it take them a few minutes to calm down.

They
are in a endlessly seeming white hall, lit by painfully bright
lights. By the bead curtain a neon sign reads, “Infinity Hall. Do
not touch the frames.”

And
below that, in purple marker, “Peace, Love and Chill, Dudes” Some
places just can’t escape those 1970’s

Because
lining the sides of the wall are completely empty frames of every
size and shape.

Paris
and Saphira turn, but too late as they suddenly see Jarvis fall into
a frame. And because of the angle, they are unable to determine the
stand looking at the wall for a long time. Paris says that they
should split up, the other two agree. Paris enters a full length
frame. Saphira jumps through a diamond shaped one, and Brian
reluctantly edges through a one in the shape of a pancake.

~~

Jarvis
yelps involuntarily, which is rather bad has she also happens to be
underwater. She opens her eyes, sees what it on the bottom of the
lake, which is covered in pile of pencils, starts thinking again, and
kicks toward the surface,

attempting
to tread water (which is hard in a skirt and sweater, suspiciously
1970’s style) and looks around. She appears to be in some sort of
lake, but she can only see the shore. An impossibly huge castle looms
above her, a single tower casing a shadow on the wall, each floor
appearing to be a slightly different colored ring of stone on the
tower outside. She squints at the window, perhaps thinking that she
sees a outline of a person, but, no, it is gone.

She
swims to the shore, ands starts towards a door that she supposes
leads to the tower. It’s cold in this place, and she is shivering
violently.

Inside
there is small stone room with a crackling, cheery fire and oddly
enough, the exact same clothes that she is wearing, draped over the
back of a chair. Strange though it is, she isn’t one to look a gift
horse in the mouth, she changes into them, neatly draping her wet
clothes over the back of the chair.

Now
dry, she heads up the staircase. She wants to get to the top, as to
possibly have a better of view of where she is and possibly how to
get out.

After
a ridiculous number of steps, she gets to a landing. And stops to
breathe.

She
jumps at a grinding noise and watches in fascination as the hall
before her slowly starts to move away, She watches as it is replaced
by a different hall. She peers forward, but is unable to see
anything.

Jarvis
finds a door at the end of that, and in that stairs, and at the end
of the stairs is a small tower of sorts. lt is dark outside, and she
did not know that so much time had passed since she came here.

The
stars above are familiar but vaguely….different. It take her a
while to figure out why.

They
have moved, slightly, not by much, but enough to be notable.

The
stars are drifting. Jarvis blinks. That means, no, they’re simply
moving. Over thousands of years. She frowns. What? She couldn’t
have been there for such a long time, surely?

She
moves on them, a strange feeling of this isn’t right pulling at,
eating inside of her. Every time she comes to an intersection, the
hallways move, bringing her to somewhere.

Another
hall ways turns, and she suddenly halts in her tracks.

Oh.

This
isn’t a hallway. it’s a wall, a solid wall of translucent white
crystal. She carefully runs a finger over it, feeling it. No, not
crystal….diamond?

Then
she notices an shallow indent in the middle of the wall. Something
she once heard comes to mind.

Once
every thousand years, a small bird sharpens its beak on a mountain
reaching to the heavens. And when that mountain is gone, a single day
of infinity shall have passed.

She
stares at it for a long time, unable to do what she thinks that she
needs to.

Finally,
rather hesitantly, she attempts to hit the wall. And then again. And
again.

After,
well, she has no idea, she finally collapses to the ground, hands
bleeding.

The
wall looks no different.

This
place wouldn’t allow her out anyway else. She think that it is the
case because it, the castle, does not allow her to wander, it directs
her exactly.

Finally
she summons the will to go back down, and reaches a window, that she
hasn’t seen before. Her fingers play with the a pencil, just on the
ledge, before dropping it into the lake below, collapsing into the
pile below. She suddenly hears a splash and looks downward. below,
faintly a figure surfaces from the water, and starts to swim towards
shore. But she thinks no longer, as suddenly her eyes roll to the
back of her head and she collapses, dead.

~~

Jarvis
frowns at the stars. If what she thinks is true, then it’s taken
millions upon millions of year for the stars to change this much.

The
pencils are now a small mountain in the lake, the indentation now a
hand deep.

~~

Billions
of years.

~~

Trillions.

~~

The
sky.

It
is completely black. All the stars have died.

There
is now a tunnel through the diamond, and Jarvis looks at it. She then
places a hand on the final, thin layer. This is it. She could be
free.

She
feels so tired. She’s outlived the universe.

And
she can’t bring herself to finally get free.

She
collapses against the wall.

~~

“l
thought
you went through a different frame!” Saphira snaps crabbily at
Brian.
“l did!” He protests. “But….we appear to have ended up in the
same place.” he looks around. Paris sighs. “Well this is
helpful.” She says, nothing short of rolling her eyes.

Jarvis,
again is not to be seem. She should really quit wandering off so
much. She might die or something. You can never know.

The
frame that they have entered from is nicely suspended in mid-air.

They
are surrounded by a slight too perfect forest, all towering trees and
mossy ground, with flower everywhere, as so it’s just perfectly
aesthetically pleasing. A bit too perfect. Almost too good to be
real. They look around, but decidethat there isn’t anything to see,
it is pretty but there’s not Jarvis.

“Righty--”
Saphira says briskly, sticking her head back into the frame. “It’s
time to go back. I suppose—AHHHH.”

She
jerks back, stumbling over herself own feet and falling down hard. A
hand gropes through the frame. Smooth, as if stone and unnaturally
white.

Only
the hand of a stranger. Saphira looks ridiculously unnerved. Brain
peers into the frame. “it’s Mirax. “ He says shortly.

Saphira
gets up, peering over his shoulder. Mirax stares back through the
frame, tilting her head.

“Hello?”
Paris tries.

Saphira
rolls
her eyes.”She
can’t hear you. You know that. She’s—probably dead.” she
partly stumbles on the words, not that they were sad but that’ it’s
awfully hard to believe
when
they're standing right in front of you.

“Maybe…..”
Brian ventures, “Maybe we can bring her back.”

“How?”
Paris asks.

“l
don’t know. Make her remember or something.” He waves a hand.

“No.
she isn’t human. Nor will ever be.” Saphira snaps, coldly.

~~

H.A.B.
has decided that there are two reasons that he is alive. Either that
he is in a dream and of course none of this is real!

...or
by the fact that he’s the only human here, and there by increases
his chances of survival, as humans aren’t terribly good at keeping
each other alive.

Well
neither Nova or Ellak have been particularly good at that either,
so….

Well
if they all died then at least it wasn’t his fault. It was after
all Nova’s

robotic
thinking that had insisted that through the beaded curtain was the
right way to go and definitely jump right there that random picture
frame, because she says so and everything is going to be okay.

“l
see
your wonderful programming has lead us to a….” H.A.B. glances
around. Nova rolls her eyes. “Excuse me. l’m programmed to make
mistakes so humans doesn’t get jealous of me. Isn’t that what you
humans say? Just made a mistake? she randomly kicks and office chair,
and watches it spin across the empty room, blown by the dusty window
from the broken window.

Ellak
is peering about from it and H.A.B. as the sudden, and rather evil
urge to give him a push. He is a dragon after all, and dragons can
fly.

“It
looks like it’s-it’s just--” Ellak apparently doesn’t have
words for it.

“Deserted?”
Nova offers, coming beside him. H.A.B. wants even more to push her
out the window.

“No!
it’s an entire city! This doesn’t just happen, you just can’t
remove millions of people, just like that. People aren't like that.”

He
glances meaningfully back as H.A.B. “They could have all….died, I
guess.”

They
spend a long time staring over a completely still city, this thought
eating at their minds.

Nova
frowns. “That’s strange. Someone messed with my radio receiver
and I don’t even know--”

Her
eyes suddenly go blank. The lights in them flicks off. She falls
over, stiffly, collapsing on the ground unnaturally.

“…...Ellak?”

“Yes?”

“You
are a robot, and you know these things…..is she...dead?”

“No,
as she was never actually alive in the first place, but--”

“Aha!”

Both
of them jump as Nova leaps to her feet.

“Ahaha.”
she snickers. “You should have seen the looks on your faces.”

“Why
the heck you do that?” Ellak grumbles. “It doesn’t make any
sense.” he mutters, mostly at no one. Nova’s face falls. She
looks confused. “That's….right. It doesn’t why am I acting this
way…..?”

She
shakes her head to one side, as if trying to dislodge something.

“Oh
dang.”

“What?’

“Oh,
no, no. Why, why did they do this? This doesn’t make any sense? No,
no. I can’t--”

She
paces in a circle, to the bemusement of Ellak and H.A.B.

Ellak,
finally sensibly, corners her to get her attention. “Nova. What are
talking about?”

Her
eyes go wide, buzzing as they readjust.

“I—l
don’t know. I seem to have a bomb. Inside of me. I don't know why,
but something, someone, was messing inside of my head.”

“When’s
it going to set off?”

“Ten
minutes. No one’s going to survive it, including me, unless I get
far away….” Her gaze slowly drifts to the window. H.A.B.
instantly knows what she's thinking and instantly regret wanting to
push her out of the window, because she may jump herself. Grr. He
can’t appear to make up his about pushing people out of windows
today.

“No—no.
don’t you dare. Nova.” He starts pacing as well, annoying Ellak.

“We
can fix this, yes? You’re robots. You know how to defuse it?”

He
doesn’t particularly like the idea of someone dying yet again,
after watching so many die when he has not done so. He feels almost
kind of guilty for staying alive so long.

Nova
doesn’t answer. She sinks to the floor, curling into a ball in an
oddly vulnerably human position.

“What
can we do, Ellak?”

He
shrugs. “Frankly?” I have no idea. Maybe….well…..we don’t
stop her from jumping? She doesn’t lie, her programming doesn’t
allow it. The bomb will kill us all if she doesn’t get away.”

H.A.B
doesn’t answer, he doesn’t say what he should, that they should
stick together til the end. Because, honestly…..he kind of wants to
stay alive, and Nova is kind of already dead no matter what they do,
so……

Of
course it’s not the right thing to do, it’s not the heroic thing
to do, it isn’t all we’ll-stick-to-you-til-the-end, because….they
end is here and they want to live.

“two
minutes.” Nova mumbles, as they approach her. “Then we’ll all
be dead.”

“Look.
l’m sorry about this, but….you’re going to kill us too, so
could you….jump?” Ellak hesitantly suggests.

Nova
blinks at him.

“l
am a bird.” she whispers,
getting
up and standing on the edge, an entire broken
city unfolding beneath
her, completely
still, completely
empty.

“And
I can--”

“--Good-bye
Nova.” the two of them say softly.

“--Fly.”

~~~~~~~ 

Rest
in peace, Jarvis and Nova.

PSA:
Your author is crabby. Why? Don’t question. she’s crabby. And
likely to bite your head off if you get too close. And
likely sleep-deprived.

*Snaps jaws*

(Mea culpa for the probably weird formatting, l'm too lazy to try to fix it.) 

 

Day Thirty

Apparently Mirax the stranger eventually leaves them alone. Saphira cautiously pokes her head through the frame, hanging in the mid-air. “All clear.” She announces. Brian pokes Paris awake (She's been falling asleep all over the place for reasons unknown to them) and they exit the frame.

Paris is dreaming. A complete dream, not broken by the bother of reality. It is, as most dreams tend to be, strange.

She is washing dishes in the dream. The grimy, grey, soapy water with questionable chunks of things floating in it, like a soup that no one quite trusts, is up to her elbows. She can't find the bottom of the sink, nor do the dishes ever seen to stop. Nor the water get cleaner. In fact, at one point, she is sure that some species of deep water fish have come to live in this sink, as she is sure that she has been washing dishes for a few centuries, and the questionable chunks of food have evolved into advanced organisms that now inhabit the sink. She does not know what they look like, but every now and then she will get bitten mysteriously and the blood will draw in even more of these strange creatures……

Despite this, as anyone would be disturbed by this, Parissaphira keeps washing dishes, vigorously. Time seem to pass faster in the dream, as if reality is sitting next to a black hole and time is creeping by for them.

And as she begins to get more disturbed, (washing paper plates for a few decades can get anyone to question their existence) part of her fears that this nightmarish task of the infinite dishes will never be done.

And just when it was getting good--the deep water fish had evolved into the Loch Ness monsters and were running conspiracy-theory blogs from a Dutch oven, someone just had to wake her up. It was Brian. And he was annoyed. And Paris was annoyed at him for waking her up. The dream was just starting to get interesting!

“Could you just….manage to stay awake for a few minutes?” Brian snaps. Paris blinks at him.

“What? I wasn’t asleep a few minutes, l was…..”

“No, you where.”
Saphira interjects, most annoyingly. Paris frowns at both of them. “Why do you keep having to be--”

Paris has been hired as a reporter for the conspiracy-theory Loch Ness monsters, apparently now promoted from washing dishes. She is at a concert, where the musicians are imitating a electric guitar on a tuba. Believe me, it's impressive. Paris isn’t even sure that a tube can make those sounds. In fact, she’s really sure that it’s all been prerecorded and these performers are  all cheats. Thus, in the back of the dark theater, she scribbles in her note book random doodles of a Persian cat atop the moon with a sinister pair of glasses while the universe dies all around it.

“No--calm down, okay? It’s--
“It’s not! It’s not fine,Brian! We’re all dying, and we have nowhere to run any longer! The strangers are after us!”

“Can’t we reason with Mirax? She seems to be leading them! Please! There’s hope yet. Please, Saphira. Please believe. We’re getting out alive.”

“Oh yes, and you’re the one that’s always so optimistic.”

Paris is now in the city of her namesake, serving tea to alien warlords as the Eiffel Tower is covered entirely with red paper hearts and snowflakes.

“Paris! What is wrong with you?”

She blinks, up towards the bright light. Alien warlords? Something like that. She doesn’t quite remember.

She is shaken hard enough by the shoulder to stay awake for a reasonable amount of time.

“Wha….what’s happening? She asks looking around, confused. She is lying on a horrible, musty floral….coach? It doesn’t look like one.

“There aren’t any doors left.” Ellak mutters, glancing around. Paris gives him a confused look. “Wait...you weren’t here before. Where'd you come from?” then noticing H.A.B., she asks, “Where’s Nova?”

The two exchange glances. “Well...then, funny story--” Ellak begins but H.A.B. cuts him off.

“She was taken by the strangers.” He glares at Ellak for some reason. “There is no other reason. That is all.”

“Ah.” Paris blinks her eyes.

“Strangers are all over the place--” Brian explains. “We think--well we aren’t really sure who they are. I think they used to to be guests here and are sort of...their ghosts or something.”

Saphira snorts softly to this but doesn’t say anything. “The hotel is shrinking--there are no doors left--this is the only remaining room.”

“So….we’re in a bit of a fix.” Ellak ends, lamely.

“Oh. well then.” Paris sits up. “Well then. Why don’t you just ask the Teller? She’s the--manager or whatever, yes?”

More glances. “Well……” H.A.B. trails off, glancing to the others. It is as if not saying it out loud will make it only a concept, something just in their minds.

“What?” Paris is annoyed by now.

“We’re…..we’re pretty sure that she’s a stranger now. Whatever she was. Can’t rely on that any longer.”

“Oh.” Paris says shortly.

And promptly falls asleep.

Paris, France, is a lovely place. When not being overrun by aliens from Mars. When it is….well, it’s not exactly all sunshire and rainbows. A bit more rainbows then sunshine, though.

“No…..Saphira. I never wanted this to happen!”

“What did you think? That l was going to live? You idiots. You’re all wrong. I always saw that….”

”...what? What really where you going to do?”

“I don't think that you could have made things better! It wasn’t going to be like this, in the end, was it?”

No one answer that for a long time. H.A.B. glances away, as a slow, smooth stone-like substance start to grow over the blue dragon’s scales. It was not quickly, thus leaving time for her to have a dramatic death scene.

“I could have sworn that l saw something in her eyes….”

Brian half mumbles.

“Yeah well you should have seen that before she killed me.” Saphira snaps. “Mirax is a stranger. You can’t seem to understand that, can you?”

Biran doesn’t answer, but one can tell that he has not changed his thinking.

He has, as most humans have, endless oceans of hope for the hopeless, the light in the darkness, even if there isn’t any he’ll just pretend there is some anyways.

Paris is awake, (faintly) but no one is paying attention to her any longer. This vaguely annoys her for some reason, but she doesn't say a thing as Saphira growls in the back of her throat. The other three have wandered off to various places, apparently rather unwilling to face Saphira’s fate.

Saphra finally glances up to Paris.

“Is this how you’re going to die?” Paris questions. “Is this how you’re going to be remembered?”
Saphira snorts. “Seriously? I don’t care about all of that melodramatic trash. I wouldn’t be remembered. Probably on some dusty gravel stone or whatever. Look, it doesn't matter.”

She sighs.

“Yes it does.” Paris says softly, resting her head on her elbows that were rested on her knees that were  atop her leges that were rested on the floor. Saphira rolls her eyes, “And what do you know of this?”

“What do any of us?”

“Apparently nothing.”

“That’s rich of you.” Paris says, raising an eyebrow at the dragon. “Because here you are, just….” she waves a hand. “dying away. Have fun at it.”

“You’re welcome. I live--l die, tell me, Paris, what difference does it make?”

“It makes the world.”

A long, awkward silence ensues.

Saphira awkwardly props herself up against the coach, her movements getting stiffer as she slowly becomes colder and colder inside. “For whatever you care…” She began hesitantly. “I don’t want to die like this. I don’t want to die like everyone else did. I want to make a difference, even after death.”

“You want to remembered, yes? I can do that. We all want to be remembered.” Paris doesn’t meet Saphira’s eyes for a long time. “We want to hailed as heroes in the history books, we want our deeds, however slight they may be, to be glorified and exalted, remembered for millennia with our name attached to them like labels. Is that what you want, Saphira?”

“No….” she reluctantly admits. “Not in that way. Just that l don’t disappear off of the face of the earth.”

“No...that’s not how it works. You won’t be remembered. At least not by name. But that doesn't matter you have built onto the mountain of human achievement along with everyone else. You won’t be remembered. I can’t say that. But you will matter. All of us make the world in the end.”

~~~~

Rest in peace, Saphira.

Guess the murderer before they make you guess your existence!

Wait, I just now realized: Teller of Tales, you're Shadow Dragon?!

Day Thirty-One

Sleep, citizens. Sleep, criminals. Sleep, foolish hearts.

Sleep, brilliant minds.

Sleep, children.

But there is no sleep for the troubled, for the hunted. The night does not hold peace for them. Only terror.

Only darkness.

“You  know,” Ellak comments to Paris. “there were once days that k used to have dreams. Dreams of going places, l think. I can’t remember what they felt like now. They must have felt like fire.” Paris doesn’t comment. She, too, has felt like this. But now she can only shift through the ashes in her heart and wonder what the bonfire felt like.

“I know.” she says softly, her voice cracking for some reason. “I used to feel that, too. And other things. Like how l would do things. Great things. But the only thing l've managed to do so far is to not die.”

“That is good….isn’t it?” Ellak asks, hesitantly, perhaps as much to the darkness as to Paris. They have...partly give up, so to speak. Paris simply doesn’t care any longer, leaving it to Ellak to keep the both of them alive, as he refused to leave her behind. And as she has drily observed, this is to be the most likely cause of Ellak’s death.

He hadn’t said anything on the matter since, but….after seeing Nova go slightly insane he wasn't sure really how long he is going to hold on.

Still.

Don’t die while you still can, after all.

That is what they say.

Right…..?

Right?

No answers for the dead.

And now it is night. The darkness is like a mist all around them, as red, flashing, lights pierce the darkness from somewhere, seemingly far away that they will never reach. The darkness is like a physical presence around them,  wrapping its cold fingers around the two. Crickets chirp.

Which would have been amusing if Ellak had stopped to think about it. He didn’t. So the crickets were unamused for the time being.

He is listening to the crickets and wondering as to how the hotel has a cricket infestation, when Paris suddenly jumps up, making him jump, with a clatter.

“Look. Look at that.”

Ellak cranes his neck, eyes readjusting to the light with a click.

“Is that….a…?”

“Yes! Yes it is!” Paris is far more excited then Ellak is. She is bouncing on her heels on the horrible 1970’s floral couch, staring wide eyed at the ceiling, a grin plastered across her face.

“How could….that be?” Ellak shakes his head, as is dislodging something he doesn't understand.

“Wait--” Paris’s face falls. “Is that….a….?”

“Yes, yes, it is.” And this time neither of them sound happy about it. Paris stares at it for a second seconds before diving to the ground.

A ship of some sort, a space ship, come rushing, falling right towards the windows above, before it  collides through the glass of the windows that Paris was admiring just a few seconds earlier, all in flaming glory, blasting the darkness away in a flashing, blazing, white light. Paris rolls over onto her back, after diving behind the floral couch. She wonders how the falling glass looks like shooting stars, only smaller, and not star-like, and on fire, and molten, and deadly, and falling right on top of her. Actually, on second though they’re not even like shooting stars and they’re going to kill her pretty soon.

I would have done so much. She thinks as the ceiling of the hotel plummets towards her, flaming, withering, wreckage, enveloped in clawing fire. The fire blackens her skin, surprisingly slowly.

Before she is tossed, yes tossed, as if she is a sack of tomatoes, aside, out of the path of the falling glass and ship.

First--she feels outrage. Excuse me. She is not a sack of tomatoes! So quit treating her like one! Second--Wait what? She was going to die, wasn’t she? Whatever happened to that? Third--...Ellak? Oh no--ELLAK? Where are you?

...Ellak?

Heat rips through the air, the fire burning her eyes as so she can’t see anything else.

You’re okay, right?

We’re all going to be okay.

You’re going to be okay.

The universe has better ideas.

Elak, in process of pushing Paris out of the way of the falling ship (like a sack of tomatoes!) has thereby put himself in the path of ship.

And, well, he doesn’t melt, exactly, like metal even though he probably should, he burns like wood, still appearing to keep his shape even though he is glowing white. Surprised, shocked, Paris creeps as close as the heat and debris will allow her to.

“Ellak?” She asks, carefully though she isn’t even sure if he is alive. But he is. And he is partly trapped under the hull of the ship. He jerks his head back, jaws agape. Paris gets the impression that he is roaring.

Or screaming.

“l…..” Molten metal is starting to run like tears down his face. “know…..what you...are.”

A sudden heat waves washed over her and Paris put her arms up to shield herself. When is passes, she looks up again.

The metal dragon is gone.

And he know what she was. And he still saved her.

Paris cannot seem to quite understand.

She cannot understand why she does not have half the heart that a robot has.

~~

“We’re dead.”

“Well thanks for that.” Brian growls, dryly. “You’re such ray of sunshine.”

“You’re not welcome,” H.A.B. answer, equally dryly. “Seeing that this is basically your fault and all.”

“Can you blame me for having a heart?”

“I can blame you when l'm dead.”

“I didn’t want it to end that way! Seriously! I thought it would be...different.”

“Like how? We wouldn’t be as good as dead? Maybe Mirax wouldn’t be dead as well?”
“I swear l saw some humanity left in her..” Brian mutters. H.A.B. rolls his eyes.

“Well then. As soon as we show ourselves to find out where she is, she’ll find out exactly where we are and we’ll be dead. Hooray.”

“C’mon. We’re not going to get anything done just sitting here. I don’t want to wait here. We need to do something.”

Sensenig it in his voice, H.A.B. intends to object, opening his mouth. But he’s too late. Brian has stood out from their hiding place, behind a large couch. He peers around in the dim light.

“Aha! No! What do you think that you’re doing?” H.A.B. stands up as well, and then freezes.

“...Why is she holding a knife?” Brian asks, quietly.

“I don’t want to know.”

“Run?” He offers.

“There’s nowhere to run. We’re cornered.”

It takes a long time before the despair in his voice sinks into Brian’s head.

The coldness, the panic, builds in the pit of his stomach, cold blood running through his veins. H.A.B., on the other hand, seems utterly calm and unconcerned.

“Aren't we going to do something?”

“No. not really,  suppose. There has to be an end to all thing, and this can be it.”

“But--” Biran cuts himself off. “I don’t want this to be the end. l don’t want to die.”
“Then live on. Live on, like the best of them. Let the world know your name. Live on.”

“Wait--what? Was that a death speech? Oh come on--l never thought you could be so--”

The cold presence of the stranger, the waves of coldness rolling around her like storm clouds, fogging up the metal on the knife.

Brian stares at her, intently. He’s dead certain that she’s still human, somewhere, inside, she has to be the same person! This is simply how things work. This is logical, of course. Reasonable.

“Mirax.” He says softly, and for a second, he think that she pauses at the sound of her name, and for a second hope explodes inside of him. She is human! She is not lost, not--

Thud.

Clatter.

Thud.

One body.

One knife.

One pair of knees.

“What have l done?”

Mirax's voice sounds thick and rusty, growly and barely understandable, as if something has been inhabiting her vocal cords and not letting them go.

“Is this how it ends?” H.A.B. asks, who isn’t quite dead yet.

No one answer his question, until it becomes the last question he will ever ask.

Brian backs off, keep his eyes fixed on Mirax.

Her skin is glassy white in patches, and naturally colored in other places. She is breathing deeply, gasping, clawing, with her lung to the air, raggedly tearing them apart, staring at the floor on her knees where she has fallen.

Never has he wanted himself to be so wrong about his hopes.

~~~~

Rest in peace, Ellak and H.A.B.

While l was editing this last part, The Hall of Fame by the Script came on my music player, which l thought was quite appropriate for the scene.

*wakes up* *smacks computer in a frenzy and surprise*

Last night I just locked myself out of my laptop! And I spent hours trying to fix it on my own to NO AVAIL! (literally I ended up falling asleep on my wood floor from eyestrain and stuff. Don't do that, plz, unless you want weird lines on your face) I finally had to ask help from a computer forum. 

BUT HEY I'M ALIVE NOW (okay well not really, at least in this story) sort of...

I kinda ignored this for a few days (sorry) but I'm caught up now!

Also, I must congratulate the bomb-maker for making one that made Nova do no-sensible stuff. It was very accurate. 

LIFE. NEVER. MAKES. ANY. SENSE.