Carclass="underline" I don’t like it, no matter what the design is.
Katia: This is just like when Donut wanted to climb up the chain and turn the roundabout. You’re a… a backseat dungeon driver. You only don’t like the idea because you didn’t come up with it.
Ouch.
Carclass="underline" I don’t like it because you’re going to fucking die, Katia. I don’t understand. You used to be scared of fighting just regular mobs.
Katia: You’re right. You don’t understand, Carl. They came back for me. She brought the entire team to pick me up. That is more than anyone has ever done for me.
An awkward silence hung in the room. It was clear to everyone that we were having a private conversation. Katia rubbed tears from her eyes.
Zev: Goddamnit, Carl. You need to be having these moments out loud.
“Go fuck yourself, Zev,” I said up to the ceiling. “How’s that for talking out loud?”
Hekla barked with laughter. “Zev sounds like our Loita.”
Zev: I’m serious, Carl. You’re one of the most popular feeds, and half of your conversations are inaccessible to the viewers. What do you think is going to happen?
I ignored the question. The tension in the room had eased with my outburst. “Okay, okay. If we do this, Donut and I will ride in the engineer’s car. And I would like Katia to stay in our team until we’re done. All this transferring around will take too long.” I turned to look at Katia. “As long as that’s cool with you.”
To my surprise, she walked up to me and hugged me, long and tight. “Thank you,” she whispered in my ear. I had no idea for what.
“That’s fine,” Hekla said after a moment, though she seemed irritated. “You can ride with me and Eva. She knows how to drive the subway cars.”
When we left the personal space, I paused, confused. Before, the door led straight into the attached restaurant, but now there was a vestibule similar to the one at the Desperado Club. A second door was attached to a wall next to ours. It was a subspace portal that I couldn’t enter or screenshot. After a moment, I realized it was the entrance to Hekla’s team’s headquarters. That was how the system dealt with multiple, non-attached personal spaces being accessible when crawlers had the ability to enter into more than one. I know what this is. This is a temporary, situationally generated space. I remembered there was a note about them in my book.
I half-expected Eva to turn and attempt to saber me in the face the moment we left the saferoom. She didn’t. We went through the trap door down onto the dark, employee line. It appeared the ghouls were leaving this track free. That was good. The Nightmare remained where we left it, happily idling. I briefly wondered what Fire Brandy did to pass the time. But then I remembered her babies, and the fact she was constantly giving birth. She probably had no time to get bored.
“If you want to ride, your team will need to hang onto the outside of the train. There’s not enough room in the cab. There’s room on the back platform, though.”
“We will ride,” Hekla said. Me, Donut, and Katia climbed into the cab while Hekla, Eva, and a few more daughters stood on the back platform by the door. The rest moved to the front and clutched awkwardly onto the railings, standing on either side of the Nightmare’s boiler. A few of the smaller, fairy-like daughters alighted onto the platform out front, just above the cowcatcher. I imagined we looked like a parade float with so many colorful women attached to the outside.
“It’s too bad we can’t move this train to the Vermillion line,” I said as I flushed the brake line. This train would be perfect for clearing the track of ghouls. I stuck my head out the window. “Ladies, watch out. The boiler gets really, really hot. Only hold onto the rails. And watch the walls. We’ll go slow, but if the walls hit you, it’s game over.”
I eased the train forward.
“I just realized you’re the only boy here,” Donut said. “All these people, and there’s only one penis. You could start a harem. Like the guy on that Sister Wives television show.”
I laughed. “Nobody is starting a harem.”
“No, I suppose not,” Donut said. “You couldn’t even keep one woman interested.”
The train hissed, and we started to pick up speed. We’d be at Station 60 in just a few minutes.
“Why does your friend have so many skulls?” Donut asked Katia as we lurched forward.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I knew she had gained a few on the third floor, but I hadn’t realized it was that many. She says she doesn’t want to talk about it.”
I bet.
“How do you know her anyway?” I asked.
“Eva? She’s an economics professor at the university. We eat lunch together sometimes. We were friends before, but not great friends. She actually knows Hekla, too. From before, I mean. Hekla has known her longer than I have. Reykjavik is a small town.”
“Was Hekla a professor, too?”
“No,” Katia said. “She was Eva’s psychiatrist.”
Like Madison from human resources had predicted, A small colony of NPCs had gathered at station 60.
We didn’t stay long at the station, which was too small already to house the group of NPCs gathered there, but as we passed through, I noted Madison sitting in the corner glaring at us sullenly. She was being berated and threatened by an angry mob of dwarves and gremlins. Rod, her ex-husband, was nowhere in sight. I wondered if he was even real.
As we left and entered into the long, twisting hallway that led to a confusing series of portals which in turn led to additional platforms, we had to step past a dwarf huddled on the ground, his head hanging low.
According to the tag, the creature’s name was Tizquick. A conductor for the Mango line. A puddle of tears had formed underneath him. Hekla stepped over him as if he wasn’t there. Donut and I paused. I kneeled. I knew there was nothing I could do for him, but I felt compelled to acknowledge him, if just for a moment.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t know what you’re going through, but it has to be hard. It’ll be over in four days when the level collapses.” Only to start all over again for you, I didn’t add.
The dwarf looked at me, and it struck me, as it always did, at the life there in his eyes.
“She was never real, was she?” the dwarf asked, tears streaming down his dirt-colored face. They left rivulets of clean skin through the grime. “My little girl was never real. I just don’t understand.”
I put my hand on his shoulder, and I leaned in. “No, I suppose you don’t. And that really sucks.” I thought of Frank Q killing people so his daughter could have a chance. I thought of my own mother, and what she did. This is my birthday present to you. I am giving you a chance at life. I’m sorry it took me so long.
Both of them had failed miserably. But this guy had it even worse. He’d been tricked into believing something that just wasn’t real. He never even had the opportunity to screw it up.
Before this was done, people like him would kill people like me by the thousands. And people like me would cleave through his kind, wreaking even more damage. All the while the real culprits sat back and watched and laughed.
“One day, this pain you’re feeling right now will matter,” I said. The conductor looked up at me, eyes sparkling with confusion.
I straightened, and I left the man on the floor.
Hekla remained there at the edge of the portal. She’d watched the exchange.
“You are going to give yourself an ulcer,” she said. “Focus on what you can accomplish, not that which is beyond your control.”
I grinned. “How much do people normally have to pay for that advice?”
She just looked at me. “We need to hurry. The main horde of ghouls will be upon them soon, and they’re starting to see mobs suffering from the third stage.”