The balcony... 299, 298, 297, 296, 295, 294, 293, 292, 291, 290... I have a lit cigarette in my hand, I take a drag in, blowing the smoke slowly out into the pit. The man is still waving, I have a clearer look now, he is most definitely smiling, his face looks like a mask of a face on a misshapen head. Every wave feels mechanical, it doesn’t feel right, none of this feels right.

I step off the balcony, leaning over the pit, falling, trying to end this dream, the wind in my hair, the feeling of true flight fills me with joy, suddenly my arm is grabbed and I hear a “ALICE.” scream directly into my ear hole, its masked face in my face, my arm dislocating from the force of gravity.

I wake up in the bath, the boy still in my arms. The bath is completely stained, the culprit being the boy sitting on my lap, I pull the plug and the noise wakes him up.

“Hey… you sleep well?”

He nods, looking confused.

“You remember me? I’m Alice…” I stroke his hair, I can’t stop thinking about ways that this boy could protect me, it’s like I’ve been given a golden goose with a rocket launcher.

“Zee!”

“Yep, zee, want to get out?”

He doesn't respond and I lift him out of the bath, my clothes are ruined. He is still stained completely with blood.

“You need to shower zee, okay?” I get out of the bath and turn the hot water on, “just, remove your clothes.”

He shakes his head, “bad tv.” He points at the shower.

“No… good, good, up, shower is up.”

“Up?”

“Very up. And blood is down, the shower will make blood go… uh… bang…”

He nods and takes his clothes off, I make my way out and into the kitchen, hoping he won’t mess anything up in there. Parenting is easy.

I decide to cook some breakfast, I have green beans and… that’s it…

I also have leftover stale chips. I try to make them look presentable, but it looks more like an art piece on poverty than actual food. Placing it into a bowl I walk over to the bedroom to grab oversized clothes for the boy, I hear humming.

It’s a cute little tune, something a mother might hum to their kid… I just wonder who this is, how did they get to floor zero, and why did they go back up?

All questions I should ask him when the time is right. He steps out, turning the water off.

“Alice…” he almost whispers, I definitely wouldn’t had heard from the dining room, so he is lucky.

I walk up to the door “here, clothes.” I give him a shirt and underwear, the oversized shirt will probably reach his knees anyway and I couldn’t find any pants to fit him.

I drop them through the door, he continues to hum softly as he puts it on, walking out looking a lot cleaner. Almost innocent.

“I uh, made you some food… if you want?”

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He jumps up and runs into the kitchen, looking around, eventually spotting the plate and eating with both hands. He nods while spilling food on the floor.

“Up.” He says with his face full, chewing quickly and gulping it down way before he should. He finishes it in record time, 37 seconds, almost a world record.

“Oh… uh wow…”

“Good tv?” He points at the plate, I think he is confused.

“Uh… just say ‘good’”

He doesn’t get it. So I do a thumbs up, point at it, “good.”

Then do a thumbs down, “bad.”

“Good.” He points at the food. I nod and hug him softly.

“Thank you.”

“Thaaank… thank you. Good.” He says like he is trying on new shoes.

It is eerily similar to how those echoists learn to talk, but more innocent somehow. I guess this is just how children learn?

No matter, I feel super safe now, “do you want more good food?”

He nods, okay I think he is more understanding my tone than the words that I’m speaking. Urgh.

I step out into the hallway, it’s still all red and gross. He follows me as I take a left to the closest door. We walk into the same room and begin to loot, he picks up on it pretty fast and we build a sort of system.

He brings something to me, I either say ‘good’ or ‘bad.’ He uses this to find out what items we need. He is incredibly intuitive after our 5th door, bringing out items that seem rare and food.

I eventually want to double our production, I point to one door “Zee.”

Then I point to another, “Alice.”

He nods and goes into his door, I go into mine, and we both meet up and I do the whole ‘good’ and ‘bad’ thing with his items.

The day ends and I cook, we had an incredible haul of items, including a book, which is basically incoherent, story wise. It has functional sentences but doesn’t really connect in a way that makes a single bit of sense. It goes like ‘there is a box in the woods, but the wolf and the blue guy had grey skies and forgot who had the keys.’ And it goes on and on and on.

I gave it to Zee, hoping he can somehow learn something from it, like homework. He reads on the couch while I cook up some mystery meat and onion blocks, little centimetres of onion. Smells absolutely delicious.

I top it off with ketchup and we have a working meal, the ketchup also tasted like ketchup.

Oh, also, I checked out the rooms Zee spawned in when we split finding items, his rooms have a more nonsensical and confusing aspect to them, everything seemed bigger too, like how a child sees the world. So, I guess my theory about rooms generating depending on the person is correct.

I serve the food and make sure Zee eats with a fork this time, he doesn’t like it but listens to me now. The dining table is now set with nice napkins and glasses for water. This space almost feels normal until I realise the kid in front of me and kill me at any moment.

“Good.” He points at the dinner. I decide to teach him a new word.

I point at the dinner and say “food.”

He tilts his head and challenges me, pointing at it and saying “good.” Almost like he is angry.

I shake my head, I do a thumbs up, pointing at it, “good.” He nods, then point at the dinner, “food.” Then I point between them rapidly “good food.”

He smiles, and yells “good food!” Almost like it was a present he wanted for Christmas. I nod at his enthusiasm.

“Yes. Good food.”

“Good food, good food. Good good food.” He keeps saying, then points at me “good Alice.”

This makes me genuinely happy for a moment, like he had taken his first steps. I point at him “good Zee.”

He shakes his head, “bad Zee. Bad bad bad Zee. Down Zee.” And gives a thumbs down to press his opinions firmly.

I just give no reaction, back to being scared in his presence, “Uhm… it’s bed time… shower time okay?”

“Good shower.”

I smile and let him shower first, we had found shorts for him, and a smaller fitting shirt. He comes out all proud of himself then I go in, I’m still in my stained red clothes. After the shower we both crawl into the same bed, he keeps sniffing me. The body wash must be nice.

Eventually the white void outside goes black, and I can sleep. Goodnight.

299, 298, 297, 296, 295, 294, 293, 292, 291… he is still waving, I hate this now. It was interesting at first but now it’s just annoying. I sit down and wait for it to be over, tapping my finger on the glass table. Suddenly a normal human man sits beside me, no features, I can somehow tell it’s supposed to be Leo. It isn’t Leo but I can tell it’s in his image.

“The hungry revolt, kill a couple men, the revolters gain power, make people hungry. Who are the villains?” He says in Leo’s voice.

The faceless man looks directly at me, I think for a moment, “the… farmers for not supplying enough food? Or the government for not providing?”

He shakes his head “God.”

I wake up in the morning, another day begun.