Shaking, I am shaking. Not because it’s cold, well it is cold but that’s not the reason. I just don’t have control over my body right now. I must look like an idiot.
Leo and I had been walking for around 2 hours without a word said, I think he realised I needed time to process everything. But now I need distractions from my distractions.
“So… you and Jack… how long have you been dating…?”
“Oh, uh, we’re not. But we met around 5 years ago, he was still on his stupid mission to reach floor zero and I stopped him.” He slows down a bit to make sure we stay shoulder to shoulder.
“Floor zero?”
“That’s where people think you can escape, but it’s not worth it. You think that phone call was bad? You should see what this place throws at you floor 260 and below.”
Oh. But if I can’t die then I guess there’s no reason not to try, “but why not keep trying? You have eternity right?”
He sighs, “things below 260, sometimes even 270 aim not to kill you but trap and torture you. Because they are smart enough to know we respawn.”
“Oh.”
If that phone call was anything to go off, and if the floors get exponentially worse, I can’t imagine what floor 100 or 50 would be like. This reminds me of that Greek thing, Sisyphus. Instead of rolling that rock up that mountain our goal is to make it to floor zero. But every time we die we get sent back to the top, to restart.
These people just decided to setup a nice house at the foot of that mountain, not even willing to try.
We reach a point where everything seems burnt, “what happened here?”
“Don’t know, probably some person in the past tried to set fire to this place.”
The lights had turned from a bluish tint to a red tint, and the walls instead of green are now mint. The carpet was the main part that got burnt, that’s how I could tell, it has black spots where the carpet meets the hard wood floor.
“You ever try to dig down?”
“Yep, you fall into some void.” He takes a right turn and I see some red webbing, it pulsates.
“Relax, this floor doesn’t have many of those spiders because voice snatchers eat them all.” He cuts down the webs with his spear, it dissolves into the carpet. “Just don’t touch the webs, they act as leeches, sucking out your blood. It’s gnarly.”
We continue walking, the webs get more and more common. “Hey uh… why do you guys live so far away from any fresh doors?”
“Oh, it’s because that cabin door has the strongest interior, any voice snatcher can come into a room by knocking the door down, but the cabin door is stronger for some reason.”
I give up trying to make sense of anything, this guy is obviously a veteran, I must look like a toddler with all my useless questions. A toddler with an axe.
“And here we are, fresh doors. We will go through about 10, grabbing anything useful. You go right I go left.”
I just stand still, “we go into different rooms?”
“Rooms are safe, just avoid any media, you see a tv? Destroy it. A phone? Don’t pick up.” He walks into a room on the left. Leaving me all alone.
I don’t want to be useless, especially after I got saved by Jack and Leo having to deal with a mental breakdown. So I walk into the right room. It looks like any other apartment, all the windows that should show a nice view are just fully white.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
I walk over to the tv and smash it with my axe, breaking it. Job done. Making my way to the kitchen was easy, I checked all the cabinets and found some beans called ‘bean flavour nut’ which sounds incomprehensible.
I open the fridge and find some meat, but it’s like, a liquid meat in a bag, which doesn’t seem useful. I find some of what seems like spring onion. I put all these into a trash bag and move into the bathroom.
I find toothpaste, some pills called ‘grief pills’ with the side effects being ‘it’s so cold in summer.’ I put them in the bag.
Finally I move into the bedroom, finding a flashlight, one of those beauty masks and a small switch blade. Easy. So I just do that for every room? This isn’t so bad.
I walk out and Leo is standing beside my door waiting for me, “nice, just making sure you’re okay.”
It looks like he had already checked 4 rooms while I checked one, he uses his spear to mark my door. “Good luck, you’re doing fine.”
He walks into the 5th door on the left, his bag almost fully filled with items. I go to the second door and walk in, this time the lights are off, and the tv is already on.
I turn on the lights and slowly creep towards the living room, it’s playing a show, everything is dusty and has an awful awful smell. The tv is showing someone’s life, a man with a woman in a sort of sitcom, then there is a… corpse on the couch… okay nope.
I slowly stroll back outside and wait for Leo to arrive, a little after one minute he does and looks at me confused.
“There’s a dead guy in there.”
He walks over and into the room, from afar I can hear him say “oh, we found the guy who tried to burn this place down, cool.” Then walks back out, his face as cold as ever. He marks the door. “You got unlucky seeing that, he is still alive though… somewhere, you know that right?”
Alive… how could a corpse be alive? That doesn’t make any god damn sense. How can his corpse be there if he respawns?
Leo grabs my bag and walks into the 3rd right door, leaving me alone. All alone. I wait until he is done.
He puts the bag in my hand and walks fast, I try to keep up, “can you slow down?”
He looks back and puts his finger on his lips, telling me to shut up.
In my ear I hear it, “can you slow down.” Which causes every muscle in my body to stop, he nods softly and continues to move quickly, I follow.
For hours I’m convinced something is about to happen, some creature is going to come out and murder us, rip us apart and then feed us to some spiders. It allows me to stay high on adrenaline the entire time, making the walk back less boring.
Eventually we move into the cabin, he knocks three times and the door is opened, I ignore their bickering and move straight to the couch to sit down.
“What’s with her?” Jack asks beside me as he sits down, he smells like soap now.
“Don’t ask, leave her, come on, it’s bedtime.” He drags Jack away, I’m hungry, incredibly hungry.
Leo and Jack go into a room and I stay here, looking at the floor, at my feet, at my knees, at my dress. Every breath just seems to compound my worry, I’m here forever.
Eventually after who knows how long Jack comes out and starts organising the food we got, he cooks something and places it in front of me, I barely register what he says. I’m left with scrambled eggs and a fork.
I don’t want to go to sleep. If I wake back up and I’m still here, I don’t know what I’ll do.
“You okay?” Jack places a hand on my shoulder, grabbing my fork and taking a bite out of my food, “its rough out there, Leo told me you saw a human corpse. Don't worry the guy that corpse was in is still alive somewhere, so don't feel bad.”
He puts the fork near my mouth and i take a bite, it doesn’t taste of normal eggs, its somehow off and spicy, i still manage to chew it down.
“Leo told me to talk to you, uh, I don’t want to be the one to do this, but you need to step up okay? This isn’t a place you can shut down and do nothing in. You made him walk for longer than he should have instead of going down to floor 296 because you were scared. That really pissed me off.” He takes a bite from my eggs, chewing loudly.
“You need to gather food tomorrow, if you don't get your shit together and you make Leo take any more unnecessary risks, I will get rid of you.”
Get rid of me? Is he threatening to kill me? Even though its obvious he is, it doesn't feel nefarious somehow, does death really mean this little to him?
He places the plate on the table, “don't you ever fucking threaten him with an axe again.” He steps away into the bedroom, leaving me alone. All alone.
I mindlessly eat the rest of the eggs, the spice on my tongue hurting me in just the right way. I begin to lay sidewards, my body being the perfect uncomfortable length on the couch, my feet pushing into the arm rest but can’t rest above it.
A candle is lit on a stone table near an unused fireplace. How would a fireplace even work here?
I’ll go to sleep and wake up in my bed, this’ll all just be a bad dream, a very very bad dream. Something that will haunt me forever. A dream that’ll change my outlook on life. But still just a dream.
Goodnight.