Sudden changes are always a good thing. Well, if you want to be pedantic, I guess getting into a car accident is both a sudden change and a bad thing, but you know what I mean. It’s unhealthy to stay in one place for too long, you’ll start to wallow in sadness, or worse, you’ll become complacent in comfort.

I’m guilty of both.

After Valentines, I struggled to think of a goal. I couldn’t see into the future, past those dark clouds the Gator left in its wake. Worse still, the Given worlds… I need to refuse them. I need to find the strength of will to refuse things that make me happy, so that I can do what’s right, heroic.

I need to learn to be less self-centred.

I need to look outward and forward, the only way I can do that is if I interact with the titanic organisations of this world, I can’t waste my time with the Circuit Board, that’s what a street level vigilante would do. I need to get in over my head, like a real hero.

Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not going to join up with anybody, ever, I just need to understand who I’m going against.

It was a shock, one minute I was typing up the last post, then I noticed something about it, I don’t know what. A black expanse. It took me a few seconds longer than I’d like to admit, but I eventually jumped out of bed and out the window, much like I’d done on the first night of June. Something told me there was a change in the situation, my mind felt clearer.

The reason I was surprised, was because June wasn’t over. It was the 29th. I still have no clue as to the exact science to all of this, which I think there is, there must be. It doesn’t seem entirely restricted by the parameters of June, the month. It didn’t start at 00:00 June 1st, so it’s sufficed to say that it wouldn’t end at July 1st. As far as I know, and if the memory erasure thing Clover was talking about is true, as far as anybody knows, the supernatural places and Units that were affected by this event could have had anything done to them.

I was strangely calm as I bolted over to Clover’s, I guess you could call it a sort of ‘flow’ I’d finally gotten into. By this point I’ve encountered a ton of abnormal situations, and I’ve been given some time to readjust to my situation, all of the… things I’ve been through.

The only thing on my mind was figuring out what actually happened to Clover and everyone else, it’s a thought pattern I find myself falling into when I’m fighting a new enemy, which I guess this month qualified as. I take the information I have, break it down, and pick out the most likely conclusion. It’s strange, I’ll take a few seconds to think of what 253 + 456 is, but my mind races when I’m counting the limbs, eyes, and openings in a fight.

After I’ve got that sorted, built up a mental profile, I start to think about how best to break them. Overwhelm Feoli, out speed Tayanita, and make a couple plans in the heat of the moment. Use my surroundings to my advantage. You can see why it’s weird I can’t get anything better than a B in biology.

Yeah, a personal skill of mine is to think through these sorts of situations, but there is one scenario, one enemy I can’t seem to predict; I’m with her now.

As soon as I arrived at Clover’s house, my cool demeanour was shaking.

Her three-floor house was there now, but I found walking forward to be just as difficult, just as sluggish, as if the air had been thickened.

It was late at night, if I hadn’t taken a moment to scan the rematerialized structure, I probably wouldn’t have noticed the hole in the ceiling.

I regained my composure, and stomped over to the door, jiggling its handle a little. Locked, which is normal enough for this time of night. I starred up at the hole on the roof, stepping back a few paces to get a sense of where it was.

I was about to jump up, but reminded myself what I’d been practicing over the past few weeks. I paced over to the wall again, trying to get a grip on a part of the ground floor window, before realising that my shoes didn’t have enough traction.

I rolled my eyes at myself, this was taking too long.

I pulled them off, holding the pair in my mouth by their collar, half obscuring my view.

After getting stuck on a section on the second floor, I’d gotten up to the dart-board sized hole in the roof, it opened through the wooden beams, couldn’t see much past that. I kicked myself for never getting a flash light, that would have helped in a lot of situations. I was starting to slip, so out of fear of either my socks or the tiles losing their traction, I hopped down.

The attic was smaller than I expected, the 5-foot drop didn’t make much noise. As I landed, I wondered how and when that hole actually got there. I stumbled around, feeling the ground for some way down.

My fingers first passed over an object, I lifted it for a second raising it up to my only light source. I focused my eyes; it was shaped like a full-face mask with a disk on its head. I squinted harder at the eye holes, something about them taking my interest, something about how the stars shone clearly through them.

Huh, I thought, before returning to my search.

I found the attic door, like in most houses, in Ireland at least, it was a simple insulation panel. It was tricky getting it open with my wet gloves, so I just got the metal mask, and used the edge of it to pry it off. This drop was a little longer, some feet over 10. I landed in the third-floor bathroom, not the one I’d seen before, this one was more extravagant, it had a long window, letting the street light in.

The room was ‘L’ shaped, a shower in the corner, the sink and window overlooking it were on the long side of the room, with the toilet around the corner, not far from the hole I’d just dropped down.

The metal mask clanked after me. Freaking out a little, I crouched quickly, as if i were silencing it. Why was I being so nervous? What did I have to be afraid of? Clover? The other members of the Mountain? No, I think I was being hopeful, I had convinced myself that Clover would just be trying to sleep.

I tried not to think about it, she was alright, her house was, so she had to be.

But her house wasn’t alright. A chunk had been taken out of the roof.

I swatted the air for a pull-cord, finding it near the door. I winced as the room brightened, opening the door to let the light pass down the hall. I checked every room from there onwards, finding one spare, a hot press, and finally, her room.

I turned the hall light on, and crept inside.

She had a really big bed, that’s all I focused on when entering the room, the lump in the blanket. Two thoughts came to mind: There is a very real chance that this is someone, anything else, or nothing at all.

The second thought was, that this was very creepy of me.

I scooted across the floor, trying to minimise the squashing noise of my wet socks. Once I got to the head of the bed, I gently pulled the blanket away from the mass.

There, I saw a head of long black-brown hair. At first, I was short of breath then I leaned over the bed. She had the crown tattoo, but that’s not how I knew. Her eyes were a little worn out, just like Saoirse’s had been when I first met her. I would have been happy, if it weren’t for that.

Whatever she’s been through, whatever she’s done, this girl’s had it rough.

I left the room, closing the door over as I left. I leaned against a wall when I got out letting out a sigh. What was I thinking? I honestly don’t know what was on my mind in the time after that.

I searched the rest of the building for anything or anyone, nothing else surfaced. Well, I did notice that all of the food in the house seemed to be out-of-date, except for some weird type of fruit I found in a bag in one of the living rooms.

I thought about going out to get her breakfast, but didn’t. I wanted to stick around.

I took my phones out- that’s right, both the brick and the smart phone. I don’t usually keep both of them on me, but just in case Clover used either number to contact Sam or Shamrock. Usually, I’m more careful, I try not to bring any ties between my lives, that’s the whole reason I bought a new pair of shoes for my costume, why I try not to make the same faces across separate personas, hell, if I could change my body I would.

It’s honestly a miracle nobody has put two-and-two together. I’ve already decided that, when somebody finally does find out who I am, Sam’s the one I’ll ditch, I’m going to keep being Shamrock till I die.

I tried to go to sleep, but I’m not sure if I actually did. Regardless, I flirted with the idea of going to the bed upstairs, the spare bed, but was too lazy to get up.

First, I felt the twinge of the sun rise stabbing through the curtains. Then I heard a rattling from the room, I waited, I knew who it was, but she didn’t actually interact with me. Again, I was slightly confused, was she being cautious?

Wait, literally anything could have happened. What if she had her mind swapped, all of her memories erased? Maybe it’s a clone. God, I hope it’s not a clon-

As I was falling back into my analytic mind, I heard a guitar ring out, it reverberated through the entire room. It was like my body was being electrocuted.

“Oh, the old paintings on the tomb-” Cried the surround-sound, “-THEY DO THE SUN DANCE, DONCHA KNOW?” Joined Clover.

I looked up at her, frozen with shock. No amount of superhero stories could have prepared me for this. Prepared me for her.

She was doing a dance, at least that’s what I think you’d call these lacklustre movements.

It was at this part that I realised there was a theme.

Ancient Egypt.

Looking back on it, yeah, it is silly. This life-threatening event that had her shaking in her boots, was evocative of a themed party. You might even call it 'whimsical'.

Looking back now, I know that’s wrong. There’s no pleasure to be taken from it.

She was wearing a white sheath gown, with a jewelled collar.

She was very tan and smiling. But her eyes…

I spoke up, “Can you turn this down?”

She replied, “Walk like an Egyptian…” Her bangles clacked, as I got up and grabbed her phone from her.

She went a little feral, as I turned it down as low as possible.

“Come on! Where’s your sense of humour?? Why can’t you just be chill??” She was still dancing a little. I mentally questioned whether or not she was drunk.

“You have a hole in your roof. ” I said bluntly.

“But I’ve got a great tan, and a cracker outfit.” She tried to get the phone back off of me, I didn’t really resist.

“There’s rotten mush all over your kitchen.”

She shrugged cartoonishly, “I’m not hungry!”

She tried to compromise, turning it to about half the volume it had been before.

“You don’t think we should try and figure out what- what happened to you?”

She stopped for a second. “What happened to me?? Not including you??”

When I shook my head there was a glimmer in her eyes. I don’t know if it was a flash of life, or the swelling of tears.

She squealed and squeezed me, “Who’s the hero now, huh?? I saved you from danger, jackass.” That left me utterly shell shocked. She eventually let go, coming to a realisation, “So you were in the first worlder part?? What was that like??”

“Good. Nobody came hunting for my head for a while, no monsters.” Her smile faded a little, “Are you still…”

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

I thought about what she meant, “That trouble with Lech? No, no for me that was a month ago.” My phraseology got me thinking about the given worlds.

“I… Am awake.”

She laughed a little, “You’re really obsessed with americana, huh? I don’t blame you, it was a pretty good show. A few inaccuracies with the chemistry, but who cares”

I didn’t know what she was talking about, so I replied with a “huh?”

She laughed harder “Whatever! But, you know, what actually happened?? Like, what crazy shit happened??”

I thought about it for a second.

What did I do... Wasn't there something about the sky?

“No, everything seemed pretty normal. There weren’t any big news stories. I met up with that Fomorian girl, but that’s about it.” She gagged.

I made a face and she knew what I was thinking, “Oh come on, I’ve been around the block, those guys are serious creeps. They worship a Dark God. You don’t have to know what exactly that is, the name gives away their intentions. I think you know this, but they want to conquer this island, and not in the subtle way the Mountain’s doing it, the want to wage war on our blood.”

I tried to make an argument, “I don’t know, it seems counter intuitive to be prejudiced against a race because they’re supposedly prejudiced against you.”

She got a little mad, “They aren’t a race, they’re a creed. Just another organisation, serving a backwards purpose. And there’s a real difference between me, and- and Noah Thatcher, the skin-head, he’s actual fucked.”

I grinned and nodded, thinking of a way to mess with her, “Right, right, you’re not racist, you’re just a white girl working for the British empire, while appropriating African culture.”

Her eyes went wide, “A- a- I woke up like this! I can get permission from people from ancient Egypt, I can get a hold of them if you want.”

I asked “You mean Egypt? It’s just Egypt.” She looked at me confused, and huffed out her nose, “I know what I said.”

I waved my hands, “So what, immortals? Like vampires?”

That made her laugh a little more forcefully. “What are you seven?? Vampires aren’t real! God, that’s so dumb. No, to quote Ae, ‘Once you’re dead that’s it.’ You might leave a ghost behind, but that isn’t you, it might have your mind and soul, but it’s all jumbled and broken, both erode in the end. I don’t know the specifics, but there are, like, two Units in Egypt, I’ve never met either of them- I probably did if Egypt was the theme, actually… anyway, I can probably get into contact with them through the Mountain if I want.”

“Uh, shouldn’t you be getting into contact with the Mountain? Like Bastard, just to check they’re alright.” As I said his name, she smiled weirdly.

“He’s alright.”

A little after she said that, she changed the subject abruptly, “Why is my hair black?!?” She seemed to be asking herself more than me.

“Clover…” I tilted my head a little, “Can we please stay on the reality altering crisis?” She let out ‘tch’, before asking, “Can’t we just talk about something other than- this? We got out alright, and I’m going to be getting a phone call from the King soon, telling me about all the crap that went down-” She had paced over to a chair by this point, “The casualties.”

I felt bad for pushing the subject.

“Besides, I think it’s still late where the people I’m on good terms with are- well, where they’re supposed to be.”

I kept quiet, shifting around on the sofa I was sleeping on. Before I remembered something I was lying on.

“Hey, you said you never met the guys in Egypt, right? Does that mean you’ve never been?”

She examined her hair’s new length, “Yeah, I hear the pyramids are crap anyway.”

I pursed my lips dumbly, “Then why do you have this freaky mask?”

I lifted up the sand-coloured face of a woman, painted with a reflective blue around the eye holes and mouth, with a deeper blue for the disc above the face and for the hair. In the deep there were tiny specks of white.

She got up from her chair, grabbing out for it, “WOW! Where’d you find it??”

I pulled it away before she got it, “Below the hole in your roof? Little suspicious, isn’t it?” She pulled her hands back, “Hmm… Is it telling you to kill me?”

I was a little taken aback by the question, “What? No!”

She pulled one corner of her mouth up, “That’s exactly what somebody would say before they get corrupted by a possessed mask.”

I shook my head with a smile, “I think I’m ok.”

Not really seeing any issue with it, I raised the plate of metal I used to pry open a panel, and held it over my face.

“Oh No! I’m being possessed by a ghost!” I laughed.

Then I started to hear whispers.

“Oh shit.” I spoke.

“What a fool you are. You suspected danger, but still, you have willingly given yourself to me, Nut, vault of the heavens, goddess of the sky. I was once bound to the shackles of mortality, but thanks to my soul anchor, my will persists through the mortal world! Fear not, mongrel serf, I will not destroy your mind. I seek a more elegant form. Yes, you shall give me to your little friend there, she’ll need some work, but if I chose this house as the throne of my resurrection, then it must be with great reason! Hear my words, slave! Tell her that this is nothing but a valuable trinket, a toy for children, have her try me on as a joke! Yes, sell me your companion as a tool! You cannot refuse! My will bores into your very soul, none can resist such an attack!”

I took the mask away from my face. And told Clover, “Yep. It’s actually got a ghost in it.”

Maybe I imagined the mask crying out in confusion after I set it down on the coffee table.

“And how do you know that??”

I answered honestly, “Yeah, it tried this whole ‘will-break’ thing on me. Guess I got lucky, because it went for my soul.”

She was a little surprised, “You don’t have one?? Are you one of those mystic types after all?? Doesn’t really go with your ‘punch-a-problem’ attitude.”

I explained, “Ae hinted at it on Valentine’s Day, and I got some more evidence after I came out of Lechoslaw’s attack. Feoli said it left me with some kind of soul sickness.”

“Is that Lech’s ability?? He obliterates souls or something??”

“No, it’s- He makes illusions. Fake worlds. Stuff like your greatest desires. I guess you can get trapped in them.” It wasn’t a big lie.

I didn’t get into how he commissioned a God to become a universe to bend my will, it wasn’t necessary. He warned me, after all, not to go letting anything slip about his origin. And for some reason I felt compelled to obey. Not because I had any sympathy for him, but because I was slightly afraid of him.

“Well, what was it like??” I gulped as I thought back on her variants, then for some reason I thought about the Woman Wearing Shamrock. “I was fighting people. I’d rather not talk about it.”

She looked away, apologising, “Sorry… guess it’s better we talk about world events after all.”

I tried not to frown, it seemed like a more ‘Sam’ face to make.

“Here, I’ll loop back to what I was saying about the ‘ol Bastard, sort of related to what I was talking about earlier. We’ve got a year till next June, so I might as well fill you in on some of the deeper secrets.” She smiled, extending her four fingers, “There are four corners in the world-”

There was a knock at the door.

Clover’s smile faded. She blinked.

“Upstairs.”

I scratched an itchy spot on my face, turning to the door, “Shouldn’t I get it? It could be anyone.”

She spoke clearly, there was no trace of her mania, just a tired, serious look in her eyes, “Just listen to me for once, okay? There are only a few people who know I live here, all of them, except one know you’re my enemy. It might just be Tayanita or one of my boys, or Ae, or hell, maybe even Axel.”

She sped up, “But there is one person who almost always shows up after June. The one person who knows where I live, but not who you are. If you want to live, get your ass up those stairs.”

We walked to the stair case, she must have noticed that I wasn’t really concerned, she grabbed me by the arm as I went up a step.

“If he sees you, you will die.”

I thought about asking if she was being literal; she motioned me up the second floor.

I climbed up the stairs lazily, getting to the foot the second floor before stopping. One person?

I heard the sound of the curtain by the door open, the jangling of keys. Was it a friend of hers? From the Mountain?

I heard the door creak open, and I skid up the stairs. Around two corners and two floors from the individual at the door.

I listened out, unable to make out any words, just a masculine voice, and a feminine voice I recognised as Clover.

If he sees me, I’ll die?

That seemed like the power of a high-end Unit, to be able to kill another Unit just by knowing about them. I thought back on how I put that stupid mask on my face, despite the fact that it was clearly supernatural in nature. It was just a dumb call I made because I thought- I think I tricked myself into thinking that everything would be alright, because Clover was fine now.

I need to take this seriously, this isn’t a joke, it isn’t a whimsical adventure, there are hundreds if not thousands of people who would willingly kill me on sight if I come off as suspicious.

I heard Clover laughing downstairs. Maybe the man was laughing, I couldn’t tell, I had holed myself up in the bathroom.

I put my ear down to the ground, trying to hear anything from the stranger, but couldn’t understand what he was saying.

After they finished the laughing, the general excitement faded. The man was saying something slowly, like a drawn-out explanation. I could hear Clover going along with what he was saying, it was like he was trying to explain to her how to cook dinner or start up a washing machine, that's how natural he spoke.

There was a bit of silence before the man said something abruptly. Clover let out a sort of laugh after a while, before cautiously returning to the general air of when they started the original conversation. The man didn’t follow, he tried to reign her in, keeping a serious tone.

It was long, one-sided talk, before a short question from Clover followed by a solemn statement from the man.

Then there was an inquisitive tone in his voice. Clover mumbled something. The man asked another question, in a livelier tone, almost sounding like he was scolding her. Then I heard him moving around, and changed my posture to get off the floor at the first sign of foots steps climbing up the stairs.

The only sounds I heard were from another room, the kitchen, I think? Maybe a sound from the fridge? There was definitely the closing of doors or cupboards. I couldn’t hear them talking if they were. I got up from the floor and looked around the bathroom, thinking about leaving through the window.

What if he wasn’t alone? It would be even more suspicious if I left without making myself known. Was the best course of action just to get Clover to explain who I was? No, obviously that wouldn’t work. If he were to ask how we know each other, what is she going to tell him, that I’m the guy who’s cost the Mountain tens of thousands of Euros? The last group didn’t look too kindly on me for that.

If this was him… then he’s the one who sent Limorilow to find the cause of all the expenses, Me.

I slammed my ear down to the floor.

Something sounded different. The closing sounds were slower, and if I wasn’t mistaken there was another, almost rhythmic banging. No, not banging, it was louder, because it was nearer, getting closer. The pacing of feet.

I jumped up again, this time with no clear indication of which was which. It was a dumb move, closing myself into this room, not only did it further hinder how much I could hear, but it also meant I was trapped like a fox in a pen.

I span around to the windows thinking about jumping out. But what if he was passing by a window when I fall through? ‘If he saw me, I was dead’ right?

Shit.

...

The door to the bathroom opened without a squeak from the hinges. His slight hum was all that told me he had entered the room. He strode past the shower to the sink, twisting the tap on. I held my breath, and the wire stem coming from my mask.

I couldn’t see him. Just the tiles on the walls, held together by a centimetre of grout. That, and a sliver of the toilet.

Eventually I heard the water twist to a stop, and the ruffling of a towel.

I scratched at my nose trying to scoot away from the opening without making a sound. For once, I’m glad that Clover has all that drug money, it’s gotten her a house with few creaks in it. I prayed that the one in a million squeaky floor board wasn’t by my foot, or under my belly.

A clump of hair. As soon as I saw it, I nearly threw my body back. I didn’t, however. To stop myself from making a sharp noise, yes… But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to see him.

And this was him. I was sure of it. Something about him- he was unapproachable. It wasn’t his build, that was average. It wasn’t his clothes, he was wearing a slightly creased white shirt, his trousers a similar colour, a little more discoloured around the ankles, sandy.

His hair was blonde and shaggy, that was the only feature that stood out from the snapshot I saw of his back. When I say blonde, I think I mean yellow. It didn’t seem unnatural though. And when I say shaggy, I mean it was meant to look that way, styled. There was a slight dustiness about him, maybe that’s because of the events of June, but if anything, it made him seem greater, experienced but not aged.

This is the feeling I got from looking at the back of his head for a few seconds.

I heard him step in a bit of water I had dripped on the floor, thinking to himself out loud, “She’s left the roof space open too… No wonder it smells like wet socks…”

I don’t actually know much about British accents, but his was something similar to Daniel Radcliff’s voice. I don't know, I was just hyper focused on every edge of him.

He opened the cupboard beneath the sink, getting some cleaning supplies out from it, and wiping not only the puddle, but around the toilet as well.

The entire time I was damning myself for not taking the panel with me, for not finding some way to hold on to it while I scaled the flimsy wall. I bit my teeth, getting more and more irritated as he cleaned the room.

Suddenly he stopped, setting a bottle down.

“Huh…”

The short hum made me cold. It’s tone was suspicious, that made me shiver.

Then he left calling out for Clover.

I let out a sigh. I wouldn’t have, had I been able to stop myself. I hastened my crawl away.

In the now well-lit attic, I could see some junk in the corner, hunkering down in the smelly mess of boxes and old forgotten things.

There was always the chance that they’d come up here, but Clover told me to go upstairs, not out a window. I had a feeling that her word choice would lead to the most desirable outcome.

This man was the Mountain, he was the man with near one hundred Units under him. He probably has just as many enemies as friends. It was really, really unlikely that he was travelling alone.

I heard him drag something into the bathroom. He was talking to Clover. “I could phone somebody. We’ll-”

She cut him off finally saying what I was waiting for, “Bastard…”

He seemed to understand what she was talking about, “You're right. You're right. As much as I’d like to do something simple, we just don’t have that luxury do we? I’m sure it’s a mess out there, and it’s only going to get messier for us. Adam has probably made moves already, what with the destruction of one of his cities. I can’t see Russia involving themselves, unless I were to go to Egypt- or perhaps, I should simply say the 'eastern Libyan desert', or 'north Sudan'.”

They both went quiet. “It was bigger this time. It’s getting longer. That’s what the trends from previous years show,” he said, “Something needs to change. Or else people like me will keep destroying people who can’t protect themselves.”

She tried to laugh, “You don’t know that. There’s nothing to say that- that you’re to blame.”

He argued, “If I had paid more attention to regional conflicts- to have been there for something unfathomably horrible, and not stopping it when I am the most powerful man in the world… That makes me just as much to blame as whatever egotist tried to destroy the world this time.”

I heard the panel being pushed in, and felt a shock through my body. Not just from the sudden noise, but because I found myself empathising with him.

Through the muffling of the floor, I heard him say, “Don’t focus on it. Clover…” He paused before continuing, “-Sweetheart… June ended nine hours ago, you were asleep for eight… But your eyes are still red, you’re not hungry, and you were complaining of soreness.”

There was sadness in his voice.

“I don’t know what happened in June, but those are all common signs of grief.”

He apologised to her.

“Make a few phone calls. If you need me, I’ll-”

She argued, “No, I’ll be fine! Maybe I was just sad about Tayanita getting redeployed, whatever it is I can handle it on my own.”

He whispered something.

And they left.

I don’t know how long it was until Clover called me out.

I reopened the panel and jumped down, with little to no concern to the noise I was making.

It returned as soon as I looked around the room. I realised just how stupid I am. To think I was bragging to myself about how great I am at planning situations out.

At the corner of the ‘L’ shaped room, were my shoes, the shoes I had to take off because they lacked the traction necessary for me to scale the wall of the bathroom. They were sitting beside each other, perfectly parallel, at the point where Bastard had simply said 'huh'.

It wouldn’t take a genius to figure out that these were neither the type of shoes Clover would wear, nor the size.