I walk through a series of empty rooms. Everything is solid black bordered by pure white to outline things. I am leading a creature of similar black to the environment. Said creature is a spider with too many legs and teeth. It's base body shape hidden by its colour and flailing limbs

Every time we enter a new room I give a present to the Spider, not out of necessity but because I feel sorry for it. The presents I give are an assortment of random mundane things like a pack of cards or some wire.

After getting to the final room our journey together ends. Inside is another person and the spider kills them for the entertainment of the masses. No one is visibly watching but I can always feel their eyes whenever I enter this room.

I close my eyes to get a feel for where I am, seeing in my mind's eye a map. The hallways are constantly shifting around to provide a faster route to wherever we need to go. The colours represent others that are traveling the rooms. Their destinations are a mystery and worthless to me.

[https://i.imgur.com/wtBkerC.png]

I don't want to keep leading this spider to reap the lives of others and unfortunately this is tradition that I can't change without backlash or punishment. I get the instinct that we are needed elsewhere, the rooms shifting to provide an easier path. I call the Spider and I walk in the opposite direction of where I'm supposed to be.

A memory plays in my mind of me at a table in a chair, on the table is a lone keyboard. Surrounding me, shallow water makes up the floor of this place, the walls are too far away to see them. I tap a key and a piano note plays. I keep playing until I finish the Mirers song.

…

We enter another room, a main one much bigger than the rooms that connect and move between themselves. This is a shopping centre with two levels, the shops above ground level are connected by a walkway and railing. The place gives off liminal space.

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No one is here since no one is allowed in these main rooms ever. Everyone should be moving to and from their tasks.

The Spider That Follows has taken a different shape and form, modeled after a picture it saw, a small girl. The Spider cant fully hide its extra mass though so it pushes it to its back. It looks like it's constantly being trailed by a hundred centipedes flowing out of its spine.

We played around for a bit before taking a rest at a table next to a food shop. I go up to the shop front and order two burgers and chips from the person behind the counter. I find it odd that someone is here at all but don't think too much about it.

The burgers are massively over proportioned with way too many patties and other fillings, like someone made a burger from the description of someone else that got their description from someone else that got their description from an image of a burger.

Finishing up eating I look at and ponder the Spider in the chair opposite me. Just as I wonder if I could be a spider in a fake world, the floor starts shaking and the world starts collapsing.

This change was not due to my thoughts or really anything from us but another creature. They proclaim themselves a queen and that I should be following her. I decided I shouldn't follow her and run away with the Spider.

The queen roars in anger explaining that no one should be ahead of her. The Spider with me slows down slightly before morphing into a beast designed to kill. The Spider didn't decide to do this on its own but from the forceful influence of the chasing queen.

The Spider joins the ranks of other foul creatures that follow the queen and start chasing me along with them, each of their steps leaving a thick black liquid to stain the floor.

I keep running, in the distance I hear the ticking of a clock and run towards it, everything except for me and the creature chasing me falls away into a void. I am unable to see anything but myself and the creatures, each of my steps sending out ripples of molten glass.

The chase continues for so long. So long that I would die of old age before the chase stops. But I don't age. Ever so slowly the number of creatures dwindles and they merge into the thick bog that trails them until only one is left.

Every creature chasing me including the queen dies off, never able to catch me. Seeing ripples in the stain of black that is left from their bodies and corpses I edge my way forward to the edge.

Inside the bog, a child's hand reaches out. I reach in and grasp the hand pulling the Spider out to rejoin me and resume our travels.