“Well, that’s not promising.”

As we arrive at the entrance to Vaylin’s commandeered convention hall, we find someone else has beaten us there.

I poke and prod at the corpses of unfortunate puppets torn apart and left to rot. Glassy eyes stare past me while unmoving limbs point at nothing in particular. Were you a friend of Bashe? I ask the nearest carcass in my head. Did you feel pain? Or did Vaylin rip that out first?

The demon’s pets are the only victims I can see, and I don’t have the faintest clue how old the bodies are or in what manner they were killed. I’m intrigued by the mystery, but more than that I’m wary of what’s waiting for us deeper inside.

“I should really invest in some information gathering spells,” I mutter to Cheshire. “That is, unless you can tell me how these things ate dirt.”

Cheshire curtsies at me with a wink. “Your wish is my command, Master, and I’m always happy to be of service. Though, really, if you spend a bit of time practicing your sight you’ll be able to gather that intel yourself.”

“Ah, but then what would I use you for, pet?” I give her a scratch behind the ears as the changeling turns her mismatched eyes on the scattered bodies, the gold and blue glinting beautifully beneath the nighttime streetlamps.

Dante keeps a wide berth of the grisly scene, looking sick to his stomach already. “This is awful. Could this… could this have been done by Averrich? Before you killed him, I mean.” He says that so awkwardly, the reluctant hero. It pricks my skin, but I’m not going to make an issue of it right now.

“It’s possible,” I muse. “I had assumed his second key fragment came from the necromancer, but maybe he rushed the demon instead. He probably had the firepower to take her on, though I’d be surprised if he came away from that fight without heavy casualties.” I frown at the carnage before us. “No bolts or burns, though. The wolf could have done it, maybe, but why send her alone? Feels unlikely.”

“The timing’s wrong, too,” verifies Cheshire. “There’s violence soaking the air, and it’s fresh; the slaughter was recent. Very recent, at that: this happened after your throne duel.”

My frown deepens. “Which means the duel might have been the trigger, but we’re missing a culprit. The only remaining key holder not in our little alliance is Vaylin herself. It would be suicidally shortsighted for Esha to make a power grab when we’re already offering her a best outcome, unless she really doesn’t trust us to keep our end of things. A rogue Noble breaking the rules? A move by the Beast?”

Cheshire catches my eye. Though her lips don’t move, her voice whispers in my ear, “Perhaps Avaya is trying to sweeten the pot. If she offers Vaylin on a platter, we’re incentivized to offer her better terms in the new order we create. Or whatever it is she wants out of us.”

But could she really do all this by herself? And, if this is her doing… are we happy with this outcome? Dante still has one wish left in the chamber, and I was really hoping to make him burn that wish on Vaylin. We still might need to kill that boy.

Dante looks past us with an uncertain look on his face. “Alice, do we really need to go in there? Can’t we just report back to Esha?”

“Of course we’re going in!” I snap without thinking. I need to win. I need that power. I wince at my outburst and rub my forehead. “Think, Dante: if this is a new threat, we need to chase it down before it can come for the Myriad. If Vaylin’s still in there, we need her key to end the game. Do you think the Nobles will let us bunker down in the temple eating grapes? Do you think the Beast will be satisfied until her game is won? We kill or we die, or we watch everyone in this city be utterly devoured by powers that laugh at everything we’ve accomplished together. There’s no reality where we just walk away now when we are so, so close to the endgame.”

“Right. Yeah.” He falls quiet.

There’s a growing itch beneath my skin, and I can’t stop my gaze from flicking between all the gory details of this latest massacre. If this is Avaya’s doing and she’s waiting for us at the end of this path, is now the time? Is it all going down? I swallow nervously. Am I actually ready to kill Dante? I don’t know what to do. I… I need to win. I need to be powerful. But is murder and betrayal the only path to power?

And then Cheshire adds a wrinkle: “Master, I think they killed each other.”

“What?” I whirl on her. “Is this another Mourner or Reveler?”

She shakes her head. “No, not a trace of those. They just started butchering each other—and themselves. Some of these wounds are self-inflicted.”

A sense of dread starts to creep down my spine, but I keep it off my face and force some levity. “Ah, so just a brand-new brain-fucker to deal with. Well, I’ve gotten pretty good at dealing with mind-affecting bullshit, so if that’s their only trick then this next fight should be a cakewalk. Let’s go say hello to whoever did this, if they’re still inside, or take a closer look at their handiwork if not.”

The interior is much worse.

The corpses outside were ugly, sure, but there was no sign of sentiment behind their murder. The bodies and their parts were strewn apart haphazardly, without meaning or intent. Grisly murders, certainly, but just murder.

The corpses inside the structure paint a more visceral picture. Death is made an art form in blood and bone and excrement: a sculpture draped in entrails, a painting smeared with pulped eyes. A few bodies here and there are strung up by ribbon and largely whole, conquests of Vaylin’s from before this latest atrocity, but even many of those have been defaced in fresh and particular ways.

Flayed limbs line walkways, stripped of skin and bleeding in shallow pools. Eyeless faces watch from the walls. The stench of blood and offal is so thick in the air that I make the conscious effort to close my sense of smell and taste, and even Cheshire looks a bit disturbed by this charnel house.

Dante suffers the worst of us, of course. The poor boy actually shuts his eyes at one point and follows our footsteps, so horrified by the macabre display that he can’t bear to look at it. I help him out with verbal warnings and light nudges whenever he strays too close to a wall or to something he really wouldn’t want to step in. I don’t blame him for being nauseous.

The path we take is suspiciously linear. In each room of the complex—the interior clearly restructured by Vaylin’s servants to form a better fortress—every door but one has been damaged, boarded up, or blocked. That also might have been Vaylin’s work, I suppose, but it still feels like we’re being herded into a trap.

That graduates from suspicion to certainty when I see the final door.

A curtain of black ink separates us from a room marked in red stencil as Vaylin’s throne. The red carpet leading up to the portal is stained with black oil, and more of that oil is smeared on the walls and on the corpses lying to either side. I remember the last time I saw that toxic substance, and it chills me.

I feel black tar coating my brain, ink sluggish in my veins, black ichor dripping from porcelain seams. I try to scream but my lungs bloat with bile. I want to cry, and this I am allowed; black ichor drips down ashen cheeks.

The name of my captor sears itself into my mind like a burning brand: Nyarlathotep, the Lucid Demiurge.

“I can’t sense anything through that barrier,” Cheshire confides to me. “Do you want me to scout ahead on foot?”

“Hard veto,” I answer quickly. “We’ll use something more expendable. [Carrion Swarm].”

I send a batch of beetles scurrying through the ominous portal, but I lose contact with my spell the second they’re all across. A moment later, nine red butterflies come fluttering back through.

Okay, so we’re about to be face-to-face with the Toymaker herself. Lovely. Absolutely splendid. I hate everything about this.

I summon Vorpal to my hand and make three quick slashes at the curtain of ink. It parts for my sword like a scalpel sinking into flesh, but with an ugly slurping sound it pulls back together as soon as the blade isn’t touching.

“Nothing for it but to enter,” I say coldly. “Dante, we’re about to have a nice chat with that ‘Goddess’ who gave you your sword. I don’t know why she’s here, but we’re going to find out.”

Conflict tears across Dante’s face, but whatever he’s about to say is lost as I step through the portal with Cheshire right behind me. A moment later, he follows.

On the other side of the curtain is a tea party.

The room is dark, shadows seeping in the corners, lit by a multitude of candles colored in all the shades of the rainbow. The candles drift through the air, gently bobbing as they burn, and they drip wax without care for what passes below. Above them, dozens of corpses are bound up in red string and ribbon.

The table is long and its cloth is plain white. Five red chairs sit around the table, two to either length and one at the head, each plush and patterned with pink flowers. Only two of the chairs are occupied, and the other three are pushed out.

All manner of fine china have been scattered across the table. Large plates host colorful mush and exotic shapes like a child’s idea of dinner, while dainty teacups are chipped and cracked and overflowing with black tar.

Avaya’ari is tied to the nearest chair on the left side, her four arms wrapped in ribbon and her mouth stitched shut. The imp’s hooves have been tied together, her tail is tied in knots, and her wings have been stretched and stapled to the back of the chair. Her black sword rests on the table in front of her.

At the head of the table sits a figure I must assume to be Vaylin Kirinal, and she is clearly being possessed by the Demiurge.

Vaylin looks largely as I’ve seen her depicted by others: an azure-skinned woman with red body-stitching, curving horns, and heaps of golden jewelry. Her lips are black and her dress is lacy and white, and there’s something almost childish about the smug expression on her face.

But her eyes are different: the white dots are gone, now turned completely pitch, and ink drips from her tear ducts and from the corners of her mouth. Black veins trace across her face and down her arms, pulsating at irregular intervals.

The Demiurge smiles at me with Vaylin’s face, her presence unmistakable. Ghostly hands squeeze my heart, and it takes an effort of will to control my breathing even though I don’t need to breathe anymore.

“Alice! Dante! It’s so good to see you both.”

Vaylin’s voice is wicked and mocking as she claps at our arrival, puppeteered by the Crawling Chaos. Her movements are jerky and sharp, as if she really were held up by strings.

I approach the table with an unimpressed grimace that belies the nervous pounding of my rabbit heart and the seething malice in my veins. “Nyarlathotep. I can’t say the same. Why are you here?”

Dante steps up beside me, but something’s off about him: he’s looking around with an expression of wonder, not horror, and when he makes eye contact with Vaylin he gives an awkward bow. “Goddess. Your, um, Grace?”

Vaylin laughs and waves a hand in his direction. “No need for such formality, my brave knight. You’ve earned an earnest audience. Call me Albaoth or Gremory.”

I narrow my eyes at their exchange. “What are you showing him, Toymaker?”

Dante glances at me in confusion. “What do you mean?”

I keep my gaze locked on the demon puppet as I tell him, “Right now, I’m seeing another scene of horror. An eerie tea party, corpses on the ceiling, and Vaylin Kirinal with black tar dripping from her eyes and mouth.”

He blinks in surprise. “Wait, really? It looks like the star ocean to me, and the checkerboard tile. The bleeding doll is sitting on her throne, and the air is filled with golden lights.”

“None of that is real,” I warn him. “She’s deceiving you.”

The Demiurge clicks Vaylin’s tongue. “Tut tut, Alice. Even now you place no value in poor Dante’s perspective. I had hoped you could learn something from him, but it was always a naive hope. In the end, you heed the call of a darker path.”

The prickling beneath my skin sharpens and I freeze. What is she after? What game is she playing? “Don’t twist my words.”

“Who’s twisting?” she says with a smile. “We both know the truth. We both know what you think of him, and what you’re really after.”

My sense of danger spikes. “Why are you even here, Demiurge?”

Vaylin spreads her hands. “To give my chosen a warning, of course. I must give my champion the tools he needs to save this world.”

This isn’t right. Something is very wrong here. “How can you do that?” I press. “What rules have been broken that allow intervention? What scales are you balancing? If you can indiscriminately slaughter everyone out there and make a puppet out of Vaylin, what did you ever need us for?”

I spare a quick glance at Dante, hoping this will reach him. To my relief, he does furrow his brow and look askance at the demon—or to his eyes, the doll. “That’s a good point.”

The Demiurge laughs again. “Oh, that one’s easy to answer: Vaylin broke her word. Or should I say, her divine oath.”

“Wait, what? I thought those were inviolate.”

“Oh, they can be broken… but the consequences, as you’ve seen, are quite dire. Vaylin forswore her promise to Avaya, a promise made under Azathoth’s stars, and that opened the door for quite a bit more direct action than is otherwise allowed. Now all her strings are mine to pull, and her soul is right where it belongs… and it also means I can give you this freely.”

She holds out a hand and the glowing key fragment appears above her outstretched palm. It floats over to Dante and fades into him. Out of reach. Part of her plan.

I bite back bile and try to stay calm. “Dante, we need to be very careful. You can’t trust anything she says. Everything wrong with this world is her fault. She’s not a benevolent Goddess, she’s a cruel Demiurge.”

He looks at me with doubt in his eyes. “How are you so certain of that? What has she done beside help us?”

Vaylin sighs, and the Demiurge looks directly at me. “Don’t you think you’ve misled Dante enough, Alice?”

I bristle and spit at her, “I’ve done no such thing! You’re the one playing games!”

She turns back to the boy with the sword and tells him, “My warning is this, Dante: Maven Alice means you harm. She plots to murder you, seize the key, and attain the glass shard that she might corrupt it to serve her will without need of sacrifice. She has no intention of saving anyone in the Labyrinth, for all she has ever craved is power.”

The tension in my body is near to boiling, and it takes all my control to keep my voice from shaking as I plead with Dante, “Don’t listen to her, please. She’s trying to turn you against me. You know I’d never do that.”

He looks more confused than shocked or horrified, which is a mercy, but the Demiurge isn’t done. She adds, “Of course, I don’t make this accusation without proof. Please, look upon the scene yourself.”

Wait, what? Oh no. Before I can object, the world around us ripples and blurs, and then we’re looking at an all too familiar scene.

Avaya’ari leans against the safety rail, one hand patting the vacant Thirteen. “The Machinist is fallen, and the alliance dissolves. You know Averrich will strike soon, and I’m confident you’ll defeat him… but what happens next? Have you made your choice?”

I look out on the city from our elevated vantage point. A place of misery. A hollow ruin, hiding behind a lively facade. Most of the people here aren’t even people, and the only faction with an once of moral fiber is led by a liar keeping secrets from her own. Is this place really worth protecting? Is it worth giving up my ambitions?

No. I can’t allow myself to wallow in lower goals when the highest throne still beckons.

“I’m in. And I have a plan: when I eat Vaylin’s soul, I’ll burn it and whatever fuel you can spare to craft my own version of her domination spell. If I can make the spell strong enough, I might be able to dominate the shard directly, but more likely I’ll use my witch ability to turn it into an artifact that I can directly control. A stepping stone to binding the Demiurge herself and taking her throne.”

Avaya’s eyes twinkle. “A wonderful plan… but the Myriad won’t like it.”

I smile. “Who do you think I’ll be testing the spell on? If they’re so eager to give up their agency in service of a higher cause, I’ll happily oblige. Conquering their temple should give me all the resonances I need to forge the control artifact.”

“And the boy?”

I try not to show weakness in front of the imp, but a bit of hesitation creeps through. “There’s a chance I can maneuver Dante out of the way without risking conflict. The Demiurge gave him a wishblade, of all things, and I still need to burn through two of them before he’s vulnerable. But once they’re gone, it should be a simple matter to attack his soul directly and bypass his healing factor.”

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Avaya holds out a hand and lets her teeth show. “Then we have a pact.”

The vision fades.

I force outrage to my face and turn to Dante, but my words die in my throat. He’s looking at me with horror and betrayal, and I can see his eyes starting to glisten. This is bad.

“Dante, I—”

“Swear to me,” he rasps, voice raw and broken. “Please, Alice. If that was fake, swear it by the Weaver. Swear it wasn’t true.”

My options are being cut away from me like branches pruned from a tree. The Demiurge just demonstrated exactly what will happen if I make a false oath, so how do I make Dante listen to me? How do I get out of this?

Beside me, Cheshire whispers in my ear, “One chance. One strike.”

And yet, though her lips do not move, Dante’s eyes still widen in recognition.

What happens next is pure instinct and terror.

Vorpal, still resting comfortably in my hand since I stepped through the portal, lashes out. All the mastery I’ve stolen guides my aim to Dante’s chest, and my blade strikes true. The name of my heartsblood spell springs to my lips as I call upon all my power for a single decisive blow:

“[Feast or Famine]!”

And the blade bounces off a shimmering wall of golden light.

The barrier appears without warning—no spell uttered, no gesture made—and completely repels my attack. The force of the aborted strike travels down my arm and pains my flesh as the hungry shadows of my spell find no target yet still take agonizing bites out of my soul. The spell burns away, its cost paid but nothing recouped.

Dante looks just as surprised as I am, maybe more. He didn’t do this, not knowingly.

My hands are shaking as I tilt my head to look at Vaylin’s malevolent grin. “That’s not fair!” I hiss at the Demiurge. “You can’t do this to me! You can’t cheat like that! How many more devils will you drop from this machine? It’s not fair!”

Anguish crosses Dante’s face, but then it resolves into grim determination. He raises the wishblade. Only seconds left till the end. What do we have left?

I press my hand to the golden barrier and shout, “[Feast or Famine]! Come on!” The spell tears through my soul again, but the shield doesn’t even ripple. I scream and pound on it. Slam, slam, slam. No impact, no register.

It’s too late. It’s all too late.

“I wish,” he says, and the universe listens. He hesitates, and I keep scratching at the wall with futile frenzy. “I wish for Maven Alice… to go home.”

What?

No. No, no, no. “No!” I scream at him. The air shimmers around me, and phantom hands caress my form. I shudder with nausea and watch in helpless horror as everything starts to fade. Greater pain than ever before wracks my soul, and black-gold flame envelops me.

“I’m sorry,” that horrible traitor lies. “I hope… I hope you’ll get better, when you don’t have to be here.”

And then he’s gone, and so is the Labyrinth, and I’m lying in bed staring at the wall of my apartment.

I’m on Earth. It’s gone. It’s all gone now.

Cold washes over me in waves like I’m being buried in ice. I stare unblinking, unable to process what just happened. I can’t believe this. I refuse to believe it, this can’t be happening.

I push the covers off and stumble out of bed in nothing but my underwear. My skin is normal, my hair is dull, and when I grab the nearest mirror I stare into boring brown eyes. Flat teeth, no hint of true fangs. I’m exactly as I was before the Labyrinth.

“Feast or Famine,” I whisper, and no magic stirs to life. I focus on Vorpal and it doesn’t come to hand. I close my eyes and try to will my second sight to activate, but when I open my eyes again there’s no difference. All my magic is gone. All my power is gone. Everything is gone and I’m powerless and alone and I’m going to die here.

I fall onto my bed and stare at the plain white ceiling. This can’t be real. I’m the protagonist! The main character doesn’t get kicked out of their own story. That’s not supposed to happen, it can’t happen, I reject it!

But were you ever really that important? whispers a cold and treacherous voice in my mind. Or were they just delusions of grandeur? Maybe it was all a delusion, from the very start.

I laugh with contempt. Are you kidding? No, don’t even try that. I know what I experienced. I’m not crazy. Not like that, at least. I don’t have psychotic breaks, and I don’t hallucinate things! All of that was real.

But you’ll never be able to prove it.

The ice down my back gets colder. She’s right, isn’t she? I’m right, I mean. I’ll never be able to prove what I went through. They’d put me in a ward if I pressed it, and I don’t have a drop of evidence except my own memories, worthless as they are.

This has to be temporary. This is just the part of the story where the hero faces a temporary setback, a darkest hour kind of situation. It’s a drop, and a bad one, but things will get better. They have to. I have to win.

Why do you still think you’re the hero of this story? You tried to kill an innocent man, and he spared you with your worst nightmare. Right now, you look a whole lot more like the villain who just lost. Karma’s a real bitch, gobbet.

My fists clench. I’m not— I bite off my words. What room do I really have to argue with that? It’s the wrong battle, anyway. Fine. Yes, I’m the villain, but I’m still the villain protagonist here. There are too many threads left unresolved, too much weight that’s been placed on my actions, my relationships. If not me, then who? Dante? He doesn’t want to be there! He wasn’t even introduced until after I killed the local boogeyman and made contact with half the important players in the city. If anything—

A knock on the door shocks me out of my thoughts. I press myself against the wall and stare with wide eyes across my bedroom. Monsters flash to mind, and hunters with knives.

“Hey, you up yet? Didn’t you want to hit the cafe before work?”

The voice is completely alien and yet utterly familiar. A voice I recognize in memory, but it’s so strange to hear aloud. That’s the voice of my roommate. My roommate back on Earth, where I am now. Where I’m stuck.

Reality intrudes. Suddenly I feel awkward and self-conscious. What the hell do I say to him? I can’t exactly confide in him about anything to do with the Labyrinth, he’d think it was a joke and then call the cops when I didn’t laugh. God, I’m still half-naked, and now I have bits again. I’m disgusting again.

“I’m awake!” I shout back at him. “Just. Give me a few minutes.”

“Kay.” I hear footsteps retreating, and then I’m alone.

“What do I do now?” I whisper to myself, feeling small and helpless.

If this is temporary, if it’s just a momentary low point in the narrative before I’m returned to where I belong, then… what do I do?

Should I go looking for doorways in the woods, or click suspicious links online? Do I apply to test a VRMMO, or throw myself before a delivery truck? Or am I just supposed to wait until called? Katoptris abducted me once, so shouldn’t it happen again?

Or has the window already passed? Has the wish returned me to the moment exactly after I was due to be taken, and now it won’t ever occur? Has a timeline been altered, or does time flow differently between the Spheres?

I can’t be stuck here. It’s not possible. But…

I still have to eat, and I need a roof to sleep under. I have to pretend that this is my life, if I don’t know when I’ll go back. Will it be days? Weeks? Years?

The chill in my blood is eating me alive. I’m Alice, right? And in the books, in the original story, Alice gets her second visit not long after the first. But in the adaptations, in the inspired works, it can take anywhere from months to decades for little Alice to be called back to Wonderland. It’s often tied to the shift from childhood to maturity, but I’m already an adult, so when’s my time?

How long do I have to pretend that I want to live in this horrible, worthless world?

What if it’s forever?

It won’t be! I can’t stay here. This can’t become my life again, that isn’t my story.

Or maybe, this whole time, you’ve had the genre all wrong.

My hands are trembling. My breathing is too fast. This can’t be happening. This isn’t happening. I’m not stuck here. This isn’t forever! I’ll find my way back, I have to. I’m Alice. I’m Alice! I’m Alice, and I am going back to Wonderland!

Wake up, Miss Liddell. Reality is knocking on your door.

Five minutes later, I’m dressed and ready to go in jeans and a Chainsaw Man shirt, cloaked by a red jacket. I grab a mask, too, because oh yeah, there’s a pandemic back on Earth. Lovely.

There’s something so disquieting about the banal task of preparing for work. For a job that I’d actually managed to forget about. This isn’t what I’m supposed to be doing, but I don’t really have a choice if I want to eat real food for however long it takes to go home. To go back to the Labyrinth, where I’m meant to be.

The people who pass us on the street and drive by in cars aren’t figments, and as we walk through town the geography changes slowly and organically, no scene transitions here. There’s a sun in the sky, and clouds, and regular weather. It’s the normal world. The real world. It all feels wrong.

I’m too quiet on the walk, and my roommate notices, but I just can’t pay attention to whatever ordinary nonsense he’s trying to engage me with. At a certain point he gives me a funny look and asks, “What’s up with you today, Morgan?”

Morgan? The name hits me with a jolt of surprise. That’s my name, or it was, but I sold it to a fae. I shouldn’t be able to hear it, shouldn’t be able to remember it. Every time I tried in the Labyrinth, it came back as white noise. But now it’s like it never happened.

Like none of it happened.

I shake away my errant thoughts and try to bullshit an answer. “Distracted. Just off my game. Weird dreams, nothing that would make sense.” Even giving that pithy answer makes me instinctively tense up and want to insist that it wasn’t a dream, it was real, it had to have been real. Right?

I try to put more energy into the flow of conversation, and that seems to appease him. We banter about shows and games and whatever’s recent, and I mostly keep up. Any slips can be easily excused, even if I’m clearly still unwell.

But the closer I get to the start of my shift at work, the more numb I feel. It’s only been a few weeks since I must have worked last—no, less than that, I think—but it feels like a lifetime. Am I really doing this? Am I going into the dull torture of retail after fighting monsters and talking back to gods?

What choice do you have? This is your new normal, same as the old normal.

So I put on my work shirt and go in.

The minutes pass by like hours and the hours disappear. One moment I’m trapped in agony, and then I blink and I’m somewhere else. It’s a horrible blur.

My speech is awkward and stilted. I’ve forgotten how to talk to customers and all the little questions we’re supposed to ask. I forget how to answer the phone, how to stock shelves, how to make tags. It’s like I’ve never worked this job a day in my life. My every moment is hesitant, distracted, slow.

People get angry at me, but even that doesn’t break through the film over my thoughts. Everything they say, rude or polite, only deepens the all-consuming gloom. I feel like I’m drowning, or I’ve already drowned. When management pulls me aside after the fourth or fifth mistake, I stare past them. When they tell me to go home early for the day, I tell them, “Okay,” in a voice devoid of emotion.

Walking home is a mistake, because it leaves me alone with my thoughts.

We’re going to die here.

We can’t die yet. Our story isn’t done.

Are you so sure it was real? We’ve always thought about delusion, about going crazy. Maybe it’s finally happened. Do you really trust your own perception? Your own memories? Do you trust yourself? Doesn’t that whole protagonist story seem a little too good to be true?

It was real. It has to be real. It was real, and magic is real, and I’m going back to the magic. I’m not dying here. It was too vivid to be fake! The pain was real, I know that for certain. Experiences like those can’t be fake, they’re way too detailed. That’s not what psychosis feels like, it can’t be. I’d know if I was crazy!

Say what you really mean: you want it to be real.

Of course I do! Why would I want this world? Why would I want to stay here?

Then, if it were a delusion… would you still choose it?

My train of thought comes crashing to a stop. Would I choose that world, even if it were fake? Between a fulfilling fantasy and an unfulfilling reality, would I choose the former? Would I forsake the real to live in a dream?

I know the answer. It isn’t even hard.

It’s funny: my time in the Labyrinth was so much suffering and hardship, but now I miss it desperately. I want to go back to the world where everything wants to kill me and the divine ruler of the universe makes a game out of my existence. All for power. For magic. For the fantasy that I actually matter.

Am I really that pathetic?

You know that answer, too.

I can’t live like this. I can’t do this.

And I know that makes me weak, but I don’t care anymore. One day is enough. I’ve had a taste of freedom and I can’t turn my back on it, no matter the cost of returning. I’ll toil beneath the Demiurge’s wicked tastes for a thousand years if it means I get to live that thousand with real magic, real power, and real meaning.

I can’t make it through months and years pretending I care what customers and managers think of me. I can’t smile at the world around me when all I am is a frail and filthy human. I can’t stay sane knowing that all I’ve ever wanted is just out of reach, separated by an impenetrable veil.

When I was a little girl, I dreamed of worlds whose wondrous sights would never grace my putrid eyes, and I seethed at the injustice of the denial of my desires.

In the safety of my bedroom I whisper, “You win. You win, okay? You made your point. So you can end this and bring me back.” My breath hitches and I beg, “Please, bring me back. Please, Demiurge, bring me back.”

For the first time since I was a child, I fall to my knees and pray. “Azathoth, Nyarlathotep, Katoptris; Dreamer, Dreamweaver, Nightmare; I beg of you, please. If you will only answer, I will listen. If you will only extend a hand, I will grasp it. If you will only bargain, then I will sell you my soul and all I am. Give me the magic I need and tear me away from this cruel little world, and if you do then I will do anything you ask to repay that debt.”

The ice has melted and my limbs feel like they’re shattering from tension and weakness. My eyes are growing wet, and all I hear is silence. You see? It’s all delusion. No one is going to answer. You whisper at nothing.

With shaking hands I clutch a pillow to my chest, my teary eyes clenched shut, and with trembling lips I plead, “Free me of this wretched flesh and I will be your slave.”

But no voice whispers back to grant my desperate wish.

The minutes tick by, the voice in my head my only companion. Outside, through the window blinds, the sun has almost set.

A parasite of doubt worms its way into my heart. What if it really wasn’t real? Is that even possible? What would that even mean?

It’s impossible. It has to be impossible. Because if it were some freak delusion, then… what would that make me? With tight chest and salty cheeks I rise to my feet and grab a coat. I need to walk. I need to think.

By every measure of the world I see around me, I wasn’t gone for even a single day. This world has no understanding of that other world, no hint of its existence. And if I really think about it, does that world seem coherent? Does it seem real?

Gods pulled from Lovecraft and a skim understanding of philosophy, a magic system that’s a transparent metaphor for interpreting literature, and all my biggest fantasies filtered through my own self-loathing. A setting with hints of depth never explored, like the vaguest smearing of verisimilitude to satisfy a mind more interested in growing more powerful than actually learning about any foreign cultures.

But it has to be real. It has to be real, because I need it to be real. I need magic. I need to be special. I need to go back, whatever it takes, even if it is a delusion, because nothing in this world means anything to me, and it never has.

I know that makes me weak. Seven billion human beings cope with their reality every day, knowing magic is beyond them, and they don’t feel like this. They don’t despair for such stupid, petty reasons. They don’t need to feel special to want to breathe. But I’m not like them.

If I can’t be special, then I’m better off dead.

The night air greets me on the rooftop patio of my apartment complex. My feet took me here on autopilot, a path ingrained by hundreds of visits. I go here so often, whenever I need to think. Whenever I get like this. I look out over the edge to the ground below.

It’s true, you know. You’ve always known it: things would be better if you were dead. Better for you, better for everyone. But you’ve never had the courage. Well, now’s your chance. What’s still holding you back?

I know this voice. I know these thoughts. So many times, at this very ledge. I know what I’m supposed to argue: that people would miss me, that things will get better, that it’s a “permanent solution to a temporary problem.” I hate that phrase so much. Who gets to decide that my problems are only temporary? I still say the words, like I’ve been taught. But they feel hollow and thin.

It’s different this time. We’ve had this conversation so many times before, but never like this. Be honest with yourself, Morgan: you don’t care if people miss you, because you wouldn’t miss them. Heartless. Sociopath. Monster. And besides, you know they’ll get over you. Everyone always does.

And getting better? There’s no better for you. Not before, but especially not now. Your “better” was impossible when you were just a jaded dreamer. Now it’ll eat you alive. Every day for the rest of your life you will yearn for an adventure you won’t get to go on. You will lose jobs and friendships until you find yourself starving and alone, and on that day I won’t be there to help you.

So take the step. Don’t choose to suffer.

I sway high above the world below, fear of heights warring with the call of the void.

If your dream world really does exist, if it’s out there waiting for you, then what’s the harm? If the Demiurge isn’t a delusion, then she’ll notice when you die. Your soul would belong to her, would have always belonged to her. Let go this fragile shell and you can see your Goddess again, and when your ghost is kneeling at her feet then perhaps she’ll grant you mercy. Make your plea again, swear to be her slave, and she’ll reward you like she did Cheshire. It’s a choice you begged for just moments ago.

But, if it wasn’t real, and your little adventure in Wonderland was one big delusion… then what’s left for you here anyway? What point is there in living, now that you’ve tasted what you’ll never have? What can be gained from a life of empty, meaningless suffering? Don’t you deserve to let the pain go? Don’t you deserve a bit of peace?

“But I’m afraid,” I whisper. The night sky. The chill wind. The ground below. One step.

I know you are, but it’s okay. It’s going to be okay, I promise. Just one little step and all the pain will go away. No more fear. No more doubt. Break the wheel of suffering and let it all go. I love you. You know I love you, right? I love you so much, and I just want you to be happy. So trust me. Trust me and take the step.

For what feels like an eternity, I lift my foot… but to step back, not forward. “I can’t do it,” I cry. “I’m sorry.

Shhh, it’s okay. I understand. You’re still too weak, but I still love you anyway. I will always love you. Are you still in pain?

“Yes,” I say softly.

It’ll come back, but there’s a way to make it go away for tonight. Do you remember what to do?

“Yes,” again.

I love you.

I go back to my apartment, strip naked, and peel a new scalpel from its packaging.

The first few incisions are delicate and overly careful, my hand out of practice. But with each fresh mark I remember the intricacies of the blade and of my skin and how to make them sing in harmony. I am careful and precise, my every stroke measured and exact.

Never the inner thighs, nor the armpits, and certainly not my wrists or ankles. Never too deep, no hint of white-yellow fat, just a safe and comfortable red. In this I know my limits better than I know anything.

In all the rest of my life, my relationship with my body is one of hatred, disgust, or willful ignorance. But here, it can be a canvas. This is art, not mutilation. Recreation, not punishment. There is a relief in it that approaches rapture.

My confidence grows as endorphins are released, my body’s chemistry reacting to the satiation of my addiction—an addiction, yes, this I admit, but is that so wrong if it’s something I need? If the alternative is the ledge I’ve just walked down from?

By the two dozen mark, my tensions are easing. By two hundred, I’m smiling for the first time since I was banished. When I beat my old record, I finally set down the knife and give myself a hug. The blood on my skin is so beautiful, and I can’t help but trace my fingers over little bubbles of red. Now for the best part.

I step into the shower and raise the heat as high as it can go, and when the water hits me I melt. The cuts didn’t hurt when I made them—they never do, unless I make a mistake—but when hot water blasts hundreds of open wounds—even small and shallow, surface-deep—it’s like being boiled alive. It’s magical.

My mind goes white, all possibility of conscious thought completely obliterated by an ocean of pain that I’m happily drowning in. Sensation overwhelms me, agony transmuted to pleasure like a stack overflow.

I stop the water and stumble out of the shower when I can’t take any more. I towel off, but I don’t bother dressing before I fall into bed. The blankets are so soft on my naked body, and so soothing and pleasurable to my overstimulated skin. This moment, right here, is bliss.

That bliss carries me down to sleep, and in my dreams I see the Labyrinth.