Sister Salt’s eyes closed, and her breathing evened, and Zoe — spinning — made ready to go. As far as Zoe knew, the Sister would survive, but the revelation of her experiencing each iteration of [Fools Rush In] still shook her. It was hard enough for Zoe to go through the burning of time, she couldn’t imagine what it was like without the benefit of reset flesh. Sure, she carried the ephemeral memory, but her skin, and the whorls of her brain, all remained intact. She would do what she could to ensure the woman did not suffer. If she could find enough non-electric equipment and some decent painkillers, she could perform a skin graft. The system would help with the healing, though… the system had been the one to do this to her.
It made her wonder, what other abnormal powers and situations had already emerged across the transformed face of the planet? But with the Sister resting, it was time for Zoe to go. She had only 90 minutes until the Gambler called her to his game, and she wanted to find the polyp and rid herself of Rue’s burdensome quest.
But as she stepped away, a tiny hand grabbed her wrist, frail, she felt the bones through the grip, as though a bleached crow perched upon her arm.
She turned and caught Sister Salt's stare. Some spark of clarity passed across her washed-out eyes. Zoe felt her bedside manner returning, though it had been a long time since she treated a patient like this.
“What is it?” Zoe asked, gentler than she thought the words would come from her scarred lips.
“There is a child,” the Sister said, her eyes already unfocusing. “He is too young for this. The others fear him, want to kill him… I tried to help him, but when I got sick…”
Zoe felt another burden being placed upon her shoulders, and she hated a small part of her wished she already left the room.
“Go on,” she said despite wanting to leave. “Tell me.”
“The child burns. Fire in his soul. Find him on the edge of town, where it hangs into the void, but save him. Save them all.”
The bony grasp slipped away and fell onto the bed as light as a feather. Zoe walked away, quietly, pondering the words imparted. There was no quest, no system notification, but it felt important. As she made her way to the door, she noticed a faint outline on the dark skin of her arm. A white handprint, dusted in salt.
###
Anton and Jack met her on the other side of the door. There was no sign of Sister Salt’s advisors.
“Where did they go?” Zoe asked.
“About that,” Jack said sheepishly. “We let them go.”
“You let them go,” Anton corrected. “I was ready to deal with the rats on the ship.”
Zoe cocked an eyebrow.
“And what does that mean?”
“He wanted to kill them!”
“Better than let them go free to stir up trouble,” Anton said coldly, before turning to Zoe. “I eavesdropped by the way — harder for me to ignore than to hear at this point — and I know she was the figurehead, but that doesn’t change what these people did.”
“No, it doesn’t.”
“So, what’s your plan?”
“Time is ticking down before the Gambler calls us.”
“Just over an hour,” Anton confirmed.
Jack looked sick.
“It’s not too late for me to back out of your party is it?”
“If that’s what you want…” Zoe said. “But I don’t know if you could convince the Gambler.”
The silence that followed was like a coin sinking into a wishing well.
“Right,” Anton clapped his hands together. “One hour. What do we do, boss?”
“Let’s go speak with the polyp.”
“You’ll have to deal with those rats at some point. Sooner, rather than later. You know that, right?”
Zoe nodded, words she wasn’t sure she wanted to say stiffening her jaw. What was the right answer? These people had killed — sacrificed — other humans. She had killed Roman and the others, but they had attacked her first. Even in the name of justice, she wasn’t sure if she could kill in cold blood.
Anton seemed to read her mind.
“We’ll talk on the walk,” he said. “But let’s get moving.”
They headed down the stairs and out of the building. Jack hung back to give them space, but Zoe called him forward.
She wished Bella was here for her opposing view to Anton’s, but since she didn’t know if she would ever — no, she would see her again — but for now, Jack would have to do.
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“I need as many opinions as possible, and I trust you.”
They strolled around the block. Zoe’s steps dragging, as though afraid to confront what lay ahead. Anton’s eyes raced around the corner, surveying the garden where the polyp rested. He let out a low whistle at what he saw but said nothing to preserve the mystique.
The yellow sky flowed soft as butter through shadows the deepest brown. Zoe decided to ask, as one lost person to another.
“Is it right for me to kill the people in charge here?”
Anton barked out a laugh.
“Is that all? Of course, you should. They’re betraying humanity, and they’ll do it again if you let them live.”
Zoe frowned, but couldn’t see anything wrong with his logic. Unless killing, on its own, was bad. She wanted to think it was — she knew it was — but it was such a neat solution for the problem.
Especially since she knew she could do it without repercussion.
She noticed Jack chewing his lip. He was cute when deep in thought, as though his features weren’t supposed to do that.
“What do you think?” she asked him.
She felt as though she were on the edge of a fence, and she did not know which way she would tip.
He looked at her and then across the road at a group of people methodically stripping an imported furniture store of its contents. Their faces drawn, eyes darted about, and they hurried like mice scampering under an open sky.
“I think you should only kill for a good reason. This is disgusting, I know, but when I served the demon. It felt — holy — to kill in its name. The feeling that welled up inside me, I think it made the killing bearable, no, palatable. It made us hunger for it,” he paused, surprised by his own words. “I can only imagine killing if it felt that right. To kill someone and feel that, they must have done something very wrong.”
“Is that why you let them get away?”
He looked at her.
“I don’t want to feel that way again. Not about a person.”
“Sounds like Jack agrees with me,” Anton said. “It’s alright to kill someone if you have a good reason,” and his voice grew serious. “Zoe. You are taking over enemy territory and you have to clear out resistance. These two are resistance, and they are the reason you took over the territory.”
Zoe shook her head.
“The reason I came here is up ahead. Taking over this town is just… a side effect.”
They walked in silence for the short walk to the gardens, where the polyp waited.
###
Zoe walked through the garden with a sense of wonder that made her footsteps light. The surrounding plants grew lush and vibrant. Broad leafs hung over the path, glowing as they reflected the swirling lights in the sky. Not a drop of snow fell, and the warmth flowed up from the ground.
[You have entered Safe Zone Gamma 67712!]
The heat became near sweltering as they followed the winding path. Thick beds of flowers dripped syrupy pollen from above their heads. Fat bees bumbled through the heady air.
Zoe fingers trailed out to brush the stems as she passed. The smell of loam and life filled her nostrils. She closed her eyes, and the forest crept around her with the comfort of a church.
They turned a bend in the tall plants, and the polyp loomed above them. A golden head, craggy in its bulk, rested its golden chin on a golden fist. Eyes like bloody coals with their ruby light glinting hard and true. Zoe’s breath caught in her throat.
She couldn’t believe she was about to complete her quest. The first quest she received. The heaviest quest, with the lives of those she cared about weighing over her. She had lived with this dread since her first meeting with Rue.
Since that first day of the apocalypse when her life went from bad to worse.
And it was about to end.
When did she stop walking? Tears dripped hot down her cheeks. Anton and Jack walked ahead of her, not yet turning around. She wiped at her eyes with her sleeve, and the microscale black dress gently cut at her skin. Her hand came away, thin streaks of blood across her mirrored hands.
When did she activate her technique? The mirror fluttered away as a moth wing brushed upon her heart.
A hand rested on her shoulder.
“Come on, boss,” Anton said. “Let’s get this over with.”
Zoe nodded, Vitality buzzed across her face as the slices closed and her tears dried.
“Let’s go.”
###
The polyp greeted them in the center of the garden. Though it did not move, though it did not speak, it greeted them. Thought resounded in the area upon that circle of baked loam. Heat flooded from the golden body to combat the ethereal winter coating the floating island.
It stood three stories tall like some ancient living statue and it beckoned — without moving — without speaking — by saturating the area with thought. A touch of song and heat brushed against Zoe’s mind and blew her ever closer to the golden giant.
But the heat only survived in this little area.
A safe zone so small she could leap from end to end without burning her Skein. Was this another cruelty of the Crimson Armada? That the safe zone was insignificant? Another lesson?
Somehow, she suspected not. This place — this nameless place — was a town in shape only. These people clung to the buildings like rats on driftwood.
That couldn’t be the only way.
She walked across the dirt toward the polyp with its burning eyes. Cracks in the soil spilled out moss, as though the polyp were a font of life. Heat burned as mirror flushed her skin.
[The Self Reflects the World]
The polyp’s eyes flared.
[No]
And the voice tugged at her like a child tugging at her mother’s arm as she left for work.
[Do not come to me in your armor]
She shuddered, stepped closer, and the heat flared like an angry forge. Her technique fell away without conscious thought. No room for thought as a song stirred up in her mind. The song of a mind reaching out to the system, like an eddy, like a gale passing through a cavern of crystal flutes, and each note plucked at the Skein running through her until she resonated, and was, string by string, unmade.
The Polyp took her into itself…
[You have the blessing of the former mayor]
[There are no objecting candidates to your claim]
[Do you wish to become mayor of Safe Zone Gamma 67712?]
[Yes] / [No]
Barely enough space in her mind to acknowledge the question, let alone answer, but a breath left her lips soft as moth wings.
“Yes…”
A weight nestled around her neck — coiling like mist condensing into lead — and then it clicked, not a lock, but a mantle, and her body felt heavier, truer than it had before.
[You have received the Mantle of Leadership!]
[Congratulations! You have completed the Burden of Being Interesting!]
The surreal fog of the polyp’s mind song faded, and she staggered to her knees under its burning gaze. The weight of authority upon her shoulders, but she didn’t notice it. Lightness filled her being like a room full of soap bubbles.
She laughed as the feeling swelled inside her, brimming, overflowing. As the burden evaporated, she felt weightless for the first time in memory. Her laughter spilled out into the garden, infecting her companions as the flowers bobbed, and the polyp smiled.
Joy bloomed in her mind and her world.
[Calculating rewards…]