“I never fucking knew that.”

Trav was deep in the shits, riding a high that never seemed to peak. Infinity music was playing on the sound box. It had come with the room. Lemsk was pouring rubbing alcohol on it, seeing if it affected the structure of the boxes compositions in any meaningful way.

“Yeah, sad to say. It took me so long to live it down. They made me a Reserve member for three years because of it.” She said. Right before the bottle ran out, she flipped it right side and drank the last few drops. In response the box grew insect like legs and scuttled away, hiding itself in a dark corner behind the mini fridge. The music was muffled now but otherwise unchanged. “I’m six years your senior.”

There was a subtle darkness to the notes the box was playing. Some eerie staccato in 5/4 with drums that came in and out heavy like the tide. Lemsk hummed along and laughed when she inevitably outpaced the machine. “I don’t really remember a time we didn’t run this city.”

“You didn’t even grow up here, didn’t you say that before?” Trav said.

Lemsk threw the now empty bottle out a circular window. The iris opened and dilated automatically, but was a second too quick, and the pieces of glass broke on the glow in the dark carpet.

“No I did, I think the leader of Lemure’s Legacy should be someone born and raised here, don’t you think.” She sniffed some more of the dream dust and fell to the ground. “Mmmm, I can feel the rug breathing.”

Trav was feeling far too sober. “Head of Number isn’t exactly leader.”

“You still believe we’ll get that pittance?” She gestured to the closed room that held their prize. “No, getting this guy has become the Legacy’s ultimate goal, I think it’s the reason they were founded in the first place.”

Trav knew better than to question her when she got like this. Which was often. “It’ll be nice to have more respect.”

“All of it, and don’t act like we deserve a bit less.” Lemsk held herself tight and breathed deep. “Grand, it’s like the city’s screaming our name.” She stopped talking and her face went blank. “Arrest me, I have sinned, Serach I am unworthy.”

“Thats the drugs talking, you probably got someone with a lot of guilt, seeing the world from their perspective.” Trav stared up at the ceiling, there was a projection going that he didn’t remember putting on. “Who’s Serach anyway?” He thought he had heard the name before. It could have been written on the side of the Helot, that massive tower of a woman that stood deep in the placid sea.

“No, it’s not saying Serach, it’s screaming my name.” She held her arms out and repeated what was in her head. “Morgan, Morgan, Morgan. See just like that.”

The projection stopped, the room produced a melodic tone. Someone was at the door.

“I’ll get it.” Who else was going to after all? The less interaction he had with Devon the better.

He slid the door open a crack. There was a dark skinned man wearing a clean outfit. Probably worked for the hotel, though Trav hadn’t seen any of the hotel staff outside of the lady with the white brick, and she was dressed nowhere near this nice.

The man grinned broadly and waved. Shadows around him signified others. Trav had definitely seen him before but he couldn't place where.

“Hello there, is this the residence of an Harold Pinter?” The man said jovenly.

Wrong room. Nothing to worry about. “No, this isn’t-“

“It’s the Suite of your new kings!” Lemsk yelled from across the floor, her voice by no means muffled. Trav had to wince.

”Sorry. Um, thats my wife, she’s just-“

“Oh that’s great, congratulations! And who might you be?”

“I don’t need to answer that.” He kept his grip firm.

“You don’t need to tell us, we’ll be out of your hair soon.” The smiling man treated this all as a passing amusement, despite the force of his hand trying to pull the door back further. “Unless… you are Mr. Harold.”

“Trav and Lemsk, motherfuckers extraordinaire!” Lemsks sudden outburst popped the tension like a balloon. The shadows around the man disappeared, his pressure disappeared.

“Confirmation. Exactly what I needed. Thank you for your time, you won’t see me again.” Licking his lips, he turned away and the door closed with an audible bang.

“That was rude, he was going to offer us more drugs.”

“No he wasn’t.” Trav went over to their supply and sprinkled some fresh stuff in his eyelids. “That man didn’t even work at the hotel.”

“Who was he, then?”

“I recognized his voice, I think-“ He wrinkled his nose, disappointed in the following statement, “I think he works for us?”

“Another Number?”

Before Lemsk could reply, a circular disc of the ceiling fell to the ground. A large gentleman followed through the negative space. He had a Remark made of saw teeth and pain. It was a terrible thing to encounter while high.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

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“I hope you enjoy eternity.”

Adam hit the glass hard, leaving a cut right where the Numbers face had been seconds ago. Something inside the ball was scratching to get out. His Remark form shook. “Quickly, you need to confirm our agreement, it’s the only-“

And then the ball burst open, purple smoke that flamed red forced itself into Devon. And then she was no longer Devon.

”I hope you enjoy eternity.”

She was a soldier in the great deluge, marching alongside a platoon of her fellows as water poured down endlessly from leaking machines with innards that flashed red. Her company was spotless. Their remarks all immaculate and only days old. They were marching in a circle, and she didn’t know why, the sun was bright and bathed everything in a comforting red light. Maybe it’s not a bad idea to walk around endlessly. A giant burdenbeast sprung down from a cliff face and barreled into the carousel of soldiers. She was crushed under the weight of thousands of bodies crashing into her her last thought was

I

am different now, she reminded herself, not fated to do nothing with her life, now she’d make her name through murder. She was a different soldier, in a different land. The sky was blue and infinite. There were bombs in the sky and the ground was filled with flailing limbs. She felt the strangest impulse to simply sit and watch. It was truly a beautiful sight. A man who seemed to be their leader floated up in the air and sliced a bomb in half. The two sides broke off and crushed resting soldiers, falling to the ground far slower than they should have. She looked down and saw she was sitting on a blanket. it was like a picnic. No, she was sitting on a tapestry of a machine, white lines on baby blue. Blue like the sky, the sky flickered when she looked up again, it wasn’t blue now it was void with faint tubes circling up forever. Someone was on fire and she could not discern the uniform from underneath the flame, so she did not know how to feel. But she had to

Hope

it would be over soon. She was stabbing a man barely older than she was with a Remark. Aware she was responsible, but absent of any control, the Remark was flicking in and out of existence, she knew this made it more painful for him. A woman with a body out of proportion with the rest of the scene stuck a massive hand on her shoulder. At first she thought this was a plea for her to stop, but then the larger woman guided Devon’s shaking hand, and shoved it in to the man’s stomach once more. They were doing this for a crowd, a band was playing near them. The singer crooned, “

You

have been found guilty of pacifism,” a voice said, she was staring down a Death Wyrm. She fell into the open mouth and now she was in its bowels. The glints of remarks flashed in the dark chamber of its stomach. A man tripped into a small puddle of bile, and dissolved into a fine mist. The person chasing him was despondent, and wandered off until she couldn’t see him behind a massive pulsing structure that might have been a heart. She raised a heavy remark to an opponent, cornered on the wall, but then stopped. She checked his pulse, despite his strange twitching, he was dead. He was not leaning against the flesh, but being consumed by it. Tendrils reached out and they bit through her skin suit with newly birthed teeth. For some reason she knew she would

Enjoy

being the last soldier in the last war of the Deluge. Her opponent was a being clad in armor long ago melted. Their attire was assymetrical to a point of repulsion. Only one eye was visible beneath the metal wreckage and it endlessly dilated. Devon hated this being more than anyone she ever hated. They fought on a tiny fraction of plaster in a sea of negative space, below them were green rapids, frighteningly real. They were not using remarks, simply fists. It felt simpler, cutting out the middleman like this. Every hit did nothing but bloody her knuckles, but she could not shake the adrenaline she felt, the raw rush of accomplishment. Devon felt like she finally had a purpose. Even when the platform crumbled, and the two fell into

Eternity

“Which fights did you get?”

Devon came to. For a second she didn’t know who she was. The previous hallucinations felt no different from now. A body above her, she thought it was Adam before but it was just a puppet.

The Wyrm mask glided towards her, their body only a suggestion amidst the purple fog. “I gave you a really nice one, a good five from primary sources, double that taken from second hand accounts. They may have been mushed together, they’re not all accurate but they sure feel like they are. They get to the heart of it. It’s what those drugs you push are made of, just at a higher potency. How do you like the real thing?”

The man talked more than he needed to. Her eyes darted under the bed. The Remark was there, glowing faintly. That was Adam.

The Lemure stooped to her level and took hold of Devon’s hand. She didn’t resist. Her remark, the useless one, slipped from her fingers, and vanished as he bought it to his chest. His mask simply stared at the empty hand for a very long time. He got back up. “You can die kneeling, or die on your feet. It makes no difference to me.”

Devon looked under the bed again. The Remark that was Adam was glowing a blinding red. Words were flowing into her head as easily as blood.

“Doyoutakemyremarkasyourownandgrantmeaccestoyourbodyandmindwhenyouneedmegrantingyoumypowerinreturnforthistransportation,” her own lips mouthed the words, she repeated them silently faster and faster. Doubling over as the Remark that was Adam shook at the same rate.

The Lemure waved his remark in front of her face, annoyed that she was causing a scene by not causing one. “Something going on in there? Come on, it’s not fun for me if you’re not here. What I gave you wasn’t that crazy, you shouldn’t be-“

Her eyes snapped up and her gaze shut him up. She was unconcerned. Her mind was clear. Gazing up at a scared little drug addict wearing a cheap mask. She felt like that final soldier, about to end the war.

“Yes. I accept, till the Curtain falls down.”

The Remark that was Adam rocketed out of the bed and connected with Devon’s hand, already in motion.

She was fluid and methodical in her movement, using surprising strength to sucker punch the Lemure in the side with the blunt end of her Remark and then holding him with her free hand, she put his body under her like she was leading a dance. There was no shaking as she cut her way across the mask and the face under it. The cut was straight, and ten inches thick. Devon saw the face as the mask fell, he was a dull looking guy, with a flat nose and curly black hair.

She expected regret, she didn’t feel regret.

The cut was horizontal to his mouth, so his whole lower face opened in a comical overexageration of a smile. His tongue fell out, followed by blood and chunks of flesh that had been sliced free from the mouth’s walls. His pupils were trying their best to escape, running rampant around his eyes. He was searching the room for an explanation. She gave him one in the form of Adam, now her Remark, shoved through his forehead. She only realized this was a bad idea when it came time to pull it out. It took her more effort than she wanted to expend.

Outside, sounds of screaming continued, coupled with the sound of a circular saw.

Standing up from her murder, Devon stretched, closed her eyes tightly, and then threw up.

It would not be the last time.