"We have to leave now," I said as I ushered them to follow me.

Luckily, whatever weird ancestor-worshipping ritual the Patchers were going through was keeping them from turning to us, but I knew it would only be a matter of time.

The Patchers did what they had to do to protect their family. They covered up the death of Tamara Cano. They killed Benny Harless. We knew of those crimes, which meant we were next.

Antoine, Kimberly, Ted the cameraman, Dina, Rose, and I hoofed it back to Antoine's cruiser. It wasn’t that far away, and we had just followed the path to the cliffside.

Still, we were too late.

When we got there, there were Patchers standing around, staring, downloading their evil magic programming.

As we headed toward the car, one of them fired three shotgun blasts into the hood, and because this was a movie, a fire ignited, quickly consuming the vehicle's cab.

There was no explosion, though. Maybe it wasn't in the budget.

Other than that, the Patchers just stood there and chanted, "In family, we find our purpose," over and over again.

"What is going on?" Rose exclaimed.

Oh, right. That's what we needed to do. We needed to explain what was going on around us and react to it.

"I think we're finding out what all those shrines around town are for," I said.

"I don't understand," Kimberly said. "Are they a cult?"

"Worse," I said. "They're a family."

We ran away from the car toward the woods.

"We're gonna have to cut through here to get to the Harless property," I said. "Antoine, you made it through before. Do you know the way?"

Antoine didn't respond. He had lost his cool, and as he stared into the woods in the darkness, I realized he was having a problem bigger than just the jitters.

"Rose, do you know the way back to your home?" I asked.

"I think so," she said. She was still sobbing but was at least able to communicate. I had expected her to be too distraught to help, but she wasn't.

We started to run into the woods, following her directions.

Antoine managed to snap out of it, and soon, we were running for our lives.

Rose was, however, a problem. As we started running into the woods, it quickly became apparent that she was too slow. She was a normal NPC, after all. We were being chased, and she could not outrun our pursuers.

"Antoine, help her," I said.

Antoine realized what was going on and picked her up with one arm, just kept running with her like it was nothing.

Ted, the cameraman, was having no problem keeping up with us. He must have had an NPC trope that allowed him to do that. He was a cameraman, so it made sense that he could follow us wherever we went.

Off-Screen.

"What's the plan here?" Antoine said, fear caught in his throat despite his efforts to hide it.

"We make our final stand at the Harless farm," I said.

"I thought we were doing the finale at the boarding house," Kimberly said. "Isn't that why I took my penthouse trope?"

"Change of plans," I said.

I had to believe that the finale would have been at the boarding house if Benny the Slasher had continued to be the antagonist. When we metaphorically unmasked him, the Patchers became the antagonist. I couldn't imagine that the boarding house would have been as effective at keeping them away.

"We need to get to the farm," I said.

I had a plan. Ever since I saw Benny/Rustle’s tropes, an idea began forming in my mind.

"Guns are not the answer," I said. "Rustle had a trope that made it so that bladed weapons would be equal to guns. That's why when I shot at him, I missed even though he was only thirty feet away. We need bladed weapons."

We could have used them right then, in fact.

On-Screen.

We had been running through the woods for ten minutes when the Patchers started to make an appearance.

"On the right," Dina said.

One of the Patchers, whose names were rapidly becoming less important, appeared, apparently unarmed, but with palpable malicious intent in his eyes.

Antoine didn't seem to mind that he didn't have a gun on him. With his one free hand, he aimed and took a shot.

One down, a few hundred more to go.

We were in a run-and-shoot sequence, which I was getting used to in Carousel’s storylines. These sequences would go on until Carousel had gotten the footage it needed.

One after another, Patchers would come out of the woodwork with blank expressions on their faces and some random weapon in their hands.

At first, I thought it was just about lining up and shooting, but then I started to realize that Carousel was depleting our ammo. Every Patcher who had a gun would shoot until their weapon was out of bullets.

They were aiming at Rose. After all, she did have the lowest plot armor.

We ran down the trail until there was no more trail, and then we just kept going.

"Rose!" Kimberly exclaimed as we came into a clearing in the woods.

I glanced up to see that Rose had been shot. It was one of those ambiguous movie wounds whose only evidence of existence was a lot of blood on her nightgown.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

It could have been a gut shot, which would always be fatal, or it could have been some innocuous wound that even an NPC could survive. We had no way of knowing, and I suspected that the nature of the wound would be determined by what choices we made.

"I'm fine," Rose said, but her weak voice did not give us much confidence.

Unfortunately, the run-and-shoot sequence did not reveal any of the main Patchers.

This was a lead-up to something else.

It took us twenty or so minutes to break through the forest into the fields of the Harless property. In the entire sequence, Ted the cameraman was never shot once. I couldn't even tell if he was shot at. That mysterious NPC trope was likely the explanation.

On-Screen.

"Rose," I said, "where do you keep all of the tools you use in the garden? Where do you keep your guns?"

"The garden?" she asked, delirious.

"Do you have a tool shed or something?" I asked. "I'm running on empty here," I said, holding up my firearm. "Do you have weapons or guns or something?"

"Behind the house," she said weakly.

We knew she had a gun, but she wasn't telling us that.

We ran across the fields until we got to the Harless house. Sure enough, there was a small shed attached to the back of the house.

We had failed to explore it before the finale, so my heart sank as we walked near it.

Discoveries have to be made before the finale.

You can't just let weapons appear out of nowhere; they have to be established. Still, it was established that this was a farm and that they did have tools. Logically, there must be some farming implements that could be used as weapons on this property.

As we got to the shed, there was a padlock on it. Dina ran ahead of us and messed with it for a moment before drawing the gun that Antoine had given her and just shooting the lock off.

"No use messing with it," she said.

As the shed opened and we started shining our lights inside, I gained a little bit of hope.

There was a large pegboard on which all the tools were kept neatly in place. The tools had been outlined in chalk or something similar to show where they went, so we knew which tools were missing.

The axe? Gone.

The machete? Not there. Its space was empty, and I couldn't see it anywhere in the shed.

In fact, I felt like Carousel was just teasing us because this shed had space for a few more ambiguous-bladed tools, but they were mostly empty.

There were a few things, though.

Dina grabbed a small hatchet. Like all the other blades in the shed, its blade was sharp.

Kimberly grabbed a pruning knife and a spade.

Antoine took a sling blade, a large wooden handle affixed with a heavy metal hooked blade. Guess he liked French fried potaters.

That left me with two options: the hedge shears and a large, intimidating scythe.

It made sense that Carousel would give us a scythe. It fit the theme so well.

I chose both.

The hedge shears had a delightful surprise attached to them. They had a trope called Sha-shing that buffed the user’s Mettle when using a bladed weapon if they brandished them for the camera before attacking.

That was a really cool trope if it had just been attached to a real weapon….

I shoved the shears into my belt.

Arming sequence complete, I turned to Rose and asked, "Where's your car?"

"The garage," she answered.

Of course. Where else would you keep your car if you had a full-size mechanic shop on your property?

The thing was, though, we hadn't actually seen it when we were snooping before. It immediately became clear why. The entire car was hidden by boxes and covered in a sheet.

"I don't really get out much anymore," Rose explained. "The farmer's market shut down a few years ago. If people need our produce, they just come here."

"Does it run?" Antoine asked.

"Yes," Rose said. "Rustle kept it in good condition for me. He was such a good son." She began to weep.

We weren't going off-screen, so I couldn't explain much to the others. I trusted them to pick up on what was about to happen.

I doubled over, my hand to my stomach.

"What's wrong?" Kimberly asked.

"This place feels off," I said. "There's a presence here..."

"A presence?" Kimberly asked.

I had done some minor work to establish my character's latent psychic powers. It would have to do. I just hoped that Carousel would go along with it. I suspected it would.

"They're angry," I said.

After I said that, the wind outside began to pick up.

"We have to expose what the Patchers did," Kimberly said. "We can't let them get away with this. Power through."

"No one's going to believe us," Dina said. "Are we going to tell them that there's some sort of ancestor-worshipping mind-melding cult?"

"We might have to leave that part out," I said.

Lots of people honor their ancestors. I guess some people's ancestors are evil.

Kimberly ran over to the phone that was still on the counter. She picked the receiver up, put it to her ear, and started to dial, but before she could finish, she paused and looked at the phone.

"The phone line's been cut," she said.

"Are they outside?" Antoine asked. "I wish this place had windows. I hate not knowing what's out there."

The garage did have windows, but they had been covered.

"My guess is that a Patcher works at the phone company," I said. "Wouldn't be surprised if all of Eastern Carousel is cut off."

"What do we do?" Dina asked. "We can't let them get away with what they did."

The wind howled outside again.

"You guys hit the road," I said. "Kimberly, you and Sheriff Stone in the back seat. Ted, you get in the passenger seat and you turn your camera back on them so Kimberly can report what happened here. Having the sheriff there to confirm things lends authority to it. We've got next to no proof. Just the hair tie and our own eyes. Get the story on tape. Miss Cano, I hope you're okay with driving. I have a feeling there might be company out on the roads. It's gonna be rough."

"I can do it," she said.

One of the first things I learned about Dina was that she liked to drive fast. She passed us on our way to Carousel.

"What are you going to do?" Kimberly asked.

"You all need to take Rose with you," I said. "She needs medical help. That little car's not going to fit all of us. I'm going to stay here," I said. "I'm the distraction. I need to make them think we're all here locked up in the garage."

Kimberly paused as she realized what I was suggesting. Her character would need to react to it.

"Riley, there has to be a better way," Kimberly said.

"All that matters is that we tell people what happened, right?" I asked. "I told you this story was going to change our lives, didn't I? We're gonna be the hotshot journalists taking down the bad guys like on TV."

Kimberly hugged me.

"Make sure everyone knows," I said.

"I will," she said.

They pulled off the cover of the car, and sure enough, it started right up.

"I'm going to go clear out anyone who's out there right now," I said. "When I give you the signal, you open the garage and you drive back to the civilized world as fast as that thing will go."

It was a plan.

"I'm not going," Rose said.

"Rose," Kimberly said, "we need to get you to a hospital."

"You're a sweet woman," Rose said, "but this is my home. This is where my husband and my son lived. I'm not leaving. Give me a gun. I'm not gonna let those bastards drive me away. They aren't the only ones who know how to pray, and those I pray to have power the Patchers could never imagine."

We weren't exactly going to argue with her. Antoine handed her a firearm and a few bullets. It was time for it to happen.

Oblivious Bystander was useless for the task I had in mind. Luckily, I had a lot of Hustle. Good for sneaking.

As I found my way outside, I realized that the stars were gone. It was overcast, the wind howled, and the crops danced to the music. Lightning struck in the distance. I had to stay on the alert.

It didn’t take long to find some enemies.

Some Patchers were walking down the road in front of the garage.

They weren't speaking to each other. Whatever had happened to them, I suspected they no longer needed to speak.

At first, I thought the hive mind trope was completely meta, that they would merely act like a hive mind. That was common enough in movies where there are multiple enemies who seem to anticipate each other's movement so well that it feels like they're coordinated by a higher power.

That wasn't the case here. These people were clearly connected to each other, connected by blood, marriage, and magic.

I laid my scythe down on the ground.

I had tucked my hedge shears into my belt.

As I walked cautiously around to the back of the two men standing on the road, I withdrew the shears and held them out menacingly. Sure enough, I could hear the metallic shing sound coming off the blade. I opened it up, and there was a further sound. The Patchers couldn't hear it, apparently.

Killing monsters was one thing.

Killing human monsters was a whole different thing.

Killing human monsters without the use of a firearm, with a blade, was a third thing, and it was the hardest of the bunch.

But I had a job to do, and I did it. The first one went down with a swipe at his neck; then I rushed the second as he looked at me and pierced his torso. I didn't know if the wounds were fatal in real life, but they were movie-fatal.

These guys didn't have enough grit to stand up to it.

"Hey!" someone screamed from further down the road, hiding in the trees.

It was yet another Patcher. This one I recognized.

It was Corduroy Patcher. In many ways, he was the only person who had to die in this whole story to ensure that we could loot his general store.

I lifted my shears and prepared for a fight.