Chapter 29: The Winner and The Loser (Part 1)

[ The Blessing of Authorship ]

[ Claimed: The Shroudwalk, Severed of No. 95 ]

[ Communion begins ] 𓂃🖋

Milo opened his eyes onto a perfectly smooth room that glared with white light.

Rubbing his eyes and slowly adjusting to the brightness, he noticed the lack of sting whenever his knuckles brushed the skin around them.

Now it hit him how clean his hands usually were. The dust and dirty smears of the battle had vanished, as if he’d stepped straight out of a bath.

"Did it hurt when you died?"

A patter of feet broke the ringing silence.

Milo looked down at a girl no taller than his waist. She grinned, showing a gap where her baby teeth had fallen out.

She wore a short-sleeved shirt, the pink-white stripes alternating horizontally before going vertical at her skirt. On her feet was a pair of pink sneakers, the white shoelaces untied and dragging over the floor in a mess.

"What did you just ask me?" Milo said, his voice coming out clear.

The girl straightened her palm and brought it up to the butterfly pin in her hair, a salute. Clasping her hands together, she bounced back the way she had come.

"Hey! Did I die o-or something?!"

The girl slowed, her brown braids swaying over her shoulders.

"Of course not! Wanna play Saved?"

She hopped aside, revealing a table with a miniature town on it.

Milo skimmed the sprawling white space, found no end to it in any direction, and took a few hesitant steps to reach the board, his boots soundless on the seamless floor.

"Why am I here?"

"We’re playing Saved. Don’t be silly!~"

The girl wrung her hands behind her back and tilted her head at the buildings.

"Okay..." Milo gave a long exhale. "What’s Saved and why do you want to play it?"

"Do you not know? Bleh. Bleh! Bleh bleh bleh!"

Her left hand shot out and gestured at the middle square of the replica.

"Look! This is my Daddy, Johnny, and this is my Mommy, Mary, and this is my Cat, Phocas!"

Only when Milo leaned over the model did he see the guns pointed into the figurines’ mouths.

"Why do they... um. How old are you? Why have they got guns in their mouths?"

"Okay. I’ll tell you the rules only because you’re My Hero!" She planted her palms on the table’s edge and stared down the figurines, eyes gleaming. "The town my Daddy Mommy and Cat live in was attacked by the Plague! Saved is about saving exactly this town!"

"Your town? Doesn’t any of this frighten you?"

"No, why? Why would I be frightened? Daddy says I pay too much attention to words, and I think he’s right. I don’t like frightened. You’re here. You’re My Hero! You’ll save Daddy and Mommy and Cat."

The girl spread her arms sideways and circled the table, mimicking a plane and humming some remix of the stewardess safety demo.

Her untied laces whisked over the floor.

"I’m... not sure I can save them?"

"Come on! Quit joking around!" She stopped. "Let’s play already."

"What am I supposed to—"

Click!

Confetti rained down, a strip of it settling on his shoulder.

"Tada! You saved them, look!"

He followed the girl’s finger to the figurines. The guns pointed toward the ceiling, smoking lightly, and from each barrel protruded a flag, stating, in a cartoonish font: Saved!

"I did, huh?"

"Yes! Look at how amazing My Hero looks!"

She took a makeup mirror out of a pocket Milo could’ve sworn had not been there earlier. He gazed into it and found no violet bruising or red crusting anywhere on his face.

But his luck ended at the skin.

Two neat holes pierced his head. In the reflection, he could see the white room through them.

Milo raised his hands. A hole opened over his heart. His fingers broke apart before he could cover it.

The rest of him went with them, as a thousand such holes disintegrated his body into nothingness.

...

...

...

Milo opened his eyes onto glaring white light.

"AAAA! AAAHH, WHAT, WHAT—!"

The table was in front of him again, and his hands were whole.

He turned and ran.

"Why are you screaming? Noooo noooo!"

Tap, tap, tap, the little girl’s feet pattered behind him.

"You’re My Hero! Not only a Hero, but My Hero."

Milo’s legs came apart under him.

Thousands of holes unmade his body.

He opened his eyes onto the white light again.

"W-WHAT THE FUCK! NO, STOP IT S-STOP IT!"

As he underwent extinction and birth over and over, the little girl’s words reached him in pieces:

"You won... Saved! You’re My Hero... Why are You screaming?"

Hero! Hero! Hero!

"MAKE IT STOP!!! FUCK, I DON’T WANT TO BE A HERO! I don’t want to save anybody. Make it stop... make it stop...!"

Milo opened his eyes under a dark gray sky.

Back in the Eye. At last.

Except, his sight had the grain of an old television picture.

"Run!" The screams echoed. "Run, for God’s sake!"

Slosh.

Drops of blood spattered warm over his cheeks.

Milo looked down at his hands and found a child’s.

A man and a woman stumbled into the street. Milo reached for them, sobbing, even though he recognized none of the faces.

"T-That’s not m-mama," he choked out. "That’s not d-dada!"

Something he couldn’t see hurled people between the buildings. Bodies struck walls and tore in half.

"That’s not what happened! Where the fuck am I? Why is, why is...?!"

The two he had taken for his father and mother went down like all the rest.

"WHAT THE FUCK AM I?!"

...

His sight went black, and a yellowed sheet of paper snapped open, the colors no longer smearing together like on the old television.

[ Communion complete ]

[ Rooted: Plague (!) ] 𓂃🖋

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⋆˚࿔ Coming right up: "The Winner and The Loser (Part 2: Finale)" ... ⤵︎ [!]