Chapter Text
꧁⎝ 𓆩༺ ꥟ ༻𓆪 ⎠꧂
The morning came as it always did; marked only by the tolling of the grandfather clock six times, not by the rising of the sun. They found, in their closet, flower-budded clothes; whenever they donned this outfit, Spawn-gifted branches appeared atop their back.
It was always eerily quiet in this realm; save for the footsteps and breath and chatter of the other survivors, the silence was only ever broken by the humming of mosquitoes or the occasional distant howl of a wolf that warned them against trying to enter the forest. There was less sound than usual; they noticed when they exited their cabin. A single missing breath, the lack of scratching on floorboards they’d already become accustomed to.
They ran to Shedletsky’s cabin and pounded on the door. No response.
What had they done, they wondered, to incur his wrath like this? To encourage him to leave them, to leave the survivors, to vanish into the dead of night? It had to have been their fault; they were the only one who understood him for who he was, so of course they were why he had left.
They struggled with the locked door, eventually resorting to grabbing their knife to try and pick it, an attempt that worked shockingly well. They weren’t supposed to pick locks; the Spawn, they knew from teachings, disproved heavily of it. But this was for a good cause.
The silence in his cabin was stifling. The floorboards were ripped to shreds in one specific spot; the blanket was left on the bed like he’d been snatched from it forcefully, not like he’d left. Perhaps he was in the forest, though they knew that wasn’t true, perhaps he was hunting a wolf and would soon come back and deliver it to them.
But that couldn’t be the case. He would have told somebody, Two Time would know it was happening.
In the main cabin, the other survivors had already begun to congregate; Jane Doe was sipping some water, occasionally looking at it in distaste, and then continuing; Builderman was lounging on the couch fiddling with a wrench, and Chance was flipping their coin.
“Oure god is gone.” They announced, and the few eyes there turned to look at them. “Ich have checked in hisse cabin and he is nowhere to be seen. The floorboards are in disarray, and I fear for hine.”
“Shedletsky’s… gone?” Builderman’s eyes darted. “Do ya think he found a way to escape the realm?”
Chance shook their head. “It wouldn’t let that happen. Whatever’s happening…”
Jane Doe jumped in. “Is far worse than that. Like I’ve said-”
Builderman glared at her, and she flinched. “We can trust him, Jane. We’ve been able to trust him for ten years now and two days isn’t going to change that. We don’t know what’s happened, yet. He could very well be in the forest.”
Two Time could see the doubt in his eyes. “Rest assured, Ich have no doubts that he is fine.”
Chance rolled their coin in between their fingers. “Physically, sure. Mentally… he was already struggling. Wherever he is and whatever he’s doing, it’s not helping anything.”
“However-”
Builderman stood up furiously. “He is not fine, Two Time.”
They remembered at once that Builderman was an admin, however useless the admins were in comparison to the spawn. Jane Doe turned around and gave Chance a look to do the same.
“He is not supposed to be in that form, and it knows that.”
“The body belongs to hine.”
Jane Doe grabbed Two Time’s wrist and physically pulled them out of the conversation.
“What-”
She slung them over her shoulder and sauntered out of the room, before setting them down on the floor with a stern look in her shaded eyes.
“Are you insane?” She finally asked. “You were about five seconds away from making him unravel. An admin’s true face is nothing to scoff about, Two Time.”
“Thou speaks with experience.”
“I can handle it. Someone like you would break. Fracture. Go off into ramblings about the fourth dimension and how the whole world is a game. You’d go insane.”
“And thou do not?”
She shook her head. “No, and neither does my husband. It made us shoo-ins for the HQ.” That, they contemplated, and the fact that Jane Doe was Builderman’s daughter, “The mind breaks because for a second, it understands. For a second, you’d know the world the admins belong to, and you’d know how pathetic of an ant you are in comparison. And that would stay with you for the rest of your life.”
“Builderman has never revealed such a thing. Neither has Dussekar.”
“Builderman,” In the commune they would never have been so formal, “is one of the most controlled admins I know.” She countered. “Dussekar uses that pumpkin hat of his to avoid it. Telamon hid his face under a hood; Doombringer uses a helmet; StickMasterLuke-”
“Ich understand. Ich have been taught that the Spawn’s face can never be viewed, for the Spawn is like air. The admins, too, are like air.”
She sighed. “That’s not what I… Whatever. Believe what you want, just leave me out of it, okay? And don’t get on his bad side. You’ll regret it.”
Two Time nodded, but they didn’t believe her. They couldn’t be harmed, not with the Spawn on their side.
⋆₊༶𖤐━━━━⊱⚔༒︎⚔⊰━━━━ 𖤐༶₊⋆
The conversation downstairs had voices he only knew from being murdered. He caught what they were saying easily, with Telamon’s hearing.
“Did you hear that?” iTrapped asked. “A screech, upstairs.”
“Pr0b@bly 1x1x1x1.” Noli guessed. “[I know you know who].”
“No,” Nosferatu said firmly, “That wasn’t 1x1x1x1. Their calls are booming. This was shriller.”
“[This] st1ll [hurts me].” Noli complained. “[MY EARS!] N0t so [BE A BIG SHOT].”
A glitched grumbling, 1x1x1x1.
“What are you talking about?”
“Did you recognize that screech?” iTrapped asked. “Nosferatu says it wasn’t you.”
“Wasn’t, but I was patrolling. Didn’t hear it.”
“It sounded almost like how the Darkheart sometimes does.”
“Wait.” Nosferatu said. “I recognize that sound, for I have come face to face with the one who makes it.”
1x1x1x1 groaned. “You’re not saying-”
“Telamon is here.”
Shedletsky vaulted out of the bed. It was more comfortable than his bed; the Killers wouldn’t have anybody to build a cabin, so the Spectre must have given them one. The room was far from personal; the only piece of decoration was a perch that was only there as a means to taunt him; it was too high in the room to use. The room was small, large enough only to pace two meters before he’d have to turn around.
Though the idea of using a perch was… awkward. He wasn’t a bird, he didn’t perch, even in Telamon’s body.
The floor was still wooden in this cabin, though he didn’t know if it was just that way in this room. Likely not; he doubted the Spectre would give him a mercy like that. Not with what it had already done.
He was wearing Telamon’s robes. It was like an ice pick being struck through his head, how that simple observation reverberated and somehow made him numb instead of making him fall into despair. His clothes were still in the closet, albeit altered to have hoods. This situation was cruel, yes, but those were clothes he had earned. It respected effort, it seemed.
With what he’d done to his fellow survivors, and what he’d have to do, he didn’t deserve to wear his favorite shirt.
There were footsteps and a pounding on his door. 1x1x1x1, he could tell by the rattle of chains that followed the strikes of the fist.
“LET ME IN, TELAMON, YOU COWARD!”
Well, he definitely was a coward, because he found the door that led to the bathroom, shut it, locked it, and cowered in the bathtub. He forced Telamon’s hood off of his face, and rubbed Telamon’s hands over his eyes.
“I’LL COME IN BY FORCE! FIGHT ME LIKE A MAN, OR HAVE YOU ALWAYS JUST BEEN A CHICKEN?!”
He was shaking. He wasn’t cold, the robes were too stiflingly hot for him to be cold, and his breath was smooth. Too smooth. Though quick, it came in and out without being short rapid bursts. Each breath took longer than it used to, but he was inhaling and exhaling rapidly.
This couldn’t get worse, could it? He’d laugh, if he could think about laughing. Laughter was a heavy thing to carry, like the wings, though they weren’t heavy in the way you’d think of weight; they only made him ache with the unfamiliarity of it all.
Moving them was second nature, and the fact that it was was the issue. They were like three pairs of arms, but they didn’t belong to him; it was a body too spacious, whereas he was used to having one that was filled.
He had to get his mind off of it. The mirror in the bathroom was small, but he still shattered it anyway. The blood that ran down his arm was bright; it shone with an internal light and was gold instead of red. Gold was cold, and a heavy color to bear.
The door splintered. He heard it and winced; he could tell the wood was scattered across the floor, and 1x1x1x1’s footsteps were heavy.
“Unlock the door.”
“No.” 1x1x1x1 didn’t respond, didn’t protest; and that was only because they heard how he sounded, they heard how broken his voice was, how he sounded like he would be in tears if he could cry. Curse Telamon’s body for having the room to host something otherworldly but no space to store emotions.
They had to shatter silence like a door.
“Shedletsky.” They acknowledged, and it made his heart flutter in anxiety to hear that, “You really aren’t Telamon.”
He unlocked the door, and it swung open. 1x1x1x1 didn’t cross the threshold, just stared at him. Mirror shattered, fist dripping blood, feathers ruffled, eyes wide; they observed it, calculated it, like arithmetic. Their hand rested on the hilt of the daemonshank. He couldn’t see movement in their eye socket, but he knew it was darting.
“You can go ahead, with what you were going to do.” He suggested. “Maybe it would give me my actual body back.”
“The fourth dimension.” 1x1x1x1 stated. “You don’t know anything about it, do you?” He was about to confirm, but then they continued, “Telamon didn’t either.”
“And?”
“...” They turned away from him. “Nothing.”
“It’s-” He cut himself off. It wasn’t nothing, but it wasn’t something they were willing to share, that much was clear-cut. “Then what is it?”
“Sunlight.”
1x1x1x1 walked out of the room, stepping over a shattered doorway. He was going to have to find a way to replace that.
No.
He wouldn’t be staying in the killer’s cabin for much longer. He couldn’t, he couldn’t in good conscience take up his blade and tear the skin of the people that he loved and that trusted him, and let their bodies fall against the ground, and make the light that they brought to the cabins and to dinner and even the rounds vanish.
At the same time, the idea of ripping into flesh was painfully appetizing. Delicious, the idea of rendering them apart, the idea of sinking his teeth into them… it was tempting, and he remembered the bloodlust stacks.
Would he still have those? Would insanity still creep up on him? Or would he enter the round with his sanity severed from him? Would he delight in killing them and regret it later? Or would he be slowly tempted to the apple on the tree?
He was hungry, for actual food- meat- cold meat. Instead of facing the killers (he was one of them now, had he forgotten?) downstairs, he elected to sit in the bed and stare at the wall.
The smell of the lake didn’t permeate this place, though his sense of smell had never been particularly good. The killer’s cabin didn’t smell pleasant; no, it smelled like sweat and tears, like a gym, but there wasn’t a smell of iron.
He chose to think about that instead.
Somebody walked into the room. Whoever it was, he got the sense that they were looking at him judgementally, staring at him.
“Are you going to wallow in anguish, or shall you leave this pathetic excuse for a room and eat breakfast?” It was Nosferatu. He turned and looked at the vampire, who had his arms crossed and was currently glaring at him. “Telamon would be strangling me right now, so it’s quite the simple conclusion to come to that 1x1x1x1 lies not.”
“Whatever issues you have with Telamon, I don’t remember them. Okay?” He pulled Telamon’s knees in.
“Hm.”
“Everything he did is a dream. So don’t try and kill me for something I didn’t do.”
“I wasn’t going to. I was going to… encourage your appearance downstairs. C00lkidd has caught wind of Telamon being here-”
“Who told-”
“Noli. And C00lkidd is excited to meet an idol in the flesh. Telamon was, as I’m certain you know, one of the few hybrid admins, and that is a source of comfort to the child.”
“... okay?”
“I’d advise you not to disappoint the child. Play it up and act natural. And please, try not to imply that you don’t remember.”
Nosferatu’s ears perked up; Shedletsky heard it too. The clock.
“I wasn’t expecting the Killers to have a clock too.” Shedletsky commented.
“The survivors have a clock?”
“How else would we get coordinated in time?”
꧁⎝ 𓆩༺ ꥟ ༻𓆪 ⎠꧂
“If he doesn’t reconvene here in five minutes,” Guest 1337 said logically, “Then we’re probably facing him on the other side.”
“He wouldn’t hurt us.” Noob said staunchly.
Elliot nodded. “Shedletsky wouldn’t. Dussekar, what do you think of this?”
“...” Dussekar inhaled. “Though I've thoughts aplenty, they’re useless if one or twenty.”
“Surely he would not harm ous.” Two Time said with confidence, because they had to believe that it was true; Shedletsky wouldn’t hurt them, because of their worship to him. Assuredly.
“If by candle’s firelight, or if it will decide to end his plight, the next round is due for a certain fright. So prepare your weapons and be ready to fight; if body or soul, something dies tonight.”
“Matt,” Builderman said, and Guest 1337’s eyes flickered with false association, “You’re goin’ ta scare them.”
“Only the truth is what I speak; only the truth is what they seek. If I was to hide it, then I would be meek; this realm is known to us to reek.”