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Many a man had tried to kill the Debutant, and many a man had failed. Some wished to kill him out of rage, others out of envy, and still others out of the plain desire to share a world with him no longer. Whatever drove them to their murderous frenzies, all saw the same fate— quiet elusion.
Before birth, he was miscarried nine times, a tragedy he owed to the interference of some mad deity. During his days at the schoolhouse, he was subject to several assassination attempts on the part of fellow students and teachers alike. At the tender age of twelve, his father— an infamously brutish, emotional man— began a ferocious campaign to put an end to him, the conclusion of which he swore never to declare prematurely.
By seventeen, he had survived stabbings, slicings, stalkings, strikings, and had lived through it all by attending more to his own personal goings-on than those of his assailants. He was withdrawn, and gave little insight on his internal affairs to either friend or foe. Living as if his head were in the clouds, he evaded every one of his would-be murderers, knowing well the next was soon to show up.
Come age eighteen, he assessed all areas of his being, as a man needfully does at such a point in his life. After fondly pondering that which made him happiest, he determined he would cast out that which brought him greatest suffering. He elected to hold a gathering to celebrate his rejection of all that no longer served him, and thus adopted the title of “Debutant”.
For nearly a month, he labored day and night over his writing desk, penning countless invitation letters with his finest stationery. While his posture was by nature bent, and he was desperately reliant on his eyeglasses, this undertaking exacerbated both conditions to the point of burdening him with the hunch and squint of a man thrice his age. He knew, ahead of time, that his preparations would bring him their own sort of misery, but he did not have enough qualms with his state to cease.
Once the last letter was writ to satisfaction, he sent them all out at once, and crowed jubilantly of it to all who would listen. He kicked up such a stir about the party that many a time he was asked if an extra invitation would not be in order. All who asked to attend were politely rejected, as the party, he testified, was meant for who it was meant and for none else.
At last, after enough anticipation to draw every attendant’s nerves taut, the night of the celebration fell. The Debutant had a fine suit tailored for the occasion, and in this he made his way to the hall he reserved.
The hall was as grandiose an affair as the party held within it— the walls aside, which were there more to conceal than to support, its structure was sustained by a great many slim Greek columns. On the roof, bas-reliefs of classical tragedies were engraved, larger-than-life in size and majesty. Looking up to contemplate them made even the sober horridly dizzy.
The revellers, who strolled in one by one, elected instead to keep their eyes on their companions, on their drinks, and on the Debutant, who insisted they enjoyed themselves to the fullest. As they entered, their presence was announced by a herald who cried out each name, so that all the party would hear of their arrival.
In accordance with their youth and predisposition to social functions, his old schoolmates were among the first to arrive, preceded only by his grandfather, a scholarly gentleman unfortunately captivated by whatever curious charm his son-in-law— the Debutant’s father— possessed. The two drank together often, and made such merry that neither wanted to depart from the other’s side at any event they attended. As such, their names were called out one straightaway after the other, with the Debutant and his party echoing them back joyfully.
After the last guest was welcomed, heralded, and assimilated into the increasingly-drunken mass, the Debutant looked down from his perch at the highest point of the hall— which was positioned at the furthest opposite wall to the entryway— and, smiling warmly, surveyed his handcrafted assembly. The group wholly made a toast to him, and their jubilant cry resounded off every wall: “To our generous Debutant!”
Laughing, the Debutant raised his own glass. He visibly readied himself as if to give a grand speech, then sent the party guffawing when, after a pause, he simply hollered, “Hear, hear!”
A few hours elapsed. The Debutant remained on his ledge, watching over his party in pleased silence. He kept a close eye on his father, who remained stuck to the side of his red-faced grandfather. As with the other guests, they stumbled about, chattering with schoolteachers and students and strangers as they went. The party had proven to be just the occasion for mingling and drinking that the Debutant had hoped it to be.
He turned his glance to some other obscure corner, by happenstance, and caught a good five, perhaps six guests exchanging what could only be parting embraces. With a shrill whistle— a signal understood by all— and a pull of one jacket cuff— a signal understood only by the staff— the single exit was securely locked. The partygoers, as they forgot reason in favor of inebriation, only supposed their host gave a whistle on account of random whim.
With the exit secure, the herald announced: “All hearken to your host!”
The anticipation rose, as it does among similarly giddy crowds, and a tense silence fell. From his ledge, the Debutant’s voice rang out, cheerier than ever. “My venerable guests! I must thank you all for coming. This event has been in the making a long while, and I salute every one of you for showing up.” The merrymakers, overjoyed at the acknowledgement, murmured their own indiscernible thanks as one.
Beaming with delight, the Debutant went on. “This gathering is one of all manners of people, of all nationalities, of all ages. It is with great pleasure that I announce your single commonality, for you all, in fact, have one.”
One lone voice asked, “You missed us all?” This voice belonged to a young lady who had, as a child, pursued the Debutant with a pair of gardening shears.
A second asked, “We are all human?” This voice was that of a distant aunt who once attempted to throw the Debutant from a bridge.
A third, cackling as he spoke, asked, “We are all drunk?” The revellers chortled with him, unaware that he, as a grown adult, had slung a bowling ball at the Debutant’s head when he was nine-years-old.
“No to all three,” replied the jovial Debutant. “I am not drunk, I don’t consider any of you maniacs human, and I could not have missed you less if I tried.”
All laughter died away. Some bristling could be seen from the crowd below, by those shocked that someone so generous could make such biting comments. From a few partygoers who yet held some hope, cries of “You surely jest!” and other such expressions came forth.
“Anyone here who thinks I am jesting is terribly mistaken,” the Debutant said. “I resent each of you with as much hate as can exist in one man. I see the hour is late, and that my debut is, therefore, drawing to a close. Or so you think.”
This disquieted the revellers. They were no longer jolly, but the free-flowing booze kept them sick and disoriented. Some, as they looked up at the grinning Debutant, ventured to look higher and found themselves dizzy from the sheer height and great size of the art on the roof above. Several swooned and fell, which stirred up yet greater unrest.
The Debutant continued: “Your one common trait, dear guests, is that you have all, at this point or that, tried to kill me.” He paused to examine the many scowls that were fixed his way. “I see,” he mused once he was satisfied with looking upon them, “that I have struck up some buried memories among some of you.”
Silence fell. The crowd, at once, realized the truth he spoke. The Debutant’s father was deadpan in affect. Certainly, he knew he wasn’t the only one aching to slaughter his child. The Debutant was as aware of this as he was of every other attempt on his life.
“My party,” the Debutant said, “is not yet over. I have invited you all to celebrate my rejection and banishment of all unworthy things in my life. As a new man, I shun the filthy. I shun the unacceptable. I shun you. And now, I will be rid of you— forever.”
Half the crowd quaked with terror. The other half quaked with rage. The former attempted to storm out— though they soon realized they could do no such thing, thanks to the firmly locked door— while the latter hastily reinstated their plots to murder their accuser. The most furious among them slung glasses, cutlery, and chairs, all of which stopped short of the Debutant’s high ledge.
Above the feverish clamor of the crowd and the ceaseless thuds of hurtling objects, the Debutant whistled again and pulled at the collar of his shirt. This time, it was not a signal for the staff, but for the herald.
He boomed: “Ecce— veremini eum!”
The tops of each column supporting the hall imploded at once. The bursts syncopated, and the crash they created was louder than thunder. Every conscious reveller— for a few more had fainted with fear— turned their wild, unblinking stares skyward. The bas-reliefs, along with the stone ceiling they were etched into, plummeted down to Earth. The sight of the falling roof elicited a discordant, hundred-voiced shriek, the likes of which has only since been heard in Hell.
The mass scream was cut short as quickly as it began. In its place, a a great crackling resounded— this was the sound of thousands of bones breaking at once. Following that, by a fraction of a second, came the deafening drumbeat of the roof meeting the floor.