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His finger hovered over the switch, hanging like the Sword of Damocles in the air before it. So close to his final goal, the Batter read aloud the prompt to his player, already knowing what their decision would be.
“The switch is ON,” he said. Their choice was already set in stone. He prepared to take the final action and to face oblivion.
Flip the switch
Do Nothing
His finger didn’t move. It hung in the air, then lowered to his side.
Do nothing. They’d chosen to do nothing. He frowned, though they could not see it. There was no other choice for them to make, yet they were prolonging the end.
Why? It wasn’t as if they were the one who’d cease to be. He’d been preparing for this final act since he was created, shaped from oblivion by the desire of a frightened god seeking freedom. That had been the first half of his creation.
The second, however, had come from another god, namely, the one guiding him now. The Player.
He could defy them. He should. But they’d taken him this far, and he trusted them. If they were delaying the end, it was for a reason.
Usually. They made stupid decisions on occasion. He wouldn’t claim to understand them (though it was always apparent when they were struggling with an easily solvable puzzle). This decision was likely one of those: something stupid done to increase their time playing the game that was his world, or something done to perhaps increase their perception of his “enjoyment”.
That was stupid, too. He didn’t feel much of anything besides drive and purpose. The roller coaster had been an exception, and not one he was willing to discuss. Those photos hadn’t been worth much at Zacharie’s store, and they certainly weren’t much to him then–or now.
Whatever stupid reason they had for refusing to flip the switch, he didn’t much care about. It would be flipped, the world would be purified, and their game would end. It was just a matter of time.
The tug of their command at the back of his mind ordered him to step away from the switch. He turned around and took a few steps, past the dead shape of the Judge on the floor. A crueler mind would have kicked what was left of his former aid.
The Batter felt no strong desire to harm or help it. The call of the switch on the wall was like a song in his ear. Yet the tug of the Player’s control was louder.
They ordered him to examine the Judge.
“He’s dead,” he said, and that was all. That was the only observation to make. There was nothing more to the dead cat besides its current state. He held no love, no concern, no care for it. It was a cat that had helped him at the start, whom he’d bludgeoned to death after it betrayed him.
The Player ordered him to examine it again.
“He’s dead.” More of this nonsense. How many times did he have to tell them the state of a dead body?
The Player ordered him to step away, taking swift steps back to the entrance of the room. Then they ordered him to open his inventory. He did so, displaying his status and his add-ons.
Not one of them was damaged. The Judge had been a poor combatant, and at every scratch he’d delivered, the Player had ordered the Batter to heal. They seemed to have quite a concern for his health. Perhaps a more feeling soul would have felt affection from the action.
The Player’s influence drifted over him, then his add-ons. It checked his equipment, then theirs. It delved into his inventory and ordered him to use a luck ticket on himself. There was no effect. Then it ordered him to use silver flesh, restoring his CC to full.
He was growing impatient. There was no use healing the points. Soon he wouldn’t be feeling anything. Why were they delaying?
Aggravated, he forcibly closed his inventory.
“The switch,” he said aloud to the Player. It was all that was left. Surely, they’d get the message.
They ordered him to leave the room. He begrudgingly obeyed. Back down the long hallway he walked, his crimson footsteps staining the white floor. All the way back to the room where he’d murdered Hugo did he walk, until he had returned to the same spot he’d stood in mere minutes before.
There were no exits in this room. He could not seek out Zacharie or return to the throne room. There was nowhere to go but back to the switch. Yet still, the Player ordered him to examine every wall and search for an exit that didn’t exist.
He grew tired of it after the second loop.
“The switch,” he said again, this time with more force. “All that’s left is the switch.”
The Player closed his text box and ordered him to walk back up the hall, past his prior set of crimson footsteps. They then had him examine every wall along the way. His anger was beginning to boil in his chest, and the grip upon his bat grew tighter.
‘Enough,” he said at last, after examining five walls. “All that’s left is the switch.” When they ordered him to examine the wall again, he refused. “I’m not doing that.”
There was a moment of no input. Then, finally, he was guided back the way he’d come. There was the Judge’s corpse, still fresh on the floor. There was the switch, awaiting his touch.
“Let’s finish this, Player,” he said, walking towards it. The only thing that stopped him was the Player opening his inventory again. Begrudgingly, he permitted them to do so.
INVENTORY
EQUIPMENT
SETTINGS
Settings?
QUIT TO MAIN MENU
QUIT TO DESKTOP
They selected the latter.
No.
NO!
He closed his inventory and their menu, defying them.
“The switch,” he repeated, gritting his teeth. “It’s time to finish this.”
The Player attempted to open the menu again. He refused.
“The. Switch,” he practically spat. “Flip. The. Switch.”
Batter walked right up to it, holding his hand out again. All the Player had to do was select “Flip the switch”. One key press, one tap, and it was over. He wanted to do it himself, would have, if the damn world would let him. If it had, he certainly wouldn’t have been reliant on this other god.
No inputs were given. He waited, and waited, and waited. Nothing happened. The Player was directly ignoring him, or perhaps trying to wait him out. That was fine. He could wait. So long as they wanted to fight, he could offer the same in return.
A second input tacked into his mind. It was an input that was difficult to understand, one that existed beyond his world, yet directly affected it. It was the same sensation he’d had during his creation, that of powerful, foreign entities working nearby to provide shape to something that wasn’t even aware it yet lived.
It was the formation of another god–no, a lower entity, a program of the Player’s–taking shape, just outside of his world. And this one, it was designed to destroy. To end the tasks which were in defiance of the Player’s will.
Their final act of defiance against his will was to prevent him from ever achieving his purpose.
The Batter did not consider himself particularly emotional. He felt little beyond his resolve, and emotions beyond that were often related to it. He’d been alive for a short time, but he’d never cried, never smiled, never screamed, and certainly never exploded with rage. If he had emotions towards his Player, they were rudimentary at best, based around necessity and nothing more. For all he knew the Player would lead him into death for their entertainment, and he’d just have to accept that.
But the actions his Player was taking against him, this far into their journey together, broke something in him. It was a wall that he’d had without even knowing it existed, a bond that had been forged with the understanding it would never be broken–not by them. He’d never felt betrayal like he did in that moment.
It awoke something in him he hadn’t known was there.
“No. No. No, NO!” His eyes rose to the sky, to where he knew the Player watched from far away. He couldn’t see them, but he felt their gaze upon him. “We are almost DONE, you are NOT leaving NOW!”
He grabbed the switch, feeling the cold metal on his skin.
“FLIP IT! FLIP THE DAMN SWITCH!” He screamed. The Player was silent. Then their gaze moved away, back to their other program, their own sword of damocles.
“NO!” He released the switch and swiped at the air with a clawed hand, as if he could somehow grab the Player and drag them down here. “STOP IGNORING ME! THIS IS OUR LAST TASK! FINISH IT! PURIFY THIS GAME WITH ME!”
The Player’s gaze returned for just a moment. It lingered upon him, a strange dread sinking into it at the shape it now beheld. With its attention locked, the Batter noticed something he hadn’t before:
There were strings, so thin and small and delicate, they had gone unnoticed by even him, extending from his wrists. No, not just his wrists. They wrapped around his wrists, poured out from his chest, wrapped around his back, even found their way around his neck.
They were the physical manifestations of the Player’s control over him, the puppeteer strings that only the Judge and Zacharie had ever seen.
His claws closed around them, his gaze following them to the darkness above. And when he spoke, it was with a voice barely his own:
“You’re not going anywhere.”
Without thinking, he jerked them violently.
A sound like the shattering of glass echoed throughout what remained of The Room. He heard cracking overhead, followed by pieces of raw code and data falling around him. The numbers caused his head to hurt and made his body shudder. But he maintained his grip and pulled even harder.
The world shook around him. The Player’s gaze was full of fear. Something about that made a sadistic feeling in his chest swell. His sharp grin was full of teeth.
“Get down here,” he growled, “and flip. The Damn. Switch.”
One final jerk. The world shook like an earthquake around him. Wind that hadn’t existed seconds before almost knocked him over. And over it all the sound cracked, spilling its shards into the room around him.
There was a light, a light so damnably bright he was momentarily blinded. Batter closed his eyes as lancets of pain stabbed into them and ran the length of his skull. Blinking, all he could see were spots, dark and brilliant at the same time, which gradually began to fade along with the light of the room.
Wait, what? The world was pure. It was nothing but white. How was it growing dark?
Which was when the sound of gasping found its way to his ears. Still partially blind, Batter turned his gaze in the direction of the sound, which wheezed and heaved over and over, growing weaker by the second.
There was something lying on the ground where the Judge had been. All that was left of the cat was its bloodstains, some of which had found their way onto the entity.
It was almost impossible to describe. A creature from another dimension, its shape was non-euclidean; even half blind, Batter could tell that no angle he observed it from would produce the same image in his head. From where he stood he thought he saw a creature made of eyes with square pupils, only for him to blink and observe a cat made entirely of bones instead.
He rubbed his eyes, waited for the spots to clear, and looked again. This time, the creature was made of starlight dotted with red X’s. Somehow, its body was rising and falling, over and over.
It was struggling to breathe. Besides its heaves, it did not move.
He stared at it, unready to blink again and witness a new shape. This was it. The gaze that he had grown so familiar with was now in front of him, gasping and shaking, struggling to survive in its new environment.
Struggling. To survive. The realization of what he’d done hit him all at once. The Player could not survive in his world. It could not breathe smoke. It could not stand the touch of metal. It could not take the light of purity now rushing into it. Trapped in a dimension simpler than what it had been born into, its body was undergoing horrible transformations at every second, reducing it from its true state into something unrecognizable.
It was dying. The Player–his Player–was dying. And with them, his mission.
“No. Wait. No.” The words escaped him without thinking. He moved to the Player’s side, blinking once. In the millisecond of darkness it became half of a plastic pedalo, losing much of its prior size. “No. No no no no no you can’t die now. I still need you to purify this world. Player–”
The Player coughed, then choked. Their small body shook from the action, then convulsed. Something fluid spilled out, indescribable in color.
“No.” He grabbed them, blinking once and witnessing them change from pedalo to a glitched block. They fit easily in his two hands as he turned and ran to the switch, grabbing it. “Come on. The switch is ON. You know what to do.”
The heaving of breath felt as if it was next to his ears. The block did not move. He could feel the tug of the Player’s will at the back of his mind again. It had nothing to do with the switch.
They were terrified, and they wanted to be held closer to his chest. They were dying, and they wanted warmth. For their last moments, they wanted to feel safe.
“No…” The word fell from his mouth like his hand from the damnable switch.
He turned his gaze to their pathetic form, which was now nothing more than a glowing ball of light. The purity of the world was fading, the brilliant white of before seeming to drain along with the Player’s life. From just a cursory glance, he could tell that the shards and the code had taken their toll. The world, now broken, was starting to collapse.
He’d pulled the switch without his Player’s input. It wasn’t the one he was scripted to ever touch. The action had cost them their life.
Was costing them their life. When he looked at them again, cradled in his hands, held against his chest, he could see they’d stopped changing shape. The extra-dimensional god had become nothing more than an orb of slowly diminishing light, and it would never be more than that again. The world–his world–was going to end, impure, as they absorbed the last of it and then went out.
He’d failed his purpose and his Player by attempting to force them.
The edges of the room were crumbling away. Batter held his Player tight as he watched the world ending around him. One final tug at the edge of his mind told him of their last desire:
Warmth. More warmth. Not enough. Deeper. Closer. So cold. So open. Deeper. Closer.
More warmth. Not enough. Deeper. Closer. He supposed he could do that. It wasn’t like they weren’t both about to be dropped into oblivion.
Bringing the Player to his lips, he whispered a quick apology.
“Sorry. It’ll be quick for us both, at least.”
And with only minor hesitation, he swallowed the orb of their dying shape. The last gasp of their breath sounded in his ear.
Divinity tasted like fire and ozone. Consuming it felt equally so. No sooner had he engulfed their body than did they his.
It was a sudden, violent, fiery pain, the worst he’d ever felt in his life. He opened his mouth to scream and couldn’t. True agony strangled his voice, shut out his thoughts and his mind, wrapped him in its embrace and choked every ounce of smoke from his lungs. He died, horribly, in that moment, the very ground crumbling beneath his feet as his body dropped into expected oblivion.
It was not quick. It was not painless. And as time slowed to a crawl, he was sure it would never end.
—
The world was dark. It was alive. When he opened his eyes he saw nothing, but he felt a presence, one that was familiar and comforting. He hadn’t truly had a good word for it before, so focused on his mission for purity that he’d disregarded any alternate emotions.
NEW GAME
CONTINUE
QUIT
The presence within him moved, selecting the first option.
—
Color returned all at once, alongside the familiar structures of Zone 0. The Batter felt himself manifest all at once, though it was not the same as when he’d been originally formed. Instead of falling from the sty like a star, he built himself up from the ground, a million tiny threads wrapping around each other to form a shape. He had memories, memories of a life previously lived, a mistake made, of a world ruined, of a Player–
Oh. His Player. He paused, feeling his body over. It was intact, as expected. The presence of his Player, however, was much stronger than before. It no longer hung at the back of his mind. There was a warmth in his chest, an unfamiliar feeling, one that he’d never quite felt before.
‘̷̩͍̄͜S̸̖͖͌̉̉̒̂́̚͘͜͝o̵̡̰͙͓͉͓̪͖͚͙̕ ̴̡̡̭̦̞͙̘͇̯̬̂̆̀̈́t̷̢͚̩̯͉̙͎̿̾̇̉͂͘̕h̵̋͜į̴̳̿͂̏̓̓͐̋̌́͆͘͠s̶̖̪̙͚͍̗̻͈̪̻̽͛͜ ̷̳̥̻͓̺̬͙̟̺͕̱͖͎͋̌ḭ̴̧̡͙͖̹͎̺̟̤̋̑̔̇͐͗̔s̵̪̮̘̠͉̹̤̔̔͜ͅ ̴̙̺͕̼̙̌̈́̽̀͊̚͜͝t̴̡̩͕͇̻̭͎͓̫̦͓̯̓̐̏͂̾͌͆̀͐́͆̑̅́͘h̴̨̫̹̪̩͍̞͖̞͍̱͓͂̎͒̀̎́͂̐̍̕̚ẽ̴̜͚̞͉̺̳̺͚̞̣͙͍͇͚͊̄̏̊̿̀̾̚͠͝ ̸̧͎̬̮̭̣̗̟̥̻̲̮̣̖̒̔̋́̿ẉ̶̨̱͙͉̘͂̅͆͆̉͂̆ō̶̦̤̦͚̙̦̮̬̠̹͒̇̍̋̅͌̀r̸͈̘̦̿̎͐̉̃́̇̆̅͘l̷̟̒̓d̴̨̨̹̼̰͔̺͚̣͍̩̊̌̑̍̀̈́̔̀͌̕̚͝͠ ̷̡̛̮̳̝͚̫̎͆̄̈̄̿̎̓̓̀̚̚f̵̭̙͋̓͌̊̌̈́͠͝r̸̫͈͙͍̹̙͎̭͌̌͆̚o̷͚̺̩̥̯͔̖̞̱͒̑̓̀̐̔̐̀͂̽̑̀̚̕͝m̷͚̲̤̂̒̾̑́͑̊̓̒̈́̇̍͠ ̶̳̩̠͉̳̦̬̉̂̂̋̎͂̉̒̉͗̏͑y̵̡̠͈̞̥̻͓̝͍͖̙͙͎͒͆̌̇͌̃̃̾͠ö̶̢̮͍͕́̾̈̋̄͐͆̓͘u̸̡͇͎̦̹̮͚̲͓̫̭̙̓̽͛͑̓͗̑̐͜͜͝ŕ̷̟̠̟̳̤̙͇͚͎̙̐͌̐͌̉͒̾͂͝ͅ ̸̧̛̜̱̳̜̞͉͉̙͒̂̊̓̏͆̇̔̾̔̎͂̆͝p̴̱̫̭̮̹͔̖̬̰̳͇̦͗̄̋̒́̄ͅḛ̶̡͕̙́̉̈́̀̍̓̾̃̆̽̕̕r̷̞̻̝͚̻̗̲͔̦͛̓͐̓̉̊̋͗̋̓̑̊͜͠s̵̱̯̣̦̱̹̏͗̓͂̎͌̌̈́͠͝ͅp̴͚̘͕̜͈͎͌̓̀̐͆͋̉̒̄͐͐̂̐͘͜͠ͅe̵̗̦̔̂̌̈́͂̀̿̈͒́͋̐̚c̶̡̛̙̜̯̻̯͓̳̞̩̰̲̻͙̀̒̓̈́́͐̄̋̈́͒̊͗͌̊t̸̯̥̙̘̠̐̉̑̒̈̓̔̍̈͌̊͋ͅi̸̯̠̮̻͙̱̽̓v̷̢̨̨̭̪̹̪͕͈̬̌̍̂̒͗͘͜͝é̸̛͙͍͓̇́̿̆͐́͌̒͠͠.̶̫̱̑͐͌͐’̸̮̰͔̕̚̕͘͠
The voice pounded so violently in his head he grabbed it, the resulting headache knocking him to his knees. Before he’d even hit the ground, vomit poured from between his lips. It splatted to the floor, dark and bloody, ruining his white pants.
Oh, right. There were consequences to swallowing a god.
“̷̡̜̜̹̞̝͉̋̿̒̅̈́̄̚͜ͅŞ̵̪͔̘̩̳͚̪̲̟̓̔͠o̸̧͈͍̥̝̫͖͇͉̠̝̒̑͐͌́͊̀͐r̵̤͈͍̮̈́̅̽̅͑̈́r̸͉͍͈̗͚̈͆̐̍̈́͑͋͒͛̀͑̀̚y̷̢̡͎͇̰̘͖̪̿̎̂͋̃͒̊̍͜.̴̻̪̲̺̣͖́̆̉̀̈́̈́͐̽̀͌͜͝ ̷̢͓̹͙͇͖͍̼̜̹̠̏̓̓̈͆͒̃̋̑̉̀̄͝Ÿ̶̯͍̬̥́́o̷̠̍̃̈́̈́̾u̵̱̝̳̪̯͎̳̮̼̥̱̘͍̝̿͜ȑ̶̰̩̤̭̭̤̲͕͉̈́͘ͅ ̸̱̞̻͙̱͍̩̫̲̺͂̊̄̎̎͗̂̈́̂̒̍̐̚͠b̵̛̤̠̰̩̫̫̼͎͚̟̣̼͈̥͗̈́̈́́̒̃̒͗̔́͘̕o̵̡̻̬̣͔͈̳̩̲͇̝͍̾̽̒̈̏͊͆̊͗̇̑͝d̵̪͇̺͛̅̈̇̊̐̈́͂͗͊͌̋͘̚͝ỵ̵͐̐̿͘͝ ̸̖̺̋̓̂̀̄̉͋́̆̄͝͝͝ỉ̶͎̻̖̻̿͛̌̔̈̾̔͜s̶̡̛̞͉͖̣̩̿͐̈̂͜͠ͅ ̴̧̻̦̺́͠s̶̨̥̠̼̹͇̙̗͈̝͈̙̲̊͑͒̔͛͆̈͋̐̚͜͜ẗ̴̯̼͈̻̣̟̯̠̠̰̭͓̫͉͚́̈r̸̢̛̮͔̹à̵̡̡̯̘̙̳̭͚̩̠͙̮̱̆͌͜ñ̴̡̢͖͍̮̠̽̿́̎g̸̪͖̭̀̋͘͜ę̵̧̞̜̩̼̥͍̽̈̋͆͂͋̈́̈́̈̾͝͠ͅ.̴̡̟̩̬͉̻̪͙̄͊̎̓̍̈́̈̂̕͝”̶͎͖̬͕̘̣͕̰̞͍͛̒͘
He coughed and gagged, freeing up another glob of something that might have previously been his stomach. It didn’t hurt, strangely.
“Stop–stop,” he gasped, moving a hand from his head to his chest. Right there, situated somewhere in his chest. He’d trapped a god in his chest. He could feel them somewhere in there as hundreds of threads looped around his ribs, interlocking with his ribcage. They were comfortable in the new environment of his body.
What an idiot decision. He should have let oblivion take them both.
It took him longer to recover than he’d like. Slowly, he moved to his feet, still keeping one hand on his chest, his fingers like a cage over it.
“Don’t talk,” he whispered out, throat sore from the vomiting. “Guide me as you did before. Don’t talk.”
The Player listened, though this time, it was not their desire at the back of his head that caused him to move. Their presence, warm and solid in his chest, grabbed hold of his entire body, forcing it to move. He had no control, no way to stop, and no way to fight it.
He’d swallowed a god, and now, he truly was nothing more than their puppet. And if their reaction to his prior mission was anything to go off of, they would not permit a repeat this time around.
“Wait–” he began, then trailed off, unsure of what to say. They were heading towards the structures of Zone 0, moving at a pace that unnerved him–it was as if they were more at home in his body than he himself was. “Stop. My Player. What happened…”
He was bad at words, actually. The actions spoke louder than them, anyways–he couldn’t bring himself to take his hand from his chest. Every breath he took, he felt tenfold, as if too much smoke was filling his lungs, making him dizzy. The molten plastic looked shinier than ever. And the metal making up the structures of Zone 0 had a new beauty to them, one he’d never seen before.
“I need a moment,” he said at last, moving himself to the edge of the land and staring into the plastic. There was his reflection, gazing back at him.
And in his eyes, normally hidden by his hat, he saw a strange light, the colors of which did not and could not exist in this world. It was his Player, gazing out through him.
It disturbed him slightly, and he looked away. In the distance, he could see the Judge atop one of Zone 0’s structures, keen gaze trained on his kneeling form. The game was waiting for him to proceed, and if the tugging from his Player was any indication, they wanted him to do so as well.
But there were additional thoughts crowding Batter’s mind, more than just the horrible strings in his chest and the burning in his throat. His Player was with him now, even if neither of them wanted this situation. In their previous life, the one they’d surely both died in, his Player had refused to take their final action. They had refused to purify the world.
His holy mission, handed to him by his creator, had gone unfulfilled. The only one capable of stopping it was now within him, controlling him, and had begun the world anew.
How was he supposed to purify this world now?
The Player urged him to stand. His legs obeyed their will, his waist turning and his body following suit. Without the desire to continue he walked in the direction of the Judge.
And whether he was ready to face it or not, the game properly began.