#21

You turns around and looks about twenty members of the Fennec Gang in the face.

“Hey guys,” You says nervously. “What's going on?”

“Not much,” they say, all speaking with one voice. “How 'bout You?”

As You reaches for the logo-badge sewn into the shirt of the dead man that You happens to be wearing, You sees then that all of the assembled members have the same face. And that face isn't Yours. In fact, a sort of coincidence is set up, in that the dead man's face is repeated on all of them.

You puts Your hands up in the air at once.

With their guns out, they begin to walk You “downtown”. You doesn't say anything, instead just focusing on maintaining a stiff upper lip. If You had an witty one-liners in the event of this exact thing happening, they're gone now; of course. L'esprit d'escalier, You figures (though naturally not in such exact terms).

“You should've figured that the logo-badge would have broadcast the news of our friend's death right to us,” one of the men says.

“Why would I think of that?” You asks, which is a relatively good question.

“I'm not sure either. In any case,” another says. “We're gonna make You part of the gate for The House.”

You blinks for a second, but with what emotion, You's not sure. “The House?”

“The House, yes! The glorious House which the Old Man brought to us, brought us up in, and then took away!”

“W-wait. Hold on. You bastards are cultists too?”

“I don't know whatcher talking about, but The House is the way back to the Great City, and You must go into the gate to open the latch.”

Cultists. Again. Yeah. Just my luck, You thinks. And to that, that reference to luck, You allows Yourself a bitter laugh.

In all seriousness, though, being caught by two cults in less than a week isn't a very good record. To say the least.

You could make another grab for Your weapons—they didn't take them this time. Unfortunately, You knows You doesn't have the combat skills to fight them all off. You does like the idea of being alive, still. You tries to think if there was anything useful that Madame Levingt told You; is the “Old Man” these guys are mentioning the same as the dude she brought up?

“Who is the Old Man?” You asks.

“Who's the Old Man, You says,” one of them chuckles. “He was a powerful magician, until he left us behind...locked away, from our birthplace and from our home. An age ago, that was...now the boredom is overtaking us and we need our little games.”

“Don't tell You too much, you fat freak!” another one yells, before punching him in the back of the head.

“You's going to die anyway,” says someone at the back.

“C'mon, now, though...just because it's a farking trope doesn't mean we have to do the whole 'Brag About the Plans to the Soon-to-Be Dead Man' bit here.”

“Well said. Though killing You with a trope...”

“Killing h̶i̶m̶ h̶i̶m̶ You h̶i̶m̶ HIM with a trope, you means? I mean, you mean?”

“Yeah. It'll make...this guy...a tastier target for whoever's sending The House back to us...”

“Burn him at the stake, then?”

“Is 'Burn the Witch' a trope? We could also use 'Kill It With Fire'.”

“Ooh, that's an Internet one. Why not?”

Several voices affirm that this sounds good to them. Then, there is talk of bringing You to the town square for a good old witch-burning. There's little You can do. If You make a break for it, You'll just get shot in the back, and there's no point in that. At least, so it seems. Perhaps later there will be an advantage towards suffering some sort of grievous bodily injury. (And bloody hell, You must be nervous again to be thinking thoughts this shitty.)

Soon enough, You is tied to a stake and some straw is placed at Your feet. The identical men around You begin to smile as one of them takes out a hilariously huge cigarette lighter. Things are happening too fast. You tries to make peace with Yourself. You doesn't try to think of those who are about to lose You, and instead just prepare for the grave. Things spiral around and begin to form the continuous stream of that “final flash”, the moment...

A guttural German scream sounds from the rooftops.

Klaus suddenly appears and begins to punch everyone in the face.

“Holy shit!” someone shuts. “Gun down that mother—” The speaker prefers to be a man of action and so empties a clip into Klaus' body. You can't look, and shut Your eyes just as You sees a quick flash of another Fennec throwing the cigarette lighter onto the straw.

However, with Your eyes closed, You hears the fight sounds continue. The Fennecs begin to scream and run away, their footsteps receding into the distance. The smell of smoke begins to fill Your nostrils, and You starts to choke, forcing Your eyes open. Through the smoke, You can see the gangsters retreated, but also a large shape; this shape begins to stamp out the flames with little care for personal risk. When the smoke clears, You realizes that this is Klaus.

Klaus has a number of bullet holes in him, but there's no blood—no leakage of any kind. Instead, the holes are just—holes, and now they're beginning to close. You can't see any sort of muscle or bone underneath the exposed flesh—he's just like a big marshmallow. The holes push out from the back forward and don't seem to be very deep.

“How did you—” You begins as he lets You free, but then You realizes that it must be the doll. Even though Klaus' body and soul were freed from entanglement with the doll, it must somehow still function as his body—or at least, the stand-in for his body. You takes a small smoldering stick and presses it against the doll's arm. Klaus howls angrily, and You quickly drops the stick. So Your companion is invincible, unless someone gets their hands on his doll. Good to know.

Klaus seems to be restraining his pissiness towards You, which is good. You sees several dead Fennecs lying on the ground. Their necks are broken, or they seem to have sustained too many blows to the crotch to sustain survival. Klaus is an ice cold motherfucker, You realizes, and You doesn't inspect the bodies too closely.

“Other ones might come,” You says. “We should keep moving.”

He nods, and the two of you get a move on.

You considers that this is the town square, and so you two must be in or near the center of the settlement. You looks around for any significantly large buildings, something that could be used to hold prisoners. Then You looks back at the stake grimly. You can't tell if it's been used lately, outside of what it was just used for. But You doesn't want to think about that right now.

Most of the buildings here seem to be roughly the same size. And, they are still made of that particularly gross material; not all of the buildings seem to have eyeballs, but You counts, as casually as possible, several fingers and toes hanging out from the walls. You wonders what they must look like on the inside, with the knowledge that You will probably have to blindly explore a lot of them. There are no signs and no convenient markers about. The situation seems hopeless.

As You searches, however, Klaus begins to wander off. You decides to keep an eye on him this time, and begins to follow him; wherever he's going, he has a purpose. You goes into what is revealed to be an alley in pursuit of him, and by the time You reaches him, he's already begun to crank on a wheel that emerges from the wall, connected to a sliding grate...made out of bones. This suddenly surges at You as too much, however ridiculous of a notion that is, given all else. You needs a break.

We cut briefly to Klaus, who watches the strange young man suddenly sit down, trying to look away from the flesh wall. He feels HIS thoughts course through HIS head, each of them jumping to conclusions and passing judgments. Most of them are directed at Klaus, who feels a twinge of anger—it's not his fault that he has the "cheat sheet" to all of this. But then, it really is, isn't it...? Du erneuert selbst, um dieses Spiel für ihn zu lösen. (Not so good German, of course, but that was also part of it.) He sees the boy turn to him suddenly, HIS face ablaze with...fear. And that's the answer, natürlich. It always is in these games. And this is a very unnatural game. The boy isn't prepared for this, and it's only going to get worse. Klaus wants to say something, to warn HIM of what's ahead—but of course it wouldn't come out right anyway. He's seen to that.

You chokes back a sob and gives a hard look at Klaus, who undoubtedly thinks You's crazy. Fuck him. You stands up and begins to walk through the now-opened grate. Inside, You sees everything is made out of metal, like a real building—mercifully. Klaus comes inside, despite Your knotted face, and he points toward a lever. You sees what this is all is now—it's an elevator car. The lever only has two positions: up (where it is now) and down. So wherever it leads is...below the city. Lovely.

“Is this really a good idea?”

Klaus nods.

“Alright.”

And You pulls the lever down. It's a start. Like You said, it's going to be a long search if Your people are even still here. Have to start somewhere.

The elevator begins to descend with a small lurch. It's a loud elevator and suddenly You feels concerned that they're going to hear You use it. Still, there's nothing that can be done. Once it arrives, just move fast and stay hidden. There's no way of knowing what to expect, except for maybe a fight. You takes out Your spear and Your knife and gets ready.

The elevator sinks for about four minutes, which is strange because it's moving relatively quickly. Klaus looks concerned, but in an untrue way, while You begins to wonder how far down this does go. You looks around, trying to see through the grate. There are no other floors; just long, rusty walls. You can peek out of the cage for a little bit and look down, but there's almost no light—nothing aside from an unshielded fuelbulb which snaps on weakly overhead.

It takes about eight minutes total for the cage to reach a destination. This might be a more promising outlet than You first thought. What's down here?

The door opens into a hallway leading left and right. There's a dirty tile floor and very little lighting. You can barely hear, much less see, anything at all.

As You begins to feel a cold breeze from down one end of the hall, You begins to hope that this isn't where Your loved ones are. Because this whole situation is starting to become very unsettling indeed.