Arc II, Chapter 67: Up to Speed

“The Spirit of Vengeance requires a delicate touch,” Madam Celia said after we had gathered inside and settled in the downstairs living room. “You were supposed to use its magic once and then return the flask. My sister tells me that you have sent it after half the town and now the flask is missing?”

“I didn’t say it was missing,” Cassie said. “The guy who had it said he ditched it, but I don’t know.”

The conversation involved a little bit of backtracking. I got the feeling Carousel was just using it to provide editing options to help tell the story.

Madam Celia was apparently Cassie’s sister in this story. She was also an NPC, not a player, so there were no meta-chats. There were plenty of lore chats, though.

“The Spirit takes on the essence of that sin it avenges,” she said. “It chokes drowners with a watery grave, arsonists with ashes, and all manner of evil with evil in kind.”

We let that realization wash over us. We kind of figured that, but it was good for our characters to understand.

“Gale Zaragoza died in a supposed accident,” I said. “Hence the bad luck wafting every which way.”

Isaac cursed.

“What do we do?” Cassie said. “If the Spirit grows too strong, then the town is doomed. Not just the Geists. Everyone.”

“That is not our concern, sister,” Celia said. “We will be moving on. If what you say is true, then we have no further business here.”

Madam Celia was playing a shady evil psychic in this story, but she still stood with the poise and elegance she always had. She was not much of an actor. I could tell she felt it was beneath her.

Cassie and Celia bickered for a while longer until Celia said, “The Spirit needs a host. As long as it has one, it will only grow in power until it has completed its duty.”

“How do we take away its host?” I asked. “Can its body be killed?”

Celia paused and then said, “It will maintain authority over its host regardless of your actions. None of you have a better claim to the host than it does.”

There was a brief pause of confusion.

“You never told me about this. Who could have a claim to the host?” Cassie asked.

We were suddenly Off-Screen.

That was odd. Premature. Something else must have happened to take attention away from us. Normally, we would just wait for our turn again, but then Celia picked up her bags and started to leave.

She couldn’t speak out of character; even Off-Screen, she was limited. She turned to Cassia and then to each of us. She rested on Ramona, who had sat cross-armed in a chair for the entire scene, perplexed.

“Venture forth. Tiny victories. Tiny defeats. That is the way. Do not lose heart.”

Then she left.

~-~

When the door closed, Isaac said, “Wait, is that the lady who writes the fortunes for the fortune cookies? I need her autograph.”

Cassie shoved him. “Be serious.”

“Things are going pretty well, aren’t they?” Kimberly asked. She moved next to Antoine. They had not seen each other in weeks, though Antoine had reportedly been “taken off the board” for much of that time. He was really starting to withdraw inward, but he definitely perked up now that Kimberly was back around.

No one had seen Dina. The photo of her with pre-Die Cast Gale Zaragoza was the only clue we had that she existed. Cassie didn’t even have her vitals on the red wallpaper. She was in the wind.

Bobby was in the kitchen looking through my shelves and fridge for food. There was a ton of it.

“I’ve been parking out on a farmer’s land out east,” Bobby said. “His wife makes me fresh-cooked meals, and they have a fenced-in place for the dogs. I just woke up there and never left. Still, I can’t say I’m not jealous of what you’ve got going on here.” He eyeballed the pseudo-modernist glass house my character lived in.

“Thanks,” I said.

Now that someone had commented on it, everyone piled on.

“Oh my god, Riley, this place is so tacky,” Kimberly laughed. It was hard to argue when she and Antoine were sitting in a chair that was shaped like a giant red hand.”

“Yeah, well, it’s home,” I said as I scooped some tortilla chips into a bowl and started making nachos.

We shared our accounts of the places we had been staying.

Ramona and I were in the glass house my tool of a character had designed, likely with his eyes closed.

Antoine slept in a spare room of a halfway house, and the woman who owned the place provided meals.

“There are multiple unmarked graves in the back,” he said. “There are spots where the grass grows greener, and the landlady always has a creepy smile.”

He concluded that she belonged to a horror story of her own and was just filling in for this one.

“Between that and seeing my daughter every other weekend, I’ve had work at a mill a couple of days, but mostly, I just jumped forward weeks at a time.”

He wasn’t under the scrutiny of a Geist. He didn’t need to be around all the time like I did. We all knew Carousel could put us in stasis or whatever it did. It had demonstrated that power multiple times. It had never done so to this extent, however.

Cassie slept in a travel trailer with her “sister.” They were fly-by-night psychics who sold magic elixirs and palm readings. Of course, if you asked correctly, they sold more than that.

“She used magic to make a man break up with his fiancé,” Cassie said. “It was a whole ordeal. The first thing we did in the story. I guess we aren’t nice little witches.”

“Carousel really has your number, huh?” Isaac said. He got punched.

Kimberly had a loft in the entertainment district with a tab at the bar downstairs paid for by Geist Productions. She wanted for nothing except Antoine. She could even plunder the costume department for clothes. She was happier than she had ever been. I couldn’t blame her. I would have taken clothes too if I had thought of it.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

Most of their month had been uneventful if it happened at all. Except one thing. Future Mayor Roderick Gray. He had been in and out of Antoine, Cassie, and Isaac’s stories.

“Acted funny,” Cassie said. “Asked Celia about the flask, weird questions. He said he threw it away. He was lying. I didn’t need Moxie to tell me that. Said he was worried someone else might find it and use it. He wondered if that was something to worry about. Celia brushed him off.”

Isaac and Antoine reported similar encounters.

“He didn’t talk to me,” I said. “Wasn’t I a part of the cabal?”

“Maybe he saw the house and thought better than to come,” Isaac said.

They were just jealous.

“You’re just jealous,” I said.

“Wait,” Antoine said. “Where have you been staying, Isaac?”

Isaac had fixed himself a plate of nachos and salsa dip. He sat on the long fainting couch with a great big grin and started telling his tale.

“I’ve been crashing in a furniture store,” Isaac chuckled. “They’ve got snacks in the vending machine that I’ve been munching on. I guess I have Bobby’s food trope to thank for that.”

Cassie laughed. “You’ve been eating like, cheese puffs and beef jerky or what?”

“No. Wrapped subs and tuna and crackers. Fresh-cut fruit snacks. Cobb salad. This place has ridiculous snacks. It’s one of those machines with revolving plates, and you pick a plate, and it spins to your selection and opens up.”

“How has that been free?” Antoine asked. “Doesn’t a vending machine cost money?”

We had no money anymore.

“Nope,” Isaac said. “It’s broken. Customers have to ask us to unlock it, and then they pay at the register. All I have to do is write down what I take and pay the guy that fills it right from the till.”