Book Six, Chapter 56: Daphne V

The final battle was going to take place on the roof. Daphne thought it was a nice change of venue. The hotel could be a bit cramped despite its size. At the end of the day, one part of a labyrinth looked like any other part.

Of course, as she rounded the landing and started up the interior stairs toward the exit onto the roof, she went On-Screen.

When she had staged Logan’s murder up here, she had done so mostly Off-Screen. That was rare enough; it meant she would probably have to explain his fate soon.

Finales were such terrible times for banal exposition, but this storyline had not gone as smoothly as she would have liked, and doing some final cleanup would be a welcome finishing touch.

Now that she was in the Finale, memories of past storylines were flooding her mind. Those blackmailers had somehow gotten the drop on her this time in a way they never had before. She sometimes struggled, sure, but this was different. There were multiple storylines, a considerable portion of them, where she managed to take out the random assortment of blackmailers before Second Blood or even earlier.

On several occasions, she had poisoned them all before the first body was discovered. Those storylines had been a cakewalk. This one had caused her to stumble, but only slightly.

She had been put in a time crunch when they had decided to kill Antoine and accelerate the storyline out of the Party Phase.

No matter. The past was the past.

She knelt down on the carpet right outside the exit door. She could hear the storm raging on the other side. She showed no fear, only a hunting instinct, a cleverness that could justify her tracking her prey all the way up here.

She ran her fingers along the carpet. It was moist. Someone with wet shoes had just come by here.

That was how she would explain it, maybe not out loud, but her biggest fans would put it together. She had followed the wet footprints of whoever was waiting for her on the other side of the door, whether it be Riley, Kimberly, or both.

Carousel was quite funny when it came to chases where multiple players were running toward the same place, but not together. Who got there first or last would all come down to Hustle and no other sort of logic. There was no wiggle room like with normal Chase Scenes.

She wasn’t exactly sure how she stacked up on Hustle against Kimberly. It didn’t matter. She had more experience.

She peeked through the window. Logan’s body still lay in the rain, but the axe she had planted in it was missing. Now she knew for certain she was only the latest person to the party.

That didn’t faze her one bit. These players were arrogant enough to banter with her in hopes of a better score. She hoped to make that their final mistake.

It was just as well that they took the axe. Bloody kills were not her modus operandi if it could be helped. She might have a couple in a movie. The audience didn’t always like her after a brutal killing, and it could be really difficult to tell what made one kill exciting and another shameful. Everything she did came down to audience appreciation.

It was like she had her own focus group whispering in her ears at all times. The customer was always right, after all.

She burst through the door, losing her fierce gaze and replacing it with a confused, tearful one. It would be lost on Riley, the player. Somehow, he had been able to take her love and throw it away like it didn’t even matter. But he was also smart enough to know that his character would be conflicted and would not be ready to accept his new wife’s hobby.

He would play his part.

Most of her grooms were so caught up in their love for her that they hardly even counted as players. Even after the truth was revealed, she was able to give them that perfect happiness, something they would never find anywhere else in Carousel or the many worlds, as the Narrators called them.

But Riley had resisted. She wanted to pin him down and get him to talk, to explain how he could just ignore their love. Even at the beginning of the storyline, he was so hesitant.

She thought he was just shy.

The rain fell on her like a heavy blanket. It was warm summer rain, like being reborn.

“Riley,” she called out. “Please. You have to listen to me.”

She probably sounded like a broken record now. Usually, a line like that would work. They always wanted to listen. They always wanted to believe that there was some secret reason for everything that didn’t involve Daphne being the bad guy.

Twenty feet away, through a haze of rain, she could hear something banging against a utility shed. It had been there earlier.

Patio furniture.

There usually was no patio furniture on the roof. She had been up here countless times. But here it was.

Who in their right mind would think that was a good idea?

Because of the storm, it had been chained up so that it wouldn’t blow away, everything from tables to chairs to beach umbrellas.

Had she accidentally brought that into the storyline when she brought the storm? It would make sense that you’d need some environmental sound for the finale. You couldn’t have a storm where nothing blew away.

“You,” a voice cried out behind her after she had walked a few steps.

It wasn’t Riley. He was nowhere to be seen. It was Kimberly. She had found the axe, the oh-so-special axe.

It wouldn’t matter. Carousel was reliable in a lot of ways. If Kimberly were really about to slay her, Carousel would want one last confrontation with the groom.

Kimberly might be able to avoid such a delay, but Daphne doubted it.

“I knew you were a problem from the beginning,” Kimberly said. “You were just too nice. Too good. Too funny. Too in love.”

So it would be a cat fight. Usually, that sort of thing was a Final Girl move.

“Too good for Riley?” Daphne asked. “I hope he isn’t hiding around here to hear you say that.”

“Too good to be true,” Kimberly clarified.

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“You have me there,” Daphne said with a shrug and a nod. “Guilty as charged.”

She watched the way Kimberly moved sideways, encircling Daphne. Was that a strategy, or was she building up the nerve to charge in and attack?

Kimberly hadn’t held a weapon like that many times. Daphne knew. She held it more like a shield than an axe. It was held closely to her chest, as if she were afraid Daphne might steal it.

“It was you, wasn’t it?” Daphne said. “You were always the worm whispering in Riley’s ear. You were always the reason that he was out of arm’s reach. That he could never love me as much as he wanted to.”

Bringing the meta into the story was a quick and easy way to tie a bow on a storyline. It made acting easier, too.

“I didn’t say anything to him,” Kimberly said, playing off Daphne quite well. “If you feel that he didn’t trust you, it’s because you aren’t as good of a liar as you thought you were.”

“No,” Daphne said. “I am.”

She was enjoying the energy. The rain had cleared a bit just on the roof. Carousel must have been having trouble getting good footage. She now had full visibility.

Kimberly would get one swing, and only one, and then Daphne would put her down quickly. What a shame. Hopefully, the audience would understand. They liked Kimberly, but they would have to get over that.

Off-Screen.

“What? Really?” Daphne asked, as if talking to the sky itself. “We were right in the middle of the final confrontation. Who did they even go Off-Screen to?”

“Probably Riley,” Kimberly said, almost hesitant to speak to Daphne in such a meta manner.

“No. Riley is behind the patio furniture,” Daphne answered.

Kimberly seemed caught off guard, if only for a second.

“Come on,” Daphne added. “It’s the only place to hide around here.”

Kimberly didn’t respond, so Daphne began walking over toward the large stack of chained-up furniture, waving her letter opener.

“If he’s not over here, you wouldn’t mind me going and standing over by this utility shed, would you?”

Before she could get even halfway there, Riley stepped out from among the furniture.

The rain had messed up his haircut. That frustrated Daphne, but she soothed herself with the thought that the wedding had already passed.

“Well, if we’re here,” Riley said, “there must be someone else still alive.”

“Exactly,” Daphne said. “Who did we miss? Did Andrew survive?”

Her eyes glazed over as she stared at the red wallpaper and the script.

“There is another scene going on,” she said. “Huh. I can’t see much about it, hardly anything, actually, which means that Andrew must have set a trap, and his Savvy is pretty high. I’ll have to figure that out after I’m done here.”

Carousel might be able to film her killing Andrew and put it before this final battle when editing. It would all be okay.

“Well, I’m glad we got that out of the way,” Riley said. But then he held up five fingers and jumped back into his hiding place behind the furniture.

“Five fingers? What does that mean?” Daphne asked. “Oh, right.”