Book Six, Chapter 9: Recon

I told the others to go home and lock their doors.

I couldn’t kick the feeling that anyone who got caught trying to watch what happened to Avery that night might share her fate.

Of course, that didn’t apply to me.

My build was designed for reconnaissance.

First, my Call Sheet trope would tell me the next time I was to appear On-Screen, and as long as that timer was hours in the future, I knew I was safe from being drawn into the scene.

But even if that wasn’t true, my Just Out of Shot trope would help me metaphorically see the cameras and avoid being picked up when evading enemies.

And of course, if that failed, Oblivious Bystander could prevent me from being attacked even if I ended up On-Screen.

Yes, I was definitely prepped for my stakeout that night. I might not have been good at killing a ravenous monster, but I could watch a scene from afar with little danger to myself.

It turned out I wasn’t the only one staking out the pizza parlor, waiting for Avery to get back.

Ruck Johnson had parked his car on the far end of the parking lot and was waiting with something small and rectangular in his hands.

A quick glance at a clock conveniently built into a large sign for a bank nearby told me that I had 30 minutes before 1 a.m.

I had plenty of time.

I cautiously walked around to the part of the parking lot where Ruck waited. He saw me coming and smiled a mischievous smile. We were Off-Screen, of course.

“So, I guess in this movie you’re a stalker of some kind,” I said, not really expecting an answer.

He shrugged his shoulders. “Better than getting stabbed in a deck chair.”

I nearly jumped out of my skin.

I knew that Ruck and the NPCs from his storyline were meta-aware; they had to be for their storyline to work. As the elder Doctor Halle had stated, NPCs remember whatever they need to be better at their jobs.

Still, I didn’t expect such an out-of-character response.

I took a deep breath and stared at him.

“So you’re going to protect her, whatever happens?” I asked.

Ruck nodded. He didn’t have his usual obnoxious confidence; he was scared.

“I’ll do whatever I can, but I usually don’t last long in stuff like this. Fat guys don’t survive this type of movie. Don’t you know that?”

I nodded. It was a fate worse than death situation, but I got his point.

“Well, whatever happens, thank—” I started to say, but then I saw what he was holding in his hands.

“Is that a mixtape?”

Ruck smiled.

“The script suggested flowers or something, but I thought this was better. What do you think?”

I agreed.

There’s a certain amount of vulnerability that comes from making a mixtape for a woman who’s way out of your league. It might even redeem him for how much he had annoyed Avery with his incessant date requests. Might.

I wanted to ask him questions, but I didn’t want to press my luck. I couldn’t imagine being in his position and being aware of what was going on.

“Good luck,” I said.

I turned to walk away and head back to my hiding spot, but then I thought better of it.

There was a question I wanted to ask.

“Do you remember us?”

He smiled but only in the corner of his mouth, and nodded his head gently.

This wasn’t important, but I wanted to ask him who actually killed him in his native storyline. The gimmick of the Delta Epsilon Delta movie was that there was a whole host of different people who wanted him dead. I wanted to know what real-world scenario could create a storyline like that in Carousel or if it had been crafted from scratch.

But that would have to be a question for a different day. The time on the sign across the street jumped ahead ten minutes.

I quickly jogged across the road.

Ruck had not been de-aged for this storyline, so he was very clearly in his early twenties, but I supposed I might have been too. He was a big guy and hopefully a strong guy, but I didn’t know how much that was going to help Avery.

I just hoped that the mixtape would survive the storyline so that I could listen to it.

Time drew nearer, and I watched the pizza parlor. Even as 1 a.m. approached, nothing seemed to change.

Maybe I was foolish to assume that the entire store would transform into some sort of funhouse version of itself or that perhaps a black hole would open up, trapping all who came near.

The 1 a.m. restriction was very subtle, but to me it had flashed in red blinking letters.

Something strange was going to happen here after that time limit, I just didn’t know what.

As I pondered this, I saw Avery’s car pull into the parking lot. I was hidden behind a bush across the street from the restaurant.

She parked in front of the restaurant and emerged from her vehicle, distraught at being late. It was 1:06 a.m.

She rolled her eyes and cursed. I had put my headphones on, so my Quiet on Set trope would allow me to hear everything that was happening across the street.

She was On-Screen. All attention was on her.

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Unable to open the front door, I saw her start to make her way around to the back side of the building, holding a wad of cash that had no doubt just been given to her by the customer.

I would have to move positions to be able to see the other side of the building, but that was okay. I had mapped everything out and had my route planned. I could stay out of shot.

Unfortunately, it would require a whole lot more movement from me to get a good view of the backside of the restaurant than it would for her, so I had to book it, all while ducking down and hiding in the shadows.

I couldn’t complain. As far as I understood it, this was what Dina did in almost every storyline.

I made it to my next hiding position with a full view of the backside of the building, although I was seeing it from an angle.

Avery tried the back door.

It was locked too.

“Typical,” she said. She started to fold the money up tight and then tried to stick it through the side of the door.

Something told me there should have been a drop box for this exact situation, but if there were, there would be no high drama.

As Avery tried to stick the money through the door, a limousine pulled into the parking lot and swung around behind the building, its headlights flashing right into Avery’s eyes.

She held up a hand to block out the light so that she could see.

The back door to the limousine opened up, and a large man in an expensive suit stepped out.

He was slow and cautious. He walked forward half a step at a time.

“Are you the broker?” he said, in a nervous voice, like he was afraid of Avery.

“What?” she asked.

But before he could answer, the back door that she had just been trying to shove the money through opened abruptly.

Red light shone out, and two nondescript men stepped out, forcing Avery to jump back.

Avery looked from one man to the other. They just looked like ordinary men in business suits.

And yet, something was off about them.

They weren’t showing up on the red wallpaper, not as NPCs, not as enemies.

Were they that powerful?

I didn’t know. Avery was probably wondering the same thing.

“I’m just trying to drop off the money from my last run,” she said, unsure of what was happening.

The men looked at each other.

“Pretty girl,” one of them said, in a voice far too high-pitched for a man or even a human.

Avery backed away.

“I’ll just turn it in in the morning,” she said, stammering.