Page 55 of Elemasters

Damn it.

Of course she couldn’t be sure.

And that was exactly the point.

Bailey took a shaky breath, tears streaming down her cheeks as she did so. After a moment that seemed to stretch on forever, she finally just… let herself rest. Her muscles unclenched, the light in her veins and eyes faded away, and the sculpture she’d effortlessly crafted and rigorously maintained, completely and utterly collapsed.

The chorus of incoherent voices didn’t fade; if anything, their meaningless words only seemed to be more venomous now that they’d seen what they perceived as weakness in her. But that’s when Bailey realized what she’d known all along.

She couldn’t understand a word they were saying… because whatever narrative they were writing, wasn’t about her. Not really.

And even though the statue was nothing but dust and rubble on the floor of a theater, Bailey, the real Bailey, was still there.

She hadn’t fallen apart. And she never would.

Chapter 21

Walking Alone

Chris was getting so fucking tired of this bullshit.

Being transported from one hellscape to another on a whim, having to watch everyone else go through trials seemingly designed to fuck with their heads as much as possible, all on top of dealing with Dustin’s self-righteous ass?

Yeah, it was time to wrap this shit up.

But of course, that’d be too fucking easy. So now he was sitting in what was supposed to be his own bedroom, but he knew better.

This was clearly the prelude to some bullshit. Like Metal Gear Solid 2 tricking everyone by thinking you’d be playing as Solid Snake again, before forcing Raiden on you like a fucked up joke.

Everything in the room looked normal at first; empty Mountain Dew bottles, piles of clean but unfolded laundry, a box of half empty Manic Panic Flash Lightning hair bleach on the dresser… but something was off.

The shelf above his dresser had a picture of the entire basketball team, with Spinner hoisting Chris up on his shoulders after they won the Washington State Championship last year. The photo itself was still there, sandwiched between two glistening golden trophies, but… Chris himself was nowhere to be seen in it.

He blinked at the picture dumbly for a long moment; his anger momentarily dissolving into straight up confusion.

There’s… no way he wasn’t in the photo. Literally impossible. He was the one that hit the three pointer that won them the game against the Garfield High Bulldogs.

As realization set in, Chris’s anger roared to life like a flashover.

The garden was trying to erase him, was it? Was that what it thought it could do? Just snuff him out of existence without him fighting back?

Fuck. That.

Dustin had gotten used to disorientation since these trials began, but he’d be lying if he said it wasn’t starting to grate on him a bit. Especially with Chris being two seconds away from snapping; he didn’t know how much more of this he could take.

Now he was wandering around the outside of his own house with the others, trying to find a way inside since that had to be where Chris was. They’d already tried the front door, but it had been melted shut somehow.

“He’s gonna burn himself alive if we don’t get in there soon,” Bailey said, chewing her bottom lip as she sat next to Dustin on the front step, “I wish I could just shake some sense into him,”

“I don’t even think Superman would be strong enough to do that,” Dustin grumbled, crossing his arms as a gust of wind blew his fringe into his eyes.

“So what, we just… give up on him? Let him stew in his bullshit until he explodes?”

“I don’t know… maybe,” Dustin sighed, shaking his head as soon as the words hit the air, “ugh, of course not. I just don’t know how to help him. I never have. Any time he gets pissed off, the next thing I know I’m taking a punch to the gut. Either from his words or his actual fists,”

“I know Dusty, I know. And I’m sorry; I’ve always tried to ease the tension between you two so it doesn’t all fall apart, but I can’t really do that anymore. No one can, not unless we hit the problem at the source,” Bailey said, rubbing Dustin’s back.

Yeah, because that would totally go over well with Chris.