Omnibus of Shadows

By Alberto Catellani

The Omnibus of Shadows; a collection of tales previously written, now reviewed and corrected. Mistakes or things missing are added. They're all bundled together for ease of reading, and because this way I can keep the price on the cheap. It's basically five books in one, the one-shots so to speak.

For those who already possess the books in digital format, do not worry; the 'updated' versions will make their way into the single ebooks afterwards. So you'd just have to redownload the original ones you already bought. Of course, this can't apply for the printed copies, as there's no service that allows it.

The Omnibus of Shadows contains The Investigator's Tales, The Race, Prim and Proper and I, Master. It is weaved with some commentary at the end of each book, and holds a surprisingly nice cover that isn't as tacky as one would expect. It's also very simplistic. This comes out as a way to reflect on the evolution of my writing style, and most importantly as a way to give a proper, polished product to those who've been believing in me for years now.

One day, who knows, I may become famous enough that people may speak of my writing prowess without being ashamed.

In the meantime, enjoy the tales of the Investigator and Lyara, of Lyara and Frederick, of Captain Drake and Anastasia, of Detective Berrill Straw and Daniel and my unfortunate near-autobiographical experience with Tabletop games. I could swear, if one wished to check, that my first rule on having fun at a table together was then later utilized for the 'social compact' thing that is now endemic in the Roleplaying genre. And if not, then I guess we all think the same way, us players and DMs who have seen the world.

Read this during the upcoming summer months; perhaps at a beach. Or buy the physical book and use it as a weapon to fight off boredom, or dark monsters beneath someone's bed.

I won't complain if you buy and use this as a paperweight either. In these trying times, paperweights are essential.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Alberto Catellani
• Release date: May 5, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005465148

Alberto Catellani

Alberto Catellani was born on the 9 of March from the country that brought forth the greatest of inventions: the Road. We are talking of Italy, and he was born on a dark and stormy night at 3 in the morning. From a bright and early age, he wanted to write and once he found his grandfather's old typing machine, write he did. What he wrote back then is best left forgotten to the annals of time. Still, he keeps writing on. Known on the Internet as Shadenight123, and outside of it as someone with fifteen years plus of experience as a Dungeon Master capable of actually finishing the campaigns he starts, he has enjoyed a Classical Schooling, moved on to the beer-filled lands of Germany, and is currently attempting a Master level degree with, hopefully, a Ph.D afterwards. And in the meantime, he keeps on writing. Writing brings happiness, to himself and to those who enjoy his books and that, more than anything, is what truly makes him willing to write more and more. If you work at something you enjoy doing, after all, it will be as if you haven't been working at all.

Book preview

Dedication

Tell a man he has no hope, watch his spirit be crushed.

Tell a life there is no warmth, only sadness and grief.

Once the poison of the tree of society imbues the soul,

There is a far greater death, lingering deep within the chest of men.

We are only humans, and verily, we create our own, worst nightmares.

The human mind: the final enemy that must be defeated.

What a terrifying enemy, fierce and unyielding. It seems gone,

But as the clock strikes midnight it whispers once more, rearing its ugly head.

It is a hydra of a hundred heads. And even when burned to ashes,

Still, it remains.

Find comfort then, wherever you can.

It may not be for long.

But happiness is precious,

Guard it well.

Know that I love you all, sad, grieving, lonely ones.

For despair can only be defeated when it is not faced alone.

Preface

This Omnibus comes for two reasons. The first is that I really enjoy the new way the Word Editor works. The second is that I like the idea of properly fixing my past works for some manner of ultimate Collection.

Now, of course, this doesn’t come because of a desire to make money out of this. It would make me happy to become a trillionaire, but alas I’ll have to contend with never achieving that level of fame for the time being.

Who knows what the future may bring me; one day, I’ll grasp in my hands some manner of literary prize. I doubt it, so in the meantime I can only hope to be a good person and live a happy life.

The Omnibus begins with the Investigators’ Trilogy first two books. The third may be written, but who knows when. It is then followed by some Sci-Fi, a standalone book which may go nowhere entitled The Race, though it is rife with opportunity and then an intriguing crossover between something akin to eldritch horror and cute magical girls that have traumas about the inevitability of their condition, Prim and Proper.

Then, everything changes for some humoristic conclusions with I, Master. Some good old fashioned Tabletop Roleplaying Tales, forever etched in the fondness of my memories.

Usually, Omnibus’ are bound together by some manner of thin thread of logic; in the case of this one, the theme is Shadows. On one hand, my nickname on the internet gives it away. On the other, the theme of darkness is explored quite deeply in the contrast between that which is under the light of the Sun Crystals and that which lurks in the abandoned alleyways of Cloatos. It is defined in the nebulous fog that casts a blanket over the people, hiding their lineaments and blurring their world in the Fury of the Fog.

It is found, quite amiably, in the deep darkness of a final frontier that has been so utterly colonized and exploited that the only source of triumph left to be found is in the gambling with one’s life on a battlefield devoid of ideals; or it is found in the grim realization of an immutable eternal life as a young magical girl while ancient horrors from beyond space decide to settle down roots on Earth, and a low-pay detective job to go with it.

Finally, there is darkness to be found in Tabletop games. It’s found everywhere, why not in a setting where rolling dice on a table inherently is reason to cause strife and conflict, when everyone wants to be the spotlight character of the theater play?

And yet, darkness without light cannot exist. However, the light burns. To be on the spotlight is to be judged, to have a jury of eternal whispers following one’s every move and to be sentenced without appeal. It is to be the star of a show in which, without tribulations, the show would not be interesting enough to move on. It is to try to be what the public expects us to be, cute and frilly with magical bows on our heads, until the façade breaks, and one just seeks isolation and silence.

It is to roll the dice and be the hero. Only to fail as the natural 1 leads to doom everlasting.  

Table of Contents

Dedication

Preface

Table of Contents

The Investigator and the Case of the Missing Brain

The City of Cloatos

The Investigator

The Depths

The Madness of Flesh

The Docks

The Swamp

The Mermaid

The Rules of the Street

The Broken Childhood

The Fickle Kindness

The Night of Clacking Teeth

The No-Brainer Deal

The Role of The Assistant

The New Guys

The Grey Side of Life

The Bloodthirsty Picks

The Undertakers’ Requiem

The Solution To the Problem

The Investigator’s Wife

The End of Patience

The Prison Break

Death and Remembrance

Epilogue

Commentary

The Investigator and the Fury of the Fog

The Mystery Of Life

The City of Osyr

The Investigator’s Shadow

The Guts of the Kraken

The Laws of Magic

The Dunes of Dust

A Picture in the Dark

A Stomach Filled with Regrets

The Heart of the Issue

The Hooked Pact

A Trip Down Memory’s Nightmares

The Doomsday Clock

The Roots of Evil

A Miracle in Darkness

The Belly of the Beast

The Lord of Cogs

Epilogue

Commentary

The Race

Prologue

The blood of the covenant

The Sinful Way

Break the Bread and Share the Wine

The Bazaar At the Center of the Universe

The Social Services’ Service

Revelations

The Blight

The Great Escape

The Water of The Electric Womb

The Hanging Thread

The Galactic Sinkhole

The Mary-Anne Trench

Epilogue

Commentary

Prim and Proper

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Epilogue

Commentary

I, Master

Starting Up – The Fundamental Rules

They must be fun.

Roleplaying is a social compact. It is a pact made between people to have fun together.

Communication is key to success. If you do not like something, say so.

Humans are weak and fallible. Nobody is born perfect, and neither are you.

Accept your limitations and change or take the challenge and rise to it.

Players: Gotta Catalog Them All

Characters seek triumph against overwhelming odds, Players just want to have fun.

Roleplaying isn’t a story. The Happy Ending isn’t certain.

The Agency Eater.

The Potted Plant

The Party That Never Existed

Expectations can be crushed or exceeded.

In a world of cats, the shepherd dog is God.

The Burning City

You cannot expect multitasking when you have only one mouth to speak.

The Dark Warrior that never could.

Players should synchronize their watches. Masters should not have time zones.

The Fiery Rider of the Poor

Triumph should be SHARED; failure should be one’s own business.

The Master In Heat.

Being a fit soldier means nothing, if you’re not the Master’s favorite

Masters: A Higher Calling Would Have Been Easier.

Miscommunication kills. It kills the fun, the happiness, and the joy of playing together.

The Party that Split, and Never Was Again.

Playing isn’t an obligation, or a duty. There are many other ways to have fun.

Learn to call it quits. Letting go is sometime more satisfying than anything else.

Second-Hand Compliments

Being a Master isn’t easy, but it’s not difficult either. It just takes a bit of effort.

Considering the Players an enemy is the first step on the road to disappointment.

The Blood Seal

Effort and critical thinking should always be rewarded.

Players do not have the Walkthrough Manual.

Do not spoon-feed the Players but give them helpful hints.

Setting The Set. Worldbuilding Lazily but Innovatively.

The NPCs without a name.

Better prepared and murderous than unprepared and murdered.

The Sneeze and the Exploding Donkey

You thought it was me, Samurai! But in truth it was I, Eduardo the magician!

The strength of a setting is only as strong as the weakest Role-player in the group.

Keep an open mind on opportunities.

Pre-generated, store-bought adventures aren’t that bad, provided you have a good Master.

The Trapped Stairway

I am lost.

Breaking Down A Campaign: Looking Back On Failure

Breaking Down a Campaign: Looking Back on Successes

Having Fun is never a sin.

You are juggling the Players’ Expectations, the Setting’s Nature, and the Challenges’ Credibility.

Sometimes, allowing the impossible makes everything better

Random Tales That Didn’t Make The Cut

A Special Poison just for you.

The City of Misguided Invitations

For honesty is not, always, the best answer to get out of trouble.

Picking a friendly animal through shopping in the forest isn’t how you make a friend for life.

Remember that Players are Different, and not in a good way sometimes.

The greatest plan in history, the luck of the enemy however, can never be accounted for.

Presentation is everything.

Checklists for the Checklists’ Gods

Conclusion of the Omnibus

The Investigator and the Case of the Missing Brain

The City of Cloatos

The morning neared in the underground pit of hell aptly used as a prison for the criminals and the unwanted.

The sun, rising over the horizon in the world Above, took a few minutes to show its rays through the hole in the cavern’s side. The beams hit the swiveling mirrors of the tall walls of the Gates, which spun and settled into place with loud creaking sounds.

That day, Cloatos would have light.

The rays proceeded, weakened by the refraction on the dirty mirrors, and spread across the pale purple crystals embedded in the ceiling. The crystals glowed and pulsed softly, started to shine and released rays of their own.

These struck other crystals along the way, cascading the effect and increasing the ambient radiance with each passing second.

A streak of light passed through a hole in the ceiling of an old, dilapidated building, hit a small crystal outcropping grown over a corner of a dirty and garbage-filled room, and sluggishly moved across the forehead of a sleeping girl, the rest of her body hidden under a dust-colored sheet.

The girl’s skin was slick with sweat from the night’s perspiration, and her closed eyelids hid the nervous fluttering of her eyeballs within her eyes’ sockets. Moans escaped her lips at first, her fingers with dirty nails digging deeply into the sheet that covered her form.

She screamed and woke from her nightmare as the rays of reverberating sunlight reached her eyelids. Her hands clutched the bed‘s blankets and pulled them over her face to cover her head, her eyes widened from fear in the dark of the dirty, but safe, fort made from her night blanket, and she trembled until the fog of sleep left her.

She dared to peek out of her makeshift bed only when her breath evened out, and relief washed over her face. She was still in the filthiest and muddied corner of her abandoned building, as far away as possible from other unspeakable things.

A few spiders crawled their way out from under her sheet, small pouches of silk on their backs filled with food. The creatures scurried their way across the walls and left through the cracks in the stone with sick ‘plop’ sounds.

The girl followed the creatures’ hasty retreat for a bit, but in the end stood up and swatted away the dust from her face together with the few tears that marred her cheeks, and gave a hesitant sniff to the brownish, frayed blouse that clung to her body like an oversized drape, reeking of mold and sewer.

She checked her knife next, strapped to her trousers’ belt buckle. She took it out from its holder, and softly touched its rust-filled back with the tip of her fingers, absentmindedly grinding its edge against the nearby rock until sparks flew from the motion. She sheathed the knife after that, firmly tucking it by her navel.

Welcome to another morning in Cloatos, Lyara, the girl said, and slapped her cheeks with enough strength to swat away the little sleep she still had in her body, another day filled with pain.

Lyara moved closer to one of the holes in the walls. There had been windows once, but now not even the frames remained. Her hands gripped firmly on the edge as she pushed part of her body past the windowsill, to look at the swarms of flies that buzzed across the garbage mountain below.

A pool of dirty water was their birthing pit, as they ate away at the sacks and the waste. The water was also her morning mirror. Her reflection winced. Her dirty brown hair, once bright hazel, and dark eyes had a harsh and hateful glare. She couldn’t believe it was her normal gaze; she had such a hard, spite-filled look, so different from what she remembered in the fragmented memories of her past.

Her right cheek sported a deep jagged scar, the result of a narrow loss in a fight for food. She tried to remember the face she had; in one of her dreams, she could still remember her reflection in a real mirror, and not in a pool of rotting water and filth. She was blond in her memories, and her eyes brown, with the beautiful glint of happiness within them.

Lyara remembered her house, her family, the love that hung in the air like a warm sweater, and just as she dreamed of the things she no longer had, her nightmares started. She shuddered at the lingering vestiges of her dream and recoiled from the hole and her reflection, which shot her a last, angry glare.

She could not waste time dwelling on her appearance for much longer. She walked towards the entrance of her house, which she had battled for with her rusty knife and a good dose of hissing and snarling at the previous owner.

The cobblestone street with its cracks covered with moss was not busy so soon after dawn. Most of the people still slept or were too afraid of the Forgotten to step out before what passed as noon in their city. Tattered clothes hung from the windows, some still dribbling blood from a day of hard work in the streets.

The day has come, the day has come, a voice sang from a window a few feet away, across the road and from the second floor of another equally ruined building. It belonged to Miss Caroline, a mad woman, song deaf and with a stump for a right leg. The beasts retreat for the day has come!

Lyara clicked her tongue against the back of her teeth and closed the door behind her. If Miss Caroline sang, it meant that it was safe to go outside. The Forgotten that lurked the night of Cloatos retreated to the safety of their dark alleys when the Sun Crystals glowed, but such a glow was not lethal, merely an annoyance and, driven by hunger, some Forgotten still lurked the streets until the glow of the crystals reached its highest peak.

A bulky figure walked on the opposite side of the street as Lyara left the alcove of her building’s entrance. He strode with purpose, and new people in the city never walked with purpose and had a grey trench coat covering most of his body. His dark grey hair came down in curls, covering most of his face except for a side of it, mottled with acid burns. Lyara glanced away quickly when she saw the grey color of his clothes and the salt and pepper beard on his chin and hurried her steps.

The grey meant that he was a member of Filth’s gang, and the white hair meant that he was old, and the old ones were the most dangerous and insane. They had survived long enough in the city to know the tricks to it and turned them to their advantage. The people of the gangs were scary like that, and with Filth’s gang made of cannibals, they were the worst in the city.

It was tempting to step back inside, because seeing a Grey first thing in the morning was an ill omen. Lyara could go out another day; she had some meager reserves set aside and she could survive on those.

Those who do not hunt do not eat, she whispered, trying to pull her courage from somewhere deep within her body, repeating the words a friend of hers used to say. She no longer remembered who he was, or what his face was like, but if she had bargained his face and the memories of him for something else, then he was not important.

The light of the sun reached the city directly from the fissure as she left the safety of Bloodcurl Avenue, her home address. The rays, refracted against the enormous crystal ceiling, showered everything in an unearthly red and orange tint. The world above had midday as the brightest time of the day. The people of Cloatos had the morning hour, with dawn being the sunniest moment of the day.

There were barely a hundred of steps between her house and the market district, and she rushed through them, eager to start the day. The square was empty and desolate early in the morning, as all merchants moved like clockwork, and headed off at the same time as sheep in a herd. It wasn’t time for them to come out of their hiding holes with their stocks, eager for bartering with the new guys and ripping everything they could get away from them.

Lyara sat down near the empty and broken fountain that stood in the corner of the square and her gaze carefully moved to where the shadows grew thicker in the nearby dark alley. The remains of rats near the entrance of the alley were a clear sign, in their bony white splendor, that a Forgotten had made his nest in there.

She fingered the handle of her knife, ignored the spot, and hoped the Forgotten was sleeping already, or would soon fall asleep.

Food, the Forgotten said from the alley.

She breathed deeply and tried to calm her heart spiked up by the sudden call. Even after all the years spent in Cloatos, the unnatural voice of a Forgotten made her fear. The creature had yet to go to sleep for the day if it could talk to her still.

Come closer. Food, it said. I have food.

The thing hid in the darkness and avoided the light of the Sun Crystals. Its appearance was difficult to discern, but it was nothing of human. The hissing and the clicking between its words revealed its true nature of a monster.

Lyara did not reply. The Forgotten were a breed of Unnatural that rarely ventured out of the dark alleys, but some did, especially if their prey talked back to them, or caught their attention. The rays of the Crystals made them weak, and disoriented them, but it didn’t stop them when on a rampage. They were a nuisance mostly, but at the same time, even the weakest of Forgotten was deadly to the unprepared.

Food, it said again. Its voice was soft, as if falling asleep. I have food.

It did not know what it was saying, only that food would come if it said those words. Thankfully, the Forgotten weren’t intelligent, but they were smart enough to know the one thing that could convince the people around to enter the alleys when at their wits’ end.

Lyara hugged her knees and pressed her back against the fountain’s edge. She ignored the Forgotten’s voice, and let the monster repeat its call a few more times until its voice lowered down to a whimper, and then fell silent. The creature had fallen asleep.

The merchants arrived in bulk after that, and she frowned as her usual milk cow was missing, an old man with a patch over his right eye always carried something comestible among his wares, and she could easily steal from him by approaching from his blind side. Patch-Man wasn’t there that day.

The market buzzed with activity within minutes, screams of the vendors interweaving with frantic bartering and gesticulation of sorts as the first clients of the morning walked in their ragged clothes, vividly interested in the merchandise. She had lost her chance waiting for the man, and with the wares of the other merchants all set up, it was now difficult to try something.

She disappeared in the crowd, headed for her second chance at a meal. The dumpster behind the Drowned Hangman was a safe bet as always, but she’d have to fight her way through another kid for a champion’s bin.

Broken Fingers had entered a gang, the Reds, while the ‘young’ Minxie was out with a broken leg —meaning her cronies wouldn’t be there that day.

Her knife at her belt, she trusted in her skills enough to assure a quality choice of breakfast, and if things went sour, she had the Investigator’s blessing on her side. She disliked relying on the Bastard’s gift, but it was useful, and she would never spit on what kept her alive one more day in the city.

Lyara hurried her step when she heard grunting and exertion from around the corner. It was the usual noise for the ‘Arena’ when it was in full swing. The dumpster was there, the windows above it open, and trash fell from the busy kitchens of the ugly establishment directly into it. The pub held what little food it could steal from the rationmen and sold it back to the people in exchange for money and work.

Dirty, ragged street rats like her eyed each other near the dumping grounds. A few older children with broken boots and squared jaws held makeshift pikes out of sharpened steel tubes, rusty and bent, while a couple of adults oversaw the thing, their eyes gleaming at the amusing scene of hungry children fighting each other off to the first blood —or to the death— for scraps of food.

Get him Benny! one of the adults hooted from a window of the pub’s back. I bet big bucks on you!

Gut him like a pig Snark! There’s a juicy bit of roast waiting for you!

A few of the youngest children rooted on their champions of the day. The blood within the Arena’s ground shone fresh —one of the two contestants was bleeding but had refused to back down. There were guttural screams, rust hit flesh and skin ruptured into festering wounds. The rust in Cloatos wasn’t simple rust.

It devoured everything, be it metal or flesh.

Lyara pushed her way past the back rows and made her way to the front of the crowd to watch. The two boys faced each other, both wounded, but neither willing to stop. They were hungry, and their eyes were vicious.

She knew Benny by sight. He was on the right, one of the anglers’ spawns with a few scales around his cheeks and half of his hair matted together into a sleek-looking fin. The other one looked human enough, if not for the crimson eyes that betrayed him for something different. That one was Snark.

Benny had a fishing hook in his right hand, big enough to fish a shark or gut a man. He was bleeding from his right arm, the source of the blood. Sickly green moss grew from the wound already.

Snark had a curved sickle, dented and pilfered from the Fungi Pits judging by the moss overgrowing on its blade. It took guts to do that —it was a sign of stupidity to steal anything from the Fungi Pits and from the Moss Lords— but to survive the Pits was a sign of skill.

Benny wildly slashed forward and left himself wide open as Snark’s blade came down hard on his slashing attempt and hit his hook. The tug of war was fierce, but brief. Benny lost the grip on his hook and the sickle continued its path, cutting the fisherman’s chest. The crowd howled in ecstasy as the slice drew blood; some clapped hands and others hurled insults at Benny’s weakness.

A few of the children nearby grabbed the loser who clutched on to his bleeding chest and threw him out of the ring. Lyara’s eyes were cold; she moved past the rowdy children, who cheered their champion in hope for a merciful scrap from winners’ bin.

Snark wasn’t inclined to share; he gruffly took his bin and walked out of there without giving a spare glance.

And that was our rising star Snark ladies and gentlemen! Now who’s up next for a champion’s bin? The announcer, his face a smile of crooked yellow teeth and rotten gums, yelled at the windows, Someone wants more blood!

The fight for food was the pub’s favorite sport after all, held for the ‘high class’ who enjoyed it.

Now, come on, the organizer said. Going home with food in your bellies isn’t hard! If you win, you get a champion’s bin and if you lose, you get a loser’s bin. There’s food for everyone, winners and losers! It hurts just a bit, but if you’re good, you don’t get hurt at all!

Sign me up! a wimpy girl of barely eight screamed, her mouth broken, and her lower lip cut. She was weapon-less, wore a large muffler and a broken skirt with long socks and half-broken shoes. Lyara’s eyes narrowed on the girl’s right sleeve, which held her tiny fist closed tightly, and at the pointy metal tip that peeked out from her grubby hand. It was a telltale sign of a hidden weapon.

Here’s a delicious morsel! the announcer howled, Who’ll challenge this child, uh? The scrawny thing, with a pair of broken scissors in her grubby hands, was at her first fight. She was one of Minxie’s kids, since the old hag liked to get them young.

Lyara refrained from stepping into the ring. If the kid belonged to Minxie, then winning here meant receiving punishment later across the street. The kids went everywhere, and nobody considered a kid a threat until he whipped out a knife to chop your flesh.

I-I’m challenging her! another kid said, and held his hand up in the air, as if he were asking permission to a teacher to go take a leak. The announcer gave one long look at the dirty faced kid, and grinned. He then ignored him completely. The kid was just like any another scared child, willing to try his hand against a weaponless opponent. He had the same age as the girl, and their faces were similar.

Lyara exhaled softly. There wasn’t going to be an easy picking that day. They’d call out one of the big guys in the kitchen; have them hold a teaching lesson to the would-be fakers. In the ring, fixing the match beforehand wasn’t just something to frown upon. It was suicidal. The announcer had a penchant for finding out, and those who cheated their way to victory got a lesson they would hardly forget.

Well? Is there no one that wants to challenge this little darling? There’s really nobody in the crowd? Well! Well then, spectators of the Drowned Hangman! he raised his arms to the windows, a large smile on his face, is there anyone you want as your chef!

Hey! I said— The crowd silenced the boy, and the girl inside the ring shrilly screamed. Her brother had produced a wonderful idea; a pity that idea wasn’t smart enough to trick any of the adults of the Drowned Hangman.

Tenderer! Tenderer! the crowd’s howling call grew with each thrust of the announcer’s arms upwards, which incited it even further. The crowd loved one-sided slaughters. Lyara grimaced. The Tenderer from the get-go was tough. They wanted to teach the kid a lesson, and she wasn’t going to walk away with all her limbs intact, not if she wasn’t fast enough.

Oh, you poor little morsel. The announcer licked his lips and clapped loudly. They summon the Tenderer! He’ll make your meat tender, oh he will! Lyara drifted to the back of the crowd, and made her way around it to the side, where the kitchen’s backdoor was. It would soon open to show the Tenderer, one of the inn’s most effective ring-fighters.

The dumpster was now in front of her eyes, and some of the kitchen’s young staff surveyed it with their steel pipes, but she trusted in them gazing at the bloody spectacle when it began than keeping an eye out on the bins with the prizes.

The Tenderer emerged from the kitchen, his namesake in hand; it was a mallet, with jagged edges on both sides. He was a tall teen with an apron dirty with blood and wore gloves of a dark green color. A white cloth splattered in red covered his face. Chef assistants and dishwashers came out after him, and held small baskets filled with minced pieces of paper. They threw it in the air around him and chanted his name as he went by.

Lyara was quick, and as the last of the paper throwers passed, she ran behind their procession, and pressed her back against the wall of the inn. She huddled in the corner between the wall and the dumpster where the bins rested. Nobody had seen her, and everyone’s gaze was on the show now.

I—I changed my mind! the child screamed, and it excited the spectators further. She tried to run, but the crowd pushed her back in the fray, chanted and screamed the name of the clear champion. The Tenderer’s walk in the ring was slow and methodical, and as he started to circle around the child like a vulture, the crowd laughed harder.

Tenderer! Tenderer! the children chanted, their fists pumping in the air. The Tenderer lifted his mallet high and grunted in answer to their bloodlust-filled calls. The mallet came down near the girl, who screamed in fright. The ground cracked where the hammer slammed.

The child on the ring cried, No, please no, I was hungry! Brother, brother, help me!

Lyara stopped paying attention; she ignored the screams, quietly gripped with her hands a bin from the dumpster and lifted it out from there. She dropped it on the ground near her hiding spot and inclined it towards her, gazing at the scraps, at the half-eaten legs of frogs or the heads of fishes and already, her mouth watered.

The screams of the girl in the arena grew shriller and made her turn an eye to the slaughter at hand. The Tenderizer toyed with her, made mocking gestures and grunted in her direction, scaring her past the tears. He was enjoying it. Any half-hearted ‘new guy’ in the city would have tried to help the child. Lyara didn’t bat an eye when the hammer struck the girl on the stomach. No one was going to help her, and if a fool tried, then he’d receive the same treatment.

Oh god, please. The child coughed and clutched her stomach. Please, help me!

It all was ignored; it took something more to make such an onslaught stop, and considering the loud cheers from the floors above, it would not be any time soon. The child’s brother was still trying to push his way through the crowd, rebuked at each attempt with sneers and catcalls. He circled around the crowd, looking for a way in.

There were some stale chips in one of the bins. Since everyone was enjoying the show, she began to munch, quietly. She had to chew properly. It wouldn’t do to make a noise with her mouth open. There was a shrill cry, a sick snap. One of the girl’s legs now bent at an impossible angle, and she grinned at the show.

Lyara’s skin itched, as an ethereal and half-transparent tendril of fog softly moved in the air, and her breathing froze in her throat. The fog pushed a small pebble a few inches to the right for just a second, just in time for the girl’s brother to step on it and fall on his back, and at the right angle to make him look past the guards to see her munching.

The boy was desperate enough to know the one thing that would make the fighting stop. Lyara gripped a slimy bit of food and showed it to him, in an unspoken deal. He could just ignore the girl, his sister, and get some food. It would be a great deal for anyone. Any older boy would have taken the deal, no questions asked. The child was too new to know you couldn’t cheat the patrons of the Drowned Hangman; she should have realized he still held on to a bit of ‘sentimentality’.

Hey! Look over there! Someone’s stealing from the bins! Look! Look! The guards turned as the boy spoke those words, but Lyara was already dashing towards the other side of the dumpster by then.

A rusty pipe came close to pierce her chest, but she sidestepped it, and threw into the teen’s face the slimy scraps of food in her hand. The boy howled as a piece of chicken bone ended in his eye. Lyara hoped he’d get an infection and die within the next day. There would be one less guard. She didn’t stop. She jolted away, as fast as her feet carried her.

There was no delay, no wait and no fear. She knew the rules better than the rest of them. They caught her and it was time to run. Her right fist slammed against a boy in the crowd who tried to act the hero; she heard the satisfying crunch of a broken nose and moved on. A few of the crowd still gave chase, and either hoped to steal her scraps or to get some sort of prize for capturing her.

She turned back once, threw a garbage sack from a nearby pile on the ground to slow them down, and then returned to her escape.

Let her go! she heard the announcer of the arena scream when she had already crossed the distance from the dumpster to the other side of the street. She’s going into— Lyara didn’t stop to hear the rest; she turned the corner and dashed across a wet and empty alley, her feet splashing in the puddles.

The water was icy cold as it seeped through her old shoes, but she pushed her muscles to the edge until they burned, and she reached for the other side of the dark alley. She stopped when the light of the Sun Crystals shone over her and eased her beating heart with shallow breaths. The thing left in her hand was a chicken leg. It was cold and slimy, more bone and skin than meat, but it was something she could eat. She sunk her teeth into it, ripped the flesh apart from it, and chewed hungrily.

Some chips and some chicken. This day’s off to a great start, she murmured. Her fingers cold, she exhaled on the remains of her breakfast a cloud of vapor. Her teeth chattered from a sudden shiver; her eyes widened at the sight of her sweat forming snowflakes, while her skin filled with goose bumps.

Child, I have food, a voice filled with melancholy whispered behind her. It was a tender voice, gentle and soothing to hear after the rowdy screams of the Arena crowd and the sneers. The frost ran down her spine as she pulled her body forward. What little remained of her breakfast slipped from her hands and fell on the ground as giant claws of pale cerulean slammed against the brick walls, passing the space she had been but a second before.

A visage of crooked yellow teeth and beady eyes snarled at her from the alley, but she didn’t remain behind to gaze. Lyara ran further away, her heart drummed into her chest, and she spun around to check on her Unnatural pursuer only when she was further into the safety of the Sun Crystals’ light.

I. Have. Food. The creature beckoned her closer with its giant claws, afraid of leaving the safety of the alley’s shade for the road bathed by the light. The lower body of the creature resembled a woman, if not for the bones and the pure white skin covered in ice. Deformed lower limbs of bones and tendrils of flesh twitched as they met the line that separated the light from the darkness and retreated into the safety of the alley rather than risk the sun’s pale reflection.

That had been close. That had been too close for her tastes. There hadn’t been an Unnatural in that alley before. It had to have moved away from its usual eating grounds during the night. Lyara swallowed thickly, and the temperature rose the more steps away she took from the creature.

Child, I have food, the creature said with a cracking voice, as if it belonged to a young, crying woman. I have food.

Lyara exhaled, and left keeping her eyes fixed on the creature that quietly began to crawl back inside the dark alley. She took another step, and her right foot slammed into something soft and fleshy. The squelching noise made her freeze worse than the Forgotten she had avoided just then.

She began to sweat and cursed loud enough the other end of the street heard. She had made a mistake. She had made one of those terrible mistakes new guys made around the city and paid with for it with their lives.

Lyara hadn’t paid attention to the ground where she walked.

The Investigator

Sweat trickled down Lyara’s forehead.

Her feet didn’t turn green with moss, or rot down into a yellow puddle. No roaring or screaming creature clawed or tore into her flesh, which meant she hadn’t stepped on something hungry for a human meal.

This didn’t mean she hadn’t a parasite of some sorts now slithering beneath her skin. There were so many small and cute creatures that could rip your head off in the city, knowing them all would be too hard, but for the present time, she was safe.

It was a carton-covered pack, which someone had simply dropped. They had lost it, considering how it was a postal package of sorts wrapped with care, or it had fallen as the result of a failed mugging attempt.

She groaned, I’m so stupid sometimes.

Lyara bent down and gripped the wet bundle with the extremities of her fingers, lifted it off the ground and held the thing as far away from her as possible. Against her digits, the package felt like it contained a mixture of goo and moss, two of the most dangerous sensations to feel around Cloatos.

The first was because the Slimes never stopped eating when they sunk their fangs on something, and the second was because another Fungi infestation would not end well for the city itself. She was still alive and breathing. Her chest went up and down regularly and that had to count for something.

She turned the package around and grimaced from the sick sensation on her palms. The address written on the package was meaningless, especially when the street names were applicable to change when the mere thought of boredom streaked through the mind of The Bastard.

The carton started to wriggle, and Lyara dropped it, as if burned, and coolly took a step back. If it was alive, she didn’t have to return it, but her palms itched even as the thing squirmed on the ground. It was clearly alive, wasn’t it? Why then, did she feel the need to return it? Her hands always itched when she lost an object to return, and it would get worse the longer it took her to recover it.

The curse was clear.

Somebody had lost that object, and she had to return it.

She hated The Bastard, but she could do nothing about it. She bent down, swallowed the reproachful lines of insults to her stupid mind for having thought the object lost, and gripped the package again. As Lyara stood up, a bank of fog lurched its way forward from a nearby alley, and its tendrils of white encompassed the street swiftly, like tentacles surrounding a prey.

Her feet disappeared beneath the fog as it began to rise, and shortly, the white haze completely covered her. The fog she breathed tasted sweet in her throat at first, like caramel and cotton candy, but soon, the sweetness left a rancid aftertaste of rotten eggs on her tongue. He was listening in now, because wherever the fog was, he was never far.

You did this on purpose. I’m sure you did this on purpose, Lyara said, as she hurried through it. There was a small bout of laughter as if to prove her point. He had heard her and, predictably, had laughed at her. The Bastard. The fog started to disperse, and when it did enough for her to peer through, she was no longer on the same street as before, but in an alley with one exit and a marble plaque by its side at the corner, the name scribbled on it written in blood.

Lyara’s End, she said, should I be flattered you named a street after me? The fog did not reply, but her throat dried up as hot air blew against the back of her head and engulfed her neck like a firm hand. She tensed. There was no warm breeze in Cloatos that did not have a hungry mouth at its origin.

Child— She dashed out of the alley, before the Forgotten woke up completely and decided to have her as a snack.

Bastard! Lyara cursed and turned just in time to see a wicked red eye look back at her, half a dozen of horns erupting from its square head. Thick arms and legs, the size of trees, stood bent at unnatural angles as jagged teeth gleamed in the pale light. The eye on the Unnatural’s head blinked, and the creature slowly fell asleep once more.

Lyara took a few steps backwards and clutched the package under her right armpit harder, catching her breath. Hate you. Hate you, she muttered to the remaining wisps of fog, which slowly dispersed in the ground as if sucked away. I hate you. If not for the different name, the street was familiar to her.

A wooden sign hung from an equally broken lamppost on the other side of the road, held by rusted nails banged together, which had seen better days. ‘Cloatos‘ Investigations, reasonable prices‘ the sign read in a crimson paint that dribbled down along its corner, and fell beneath the lamppost in a small puddle, which drained into the road’s sewer grate.

Lyara didn’t like the place. She didn’t like the man inside the house, and she didn’t like how he had her in his fist; standing outside the gate, looking at the dead garden filled with charred and black flowerbeds and crusty soil, she hesitated. He never called her that forcefully, but waited until the last, and named the highest of prices.

This was uncommon, and not his usual behavior. It was never a good thing when The Bastard did something strange. The iron gateway swung aside with a rusty creak, inviting her in while a light breeze ruffled her short hair, making her lips thin.

Lyara stepped through and reached for the door at the end of the garden without another glance at the decayed soil, or at the battered iron plaque next to it. ‘Basileus – Investigator’ the plaque said. She had seen the sign too many times for it to surprise her with how it glinted and gave off the feeling of being new, even though it wasn’t new at all.

Everything in the city turned into grime, rust, or eventually decayed and rotted. Everything broke down or died, safe for the man known as The Bastard.

To everyone in Cloatos, this was the house of the most feared psychopath in the city, barring the Unnaturals and the Forgotten. The bloodthirsty cannibals known as the Grey feared the monster in human skin, the Forgotten cried at his unholy passage, and the people in the street gave him a wide berth.

This was the home of The Investigator.

Nestled at the corners of the city, the precise place always changing, his office was a two-floor building with chipped red and purple paint and barred windows. It was a symbol of what Cloatos was. It defined what the city was about; the form of mercy and law one could expect from it embodied into a single horrible and evil man.

She called him The Bastard.

Lyara didn’t use the knocker on the door because it was always open for her. She pushed down on the handle, entered, and held her breath as her eyes watered up. There was a bright light inside, stronger than anything the crystals ever held, even stronger than the sun itself, and it pointed at the precise height her face was, out of spite.

She moved past the beam of light, and as her tears dried up, the entrance came into focus, and disorderly filled with dirty newspaper and rags, it greeted her with its usual pungent smell of rot and sweat. Flies buzzed harmlessly atop half-eaten skulls, while candles delivered a thick smell of citrus, rotten and cloyingly sweet at the same time.

There was a hat stand mounted near the door, and on one of the hooks a bowler hat rocked back and forth, as if the owner had only recently hanged it. A polished and bright pink walking stick, dotted with green spots, leaned against the wall; tiny yellow rings with a black core circled within the green spots, like eyes. They had beady gazes, filled with some maniacal lust.

Lyara walked her way through the corridor’s filth, holding on to the package as if it were a shield. She hated what came next, as she neared a rickety door of mahogany nestled between two columns of stone and an arch that was a sore thumb against the rest of the house’s architecture. Words she could not read, written in ancient tongues around the marble columns and the archway, told how to pass through, but she didn’t read the instructions; the Investigator had told her what to say.

Make a deal with me, she said, her throat hurt from the effort of sounding chipper and happy, while she kept the bile repressed inside. It nauseated her. If she could, she would burn the office and The Bastard inside. Unfortunately, she needed him, and she was sure he wouldn’t burn even with the flames of hell to fuel the fire. I’ll make it interesting.

Her free hand gripped on the doorknob. I’ll give you a memory. Her voice trailed off; her mind faltered to recall what could rhyme with ‘interesting’. Just take my commissioning. She finished the song and pulled the doorknob.

The door did not budge an inch, but Lyara simply let go of the knob and waited, moving her weight from one leg to the other, letting the wooden floor creak beneath her to dampen the lack of sound that now permeated the hallway.

Finally, the silence broke.

That was a horrible rhyme, the Investigator said from beyond the door. The lock clicked as it unlocked, and the door swung aside. You also used it before, didn’t you? You’re a horrible person for reusing used rhymes; I hope you understand that.

She rolled her eyes and entered the office of the despicable bastard she’d love to see gutted in a corner of the name-changing streets.

To define it as chaotic was not to give an apt description of the office; large piles of books, floating archives of metal, unhinged frames of doors that soared through the air as if they were hawks and glistening crystals that shone of purple light all danced in the air.

Skulls laughed in their clacking ways, while lit candles left wax droppings on the floor; dirty and planked windows covered in cobwebs trembled and everything was so loud Lyara wondered how he could hear her all the way from behind his desk.

The Investigator smiled at her and she curled her lips back in disgust. Her shoulders tensed, her eyes dropped on the desk’s surface, filled with papers inked with gibberish.

Would you mind? She gestured to the flying ruckus, not lifting her gaze from the papers on the man’s desk.

He kept his smile up, even as he snapped his fingers. The noise ceased immediately, and she stepped closer to him, walking beneath the assorted plethora of rubbish flying around in a now eerie silence.

They all gazed at her in their own ways, with the skulls’ empty eye-sockets being particularly frightening; even after all the corpses she had seen, skulls had a way of being eerie. The Investigator of Cloatos invited her closer to his desk with a nod of his curly red-haired head.

The package in her hands was interesting believing his eyes, a childish twinkle in them as he smirked wickedly, like a shark smelling blood in the water. His long fingers folded together, thin and spider-like, as his furred robe glistened in the air from perspiration. Beneath it, open in the middle to show his chest, were a set of golden trinkets upon a black shirt.

The robe did not have a hood, but three stuffed dogs’ heads stitched to its back emerged from the top of it and fell behind the Investigator’s shoulders with their eyes closed and their teeth bared.

Tell me, little unoriginal brat, the man smiled and showed all his perfect white teeth. Why should I help someone without the soul of a poet and with the originality of a broken shoe sole?

Lyara narrowed her eyes; her shoulders trembled in displeasure as she held the package with enough pressure to make it dribble on the floor. She dropped it hastily when her hands burned upon contact with the grey liquid it exuded.

The bundle fell on the ground with a sickening plop, and the paper wrapped around it broke aside to reveal its grimy contents, a greyish matter that oozed out from within a fleshy formless thing. Lyara recoiled in disgust, a grimace on her face. She had seen a lot of crap over the years, but this took the top spot in disgusting stuff Cloatos regularly spewed out on the streets.

Basileus, she said, her voice cold, Cut the crap. You make it sound like I have a choice in this. You see this? She pointed at the package. Someone lost it and I’m here looking at your disgusting face because you cursed me. I’m not sorry if my originality sucks, like I’m not in the mood for making rhymes, but I am in the mood for insulting you until you get this thing off my hands.

He cocked his head to the side, the smile that graced his lips not faltering once. Oh? I cursed you? I can’t remember properly. There’s a lot of stuff going inside my head; I have so many memories twirling around lazily, you can hardly fault me if I don’t recall something as trivial as that. Do you die if you don’t bring a lost object back within the end of the week? I can’t remember, so we might just have to test it, in case I’m wrong. Basileus smirked, as Lyara kicked the package at his face.

She missed him by a wide berth, and the thing fell with another wet splash a few feet ahead, dirtying with brownish blotches the carpet of magenta locks.

Why do you think I’m here, for your company? Not that I had a choice in coming here to begin with, but at least you could stop looking so damn amused and get this over quickly.

My, I can’t understand all this anger and spite in my regards. We’re friends, aren’t we? I help you when you’re in need, and in exchange, you stick by my side as we return lost objects. Basileus stood up from his chair and walked by the side of his desk, taking deliberate slow steps towards the bundle; the thing quivered on the ground, as it moaned and whimpered.

Well, well, well...What do we have here? Basileus hummed, bent down to grab the foreign object, and touched it with two fingers, prodding its consistence and staring at its caustic mucus slowly burning the tip of his digits.

He clicked his tongue against his teeth in an audible way and lifted it up in his palm. He began to juggle it with two skulls, which floated on his hands at his unspoken command.

It’s a brain, he said, and started to spin it upside down while juggling.

A brain? The air left her lungs as she exhaled. The curse’s standards did not consider parts of living things as lost, so there was no way the curse would react if she threw it away. But it’s not just a brain, Lyara said. I still feel the need to return it. My palms are itching right now too, so it’s not something you lost.

Oh? Is this a smart observation coming from you? There’s still hope, Basileus said, and nodded. Well, he continued, it’s a brain held within an artificial sack made with human skin and leather stitched together.

Carefully, he nudged it with the index of his other hand, eliciting another whimper from the thing. It’s a container for a soul, and judging they built it, I’d wager it’s Undertakers’ work. This is a manufactured object, and thus someone can, and has, lost it. Funny, this thing is both alive and dead. Schrödinger would have a fit.

Her heart dropped to the bottom of her feet. The Undertakers were a group of Unnaturals that lived deep within the mines of the gang-controlled zone, with a reputation for what they did with corpses and people who trespassed in their land; and nothing said about them was pretty.

And I have to bring it back to the right one, Lyara said. Wonderful. She hung her head low, beneath her shoulders. Fine, I’ll throw it inside their galleries from outside their checkpoint or something.

Why risk it? Basileus said, You need to properly deliver things back, and if it doesn’t belong to them? A budding Necromancer built this to test his skill, and then died, horribly, because people who build this stuff and are budding generally die horrible deaths within the next five days, he added with his matter-of-fact voice. His face turned towards the window of his office, covered by planks. I think this will be an interesting case; I’ll help you.

Basileus dropped the brain on the ground and the greasy substance the organ exuded dripped down his fingers, which he flicked in the air to dry off. Lyara ducked, moving her head to the side to avoid the droplets aimed at her head. The Investigator chuckled and smirked at her. Lyara’s teeth bit down on her lips and she shook her head. There was no way she would accept his help. She knew enough and she didn’t need to know more.

No, I can do this alone, she said. You don’t have to help me. If I fail, I can come back to you on the last day.

I insist, he said and moved closer to her. His hands gently touched the tip of her hair. Lyara shook her head again and grimaced, nauseated by the feeling of his fingers on her.

Please don’t. This time, her voice was cracked. She felt a deep unsettling weight in her stomach, which hadn’t been there before. It was The Bastard, making her feel like that.

You still have memories you are willing to bargain for deals, do you not? he asked. She recoiled and took a step towards the door, while she kept her eyes fixed on him. The step away gave her some breath, but he closed the distance and the feeling returned.

No, please, she said. Her eyes watered and her vision grew foggy. I don’t want to.

Are you sure you won’t need my help? he asked, closing his face near hers. The Undertakers live in the Deep Pits of Cloatos, he said. They love to get their hands on young children, on orphans, on the trash that pollutes the beauty of the Empire’s best working penal colony. They enjoy giving burials to them, letting their still beating hearts become the home of their trees of flesh and muscles. Then, suddenly, he walked away from her as his furred robe swished on the ground.

His hand scratched under his chin with his eyes lost in thought, a mysterious expression on his face. His skin was unearthly pale beneath the glowing crystal on the ceiling.

I think you could pass through the Gatekeeper, and maybe avoid the dangers of the garden of bones and blood. However, can you avoid one of the Undertakers, if they come close enough to hear your heartbeat? Or if their thirst is so great they sink their fangs upon your tender neck before bothering to ask questions? For a second his eyes flashed silver and golden, before their icy blue gaze returned as cold as ever.

He smiled a soft and kind smile, which made her heart drum louder in fear and revulsion. He was always kinder before he took his payment.

What memory do you want? Lyara relented, and her shoulders slumped as she surrendered to him. Life was more important than memories. The risk in Cloatos was always of death, no matter the action taken or the outcome desired. He clapped his hands excitedly, grabbing hold of her shoulders with a bright smile on his face.

Good girl! Always hire the best I say. How about a fairy tale told at night, near candlelight? he said.

She breathed, filling her lungs with the scent of citrus, and nodded once. It was one of her best memories, one of the few with her parents still in it. She had bargained their faces and their names, but she still had more memories with them.

She had the memory of helping her mother wash the dishes. She had the memory of cradling a teddy bear gifted by her father. She remembered the white picket fence and the garden, the glare of the sun, the heat of the light’s rays and more. She could do without a fairy tale at night.

Cer, the Investigator said. He did not need to say anything else. The head of the dog stitched on the Investigator’s robe, the one on the uttermost right, opened its eyes, the stitches and crude wires holding its mouth shut twisted and pulled as they came undone. It bared its fangs, glistened with saliva, as its neck warped and cracked.

The head grew and lengthened, the neck elongated to let the furred monstrosity gaze at her from above the Investigator’s head. The awaiting jaws of the creature lingered above Lyara’s own. She had done this before. She knew it would not hurt, but she still didn’t like it.

Get it done with, she said. He needed her permission. It was so easy to ignore the impulse of simply turning around and running away. The Investigator was a spider in her mind, spinning a thread that always drew her uncomfortably close to him, like a moth to a flame or a vampire to freshly spilled blood.

The jaws of the dog head opened and fell on her as she closed her eyes. It was always over in an instant, and afterwards she didn’t even remember