Through the purple haze, I could see fibrous muscle growing on my bones. I'd try to get a better look, but then the smoke would seemingly get thicker and obscure it once again. I could hear Church coughing and Patti barking, but it all seemed very distant to me. The smoke became so dense that I couldn't even see my hand right in front of my face. That was until the smoke all imploded in on myself. There I stood, in my living room, with a rotted and decaying hand in front of my face. I yelled and stumbled back, falling onto my couch.
Patti was now barking uncontrollably, and Church just stared. Jay walked up to me, leaned down, and got real close to my face. She smelled of saltwater, which wasn't unpleasant. Her tentacles reached out and touched my face. That shocked me even more to feel her touch.
"Okay! It worked, Max! How do you feel?" Jay asked.
I looked back at her before replying, "I… I feel brittle. Like pieces of me will break off if I move too quickly. I don't like it." I looked to Patti and called for her. She stopped barking and came up to sniff. She seemed to recognize my smell, but I think my appearance was scaring her. She went to stand next to Church, but at least she wasn't barking anymore.
Jay stood up and said, "Well, you're not going to disintegrate or anything, but you do look like a corpse." She pointed at a mirror in the living room. "Go take a look."
I followed her finger pointing to my wall, and I stood up. I felt in a daze. This felt different than when I had changed into a skeleton. It felt like I hit a growth spurt. I shambled to my mirror and took a look. I looked more like me in this form than I did as a skeleton, I supposed, but I was certainly a zombie… angel… thingy. My skin was green and peeling, revealing gray muscle underneath. My eyes were milky white with some dull color from my iris coming through. I still had my leather jacket on, but it was cracked and brittle. My mohawk was tilted to the side, looking sad. Above that was a golden halo that moved with my head's motion.
I was examining my face closely when the world outside flashed red. This startled me, and behind me I heard Church say, "Dude, what was that?"
I turned quickly to Jay and said, "Jay, what was that?"
Jay was frowning and looking outside. She turned to me and said, "Every so often, the maze will warn people of an impending monster spawn. It's for those who stay in one place too long. That's a five-minute warning for us to move."
"We can't stay in one place too long?" I asked.
"Well, you can, but you have to remember that this game is still trying to downsize your population."
"No, I get that, but why warn us? Why not just send the monsters?" I said.
Jay thought about that for a moment when Church asked, "Do we need to leave now?"
"Yeah, I think we do," I said.
"Where are we going?" Church asked.
I looked back in the mirror to examine myself one last time. I now had raggedy wings that were held close to my body. I was able to move them, too, which felt weird. I finally said, "We're going to your house and we're getting your token. After that, we'll figure it out."
We gathered ourselves and headed to my front door. I was in the front with Patti by my side, who still eyed me suspiciously. Church was behind me with the backpack of supplies, and Jay was in the rear, still thinking.
"Okay, what direction is your house?" I asked Church. He pointed in a direction, and I looked out the door where he had pointed. I couldn't see anything dangerous, so that was good. Church had gone quiet and was starting to look scared. I turned back to him and said, "I'll protect you, okay?" He didn't say anything, but he nodded. I looked at Patti and snapped my finger, pointing at Church. She went to his side. "Well, let's do this," I said.
I opened the door, and we exited onto my lawn. It was still the same outside, quiet and nighttime. The smoldering pile of the burnt angel let off small plumes of smoke. As we got further into my yard, I looked around and saw there was a wall a few hundred feet behind my house. It was a maze wall that stretched in both directions, forcing us into its lane. I wondered if anyone else got killed by the walls generating earlier, like Joey. Shit, I realized, I forgot about him. "Hold on a moment, I've got to check something," I said.
I retraced my steps to where Joey's arm and face had been sliced off. I looked around and finally found him. His face clung to some of my overgrown grass, still and unmoving. I knelt down beside it and said, "Sorry your face got sliced off, Joey. You were an asshole, but you didn't deserve that. Maybe it's best that this happened to you? I don't know if living through this is any better than the alternative."
Church cleared his throat from behind me, and I stood up, slightly embarrassed. Church said, "Is the face talking to you?"
"What? No, of course not." I said.
"I don't know, man. You're talking to an invisible octopus vampire thing, so how the hell am I supposed to know the face doesn't talk?" he said.
Jay let out an indignant noise and said, "Tell him I'm not a vampire, Max!"
"No, he's not talking to me. This was my neighbor, Joey. His, uh, face got sliced off when the wall materialized." I said.
"Whoa, that's messed up," Church said.
"Yeah, he didn't deserve it. He was complaining about my grass when he-"
I was cut off by a low, groaning word that said, "Grassssss." I looked down and saw that Joey was looking at me with focused eyes. I yelled and stumbled backwards. I heard Church say something, but I just crab walked backwards away from the face.
"Jay! Jay! It just fucking talked!" I said.
"What?" said Church. Jay walked up and examined the face. She turned to me and said, "Well, yeah, since you're in this form, you have a skill for talking to the dead and your neighbor is dead."
I just looked at her incredulously while Church walked up to the face. He looked nauseous as he studied it as well. "I don't think it can talk, dude. It's pretty dead looking," he said.
I stood up and brushed off my pants. They were also rotting away, and some bits were flaking off. "I forgot I have a skill in this form that lets me talk to the dead." I walked up next to Church and looked down at my neighbor. Joey's eyes were looking all around him now. I was going to say something else when the world flashed red once more.
I looked to Jay, who was standing next to me. "We've got to go now. They're going to spawn monsters at any moment, and we need to get far away from this location," she said.
I turned to Church, pointed in a direction, and said, "This way?" He nodded in reply, and I looked in that direction. The maze walls seemed rather wide, maybe a thousand feet or more, and the corridor went in the direction we needed to head. "Okay, we've got to go now before they spawn some bullshit to kill us. You ready?"
Church nodded, looking scared again. He had his hands gripped tightly on the backpack. I went to begin walking away when, from the ground, I heard Joey say, "Pleeeease". I stopped, and Church almost walked into the back of me. He apologized, and I looked down at Joey's face. He looked worried, even scared. I just couldn't leave him behind.
"Fuck it," I said, as I went to grab his face. It was gross and felt like loose skin, because I guess it was just that. I turned Church around and opened the backpack. I shoved the face in and zipped it back up. I heard a faint, "Thank you" from inside.
I turned to face down the maze corridor, leading off to where Church said he lived. I held out my hand and said "Baton". I heard Church fumble around before he put the metallic rod in my hand. It was still collapsed in, so I swung my arm out and extended it fully. "Okay, let's fucking do this."