CHAPTER 22: Can You Blame The Madman For Laughing?

(Yes we missed last week as well. Sorry, but life is random and things happen. ~ Author-sama.)

Jacqueline sighed as she rested her head on the cool countertop of the Dollar General checkout line. There was no one else here, so she didn't feel bad for holding up a nonexistent line. She needed to rest after having spent the last twenty minutes ranting at the cashier about the book she was writing, simply titled 'Can You Blame The Madman For Laughing'.

Said cashier leaned over and said, "So, to summarize: a guy with extreme hallucinations and a physiological need to laugh at everything gets out of an insane asylum through magical means and now travels the multiverse looking for a place that accepts him. You're stuck at the point where he ends up outside of the boundary because you don't know what to do. Did I get that right?"

Jacqueline lifted her head back up and nodded. "Yeah, pretty much."

The cashier, who's name tag read 'Carl', hummed in thought. Eventually, he snapped his fingers with an idea, "I'm not much of a writer myself, but I love coming up with dramatic speeches. I came up with one last night that you could maybe use."

She shook her head, saying, "I wouldn't want to take something someone else wrote."

He interrupted her, "It isn't going to be used otherwise, just hear it and if you can use it, then do."

She pulled out her notepad as Carl cleared his throat.

"One man, nay, one species, cannot hold a universe themselves, much less many. And while it is true, you can remove the pillars holding one together by killing those who represent them, that alone won't destroy the infinite. The shockwave can do damage, but nothing more than what time would do anyway. Everything spawned from the void will eventually return to it. Souls however… Well, that's a different story."

Jacquelin wrote the final few words down and looked up at the man with stars in her eyes. "Thank you, thank you! That was just what I needed!"

She slapped a ten-dollar bill on the counter and grabbed her purchases, running out the door.

Carl called after her, "Wait! Your total is only $6.75… And she's gone.

He looked down at the dollar and finished the transaction, before picking up his textbook to continue reading. Hopefully, even if she uses that word for word, he changed it enough so no one would notice he plagiarized his schoolbook.

He was looking forward to hearing about the laughing madman showing up in some Dollar General somewhere, he sounded fun.