Chapter Eight: Alchemize

I could feel the blood spattering my shirt as I buried my knife into the ogre's mouth, driving it out through the back of its skull. The underling gurgled for a moment, choking on its own blood, before collapsing into a large pile of grist. There was blue build grist, as well as several of the other variants…shale, tar, and maybe mercury, or some other substance.

I tried to use the alchemiter to create new weapons that would be better suited to my needs than a simple Bowie knife, but I quickly realized that I needed more punched cards and more of the different kinds of grist…as well as a few captchalogue codes that I did not possess.

But I had an idea of how I could acquire them.

In the meantime, I had to get back to a defensible place before I was completely overrun by these goddamn imps. The imps had all seemed to rally behind the ogre underling that I'd just killed, completely storming my front and backyard. Even now, they were swarming into my house. I collected all of the grist dropped by the ogre, sending it into my grist cache for Cruz to build up my house with.

I sprinted out of the kitchen and back onto the stairs. An imp waited for me about halfway up, but I blew right past it, driving an elbow into the side of its face. The blow did not kill the imp, but it certainly dazed it. It was not able to injure me as I sprinted past. The sound of dozens of imps forcing their way inside spurring me on, I reached the top of the stairs, kicked a second imp out of the way, and ducked into my bedroom. I slammed the door shut and locked it.

I could hear the underlings swarming around downstairs—making a complete mess of the kitchen, no doubt—and there were a few who were starting to explore the upstairs. Before long, there was scratching and banging coming from the other side of the bedroom door. My door was pretty sturdy, but if it was subjected to a beating by a swarm of bloodthirsty little shits…well, that's why I needed to get some weapon upgrades.

I sank down into my rolley-chair, opening itunes and playing some Hans Zimmer. I chose something from the soundtrack of The Last Samurai—that was one of Zimmer's more peaceful-sounding works. For a moment, it occurred to me that if the world had actually ended, then that would mean Hans Zimmer was dead… I shook my head frantically, banishing those thoughts.

"Not thinking about home, not thinking about home, not thinking about home…" I repeated to myself. I couldn't afford to have any kind of breakdown now; not with monsters quite literally knocking on my door. I closed my eyes, let the music calm me down. I really did like this particular soundtrack—I'd read somewhere that, while composing the soundtrack, Hans Zimmer thought he was doing a terrible job trying to understand Japanese music. But when he ended up taking his work to Japan for feedback, he was actually asked how he knew so much about Japanese music.

Because he's a fucking God of all things Awesome, that's how he knew so much about Japanese music.

But I digress.

I opened up the internet and checked my facebook, but the website was dead. No updates at all, from anyone, past five o'clock. I checked the time at the bottom corner of my computer…but the clock was reading all zeros. My cellphone clock was similarly neutralized. I had no way of telling time. But I was still pretty sure it was long past five. How could Facebook be inactive for that long? Maybe the world had ended…

Not thinking about home, not thinking about home…

I closed out of the internet and went back into PasHassle, checking to see if Tami was on. She was not, at the moment, but someone else was.

-anomalousThespian began hassling conquistadorsAshes-

AT: hey
AT: cruz
AT: you there?
CA: yeah bro im so here
CA: im like
CA: the here-est of them all
CA: …
CA: heh
AT: are you…?
AT: fuck it, never mind.
AT: you get into the session yet?
AT: the medium
AT: whatever the hell cass called it; you get in?
CA: ya bro
CA: i got in
CA: went all kevin flynn on this motherfucker
CA: got me a sprite and everything
AT: yes, wonderful.
AT: you know what you're supposed to do?
AT: you're supposed to build up my house to the first gate?
CA: yeah bro i got you
CA: i just gotta go make these imps chillax aight
AT: you know anything about sprites, dude?
AT: i mean, you seem to know a lot about this game, already…
CA: yeah man i know shit about the sprites
CA: question is
CA: what do u know about the sprites
AT: …well, obviously not enough, if i'm asking you something about them.
AT: i spoke with cass
CA: o yea bro did u guys go on ur date
CA: the one theo set up for u saturday nite
CA: howd that go
AT: the world blew up, cruz; we didn't get the chance.
AT: anyway…
AT: i speak with Cass, and she tells me to prototype my sprite with something living or previously alive;
AT: something reasonably sentient, mind you.
AT: and my murdered dream self, minus an intact throat, is suddenly dumped into my bedroom.
CA: whoa man hit the brakes for a sec
CA: whats this about ur murdered dream self
CA: ur dream self is fine bro
CA: i just saw it a minute ago in ur dream tower
CA: sleepin like a fuckin baby
AT: how could you see it a minute ago? you were sleeping a minute ago?
CA: naw man
CA: i find myself on prospit sometimes if i smoke too much
CA: …
CA: i think i smoked a bowl too many this afternoon
CA: haha which reminds me
CA: i saw u in the clouds again u fuckin angel
CA: u were a fuckin angel dude hahahaha
CA: so fuckin weird
AT: yeah, about that…
AT: and wait, why the fuck are you looking at my sleeping dream self?
AT: actually, fuck it.
AT: never mind.
AT: as i was saying, shenanigans happen, and my dead dream self ends up prototyped with the eaglesprite—it'd already been merged with my roman eagle sculpture.
AT: my dream self was definitely sentient, definitely 'previously-alive', just like cass wanted.
AT: and it tries to fucking murder me when all i do is speak two words to it.
AT: and my sprite, it still has the wings.
AT: and feathers. it has fucking feathers, too.
AT: there is a glowing red sprite-version of me combined with an eagle rampaging around somewhere.
AT: there is your fucking angel that you see in prospit's clouds.
AT: my fucked-up sprite/eagle clone.
CA: naw dude prospit dont have any clouds
CA: those are skaian clouds dude from skaia
CA: and when i saw u in the clouds u werent glowin red dude
CA: and ur dream self aint fuckin dead either so
CA: i dunno what u want me to say
AT: i dunno… i guess i was only curious as to why prototyping my dream self would create a psycho.
AT: well, it doesn't really matter at this point, now, does it?
AT: oh, shit, gotta go.
AT: tami just signed on and i've been meaning to talk to her.
AT: oh, i almost forgot. can you do me a favor?
CA: yeah bro what do ya need
AT: i just need you to deploy the punch designix from the phernalia registry.
AT: put it somewhere upstairs, preferably.
AT: and move the cruxtruder upstairs, too.
CA: aight i have it…
CA: uh…
CA: ok i just set it down on the balcony outside ur window
AT: can you build a bridge from my window to the balcony, real quick?
CA: already done
AT: whoa, what the hell was that?
CA: sorry dude i just made ur roof flat
CA: made a bit more noise than i thought it would
CA: ok i just put the cruxtruder down on the roof
CA: here ill make u a ladder
CA: there we are
AT: great, cruz, thanks a bunch.
CA: aight bro later
CA: ill start building ur house once i deal with these imps

-anomalousThespian is no longer hassling conquistadorsAshes-

It startled me slightly when Cruz made the ladder. Everything was normal, and then suddenly BOOM! A ladder appeared next to my bed, leading up through the ceiling. Cruz had been nice enough to build a hatch, as well, so that the rain wouldn't fall right into my room.

I scrolled down to my friend Tami's screen name. I double-clicked on it, starting a new conversation.

-anomalousThespian began hassling tchaikovskysAccompanist-

AT: hey, tam.
AT: you there?
TA: Do u really have 2 ask that every time u start a convo on here?
TA: I'm logged in, rn't I? Unlike u, when it says I'm logged in, I'm actually on my computer.
TA: There a reason y ure interrupting me?
AT: good, i was afraid you were going to be in another one of your moods.
AT: i need you to draw up a few captchalogue codes, if you have the chance.
TA: And by 'if u have the chance', u mean right now?
AT: well… yeah.
AT: normally i wouldn't press you, but there's kind of…you know…
AT: a mob of monsters swarming into my house, with sharp claws and teeth, who just so happen to want a bite of me.
AT: several bites, rather.
AT: i need to make a few weapon upgrades.
TA: Y don't u just get the Pictionary Modus and draw shit urself?
TA: I've got my own problems here, 2, u know.
AT: i tried that a while ago.
AT: anything i drew on that thing ended up being read as a fucking pumpkin.
AT: except for when i try to draw a knife—then i end up with some stupid blue piece of shit that looks like a three-dimensional jpeg.
AT: not everyone has your art skills.
TA: not everyone has ur incompetence skills, either.
AT: …so that's a yes?
TA: Yeah, ok, I'll do it. Gimme a sec…
TA: Ok, I'm back. Goddamn basilisk swiped me and ripped up my fav shirt.
TA: Some of the basilisks have wings, now. Some dumbshit must have prototyped a fucking bird.
AT: well, dragons have wings, too…
TA: Alright, I found that modus. What do u need?
AT: uh…okay. okay, can you draw a gladius for me? you know, the roman sword?
AT: and a lightsaber.
TA: U know what? i just realized that i actually don't feel like doing all that.
TA: U have a printer in ur room, right?
AT: um…yeah.
TA: Ok, here's what ure gonna do. Captchalogue ur printer and send me the code.
TA: And don't ask any dumb questions.
AT: what's a dumb question?
TA: …
AT: okay, here's my printer's code; Ch27fFN0.
TA: Right, thanks. Now give me another sec…
TA: OK.
TA: cg6fOj19
TA: This code is ur printer combined w/ my Pictionary Modus.
TA: U can scan pictures of objects into ur computer, and it'll create a captchalogue file.
TA: Exactly like a ghost captchalogue card, only in digital form.
TA: U can't use this file for alchemy, but u can use it to extract the captchalogue code.
TA: Take the code 2 the punch designix with a blank card, get a punched card…and u know the rest.
AT: good thing i keep every blank card i've ever gotten. my sis would give me piles of the things…
TA: The thing works through the scanner. U'll have 2 print out a picture of an object and scan it 2 make it work.
TA: Kinda inconvenient, but it is the way it is.
TA: If there's a way 2 convert something to a captchalogue file w/o having to print it out, I haven't figured it out yet.
AT: alrighty.
AT: thanks, tam.
TA: Yeah.

-tchaikovskysAccompanist is no longer hassling anomalousThespian-

I closed out of PalHassle and stood up, stepping over to the ladder that Cruz had made. I grasped the rungs and pulled myself up to the ceiling, where I pushed open the hatchway and crawled up through what was left of the attic. Cruz had indeed made my roof flat…he'd done it by shearing off most of the roof and replacing it with a flat surface. While it was certainly easier to set the cruxtruder down on top of this surface, a consequence of the roof's flattening was that the attic was barely two feet high.

I climbed out onto the roof, into the light rain. The cruxtruder sat not too far from the opening. I hurried over to the machine and manipulated the little wheel set into the side. As I turned it, a cruxite dowel was pushed out of the cylindrical shaft. I took the dowel and continued to turn the wheel, extracting a second cylinder of cruxite.

I pulled five dowels from the cruxtruder. I was considering extracting a sixth, but as I grabbed the wheel again, I sensed movement from up above. I glanced up just in time to see a flash of sharp teeth and beating wings before claws suddenly tore into the back of my shoulder. I threw myself to the ground, swearing at the top of my lungs.

"Stop! Fucking! SCRATCHING ME!" I roared. I've been getting sliced up by my Sis since I could stand—I had more than my fair share of scars to prove it—I did not need the same treatment from these little shits. "C'mere, asshole! Come the fuck back here!"

The creature that had scratched me obliged. It was a snake-like…well, it had a snake-like body, but it also had arms and feet, like a lizard. It had a reptilian head and a wide grin, filled with glistening teeth. It also had wings that sprouted from its back, which was what enabled it to fly. This must have been one of those flying basilisks Tami had mentioned.

I was pissed. Pissed at getting cut up yet again, and pissed at losing another shirt. And when I was pissed, I fought twice as hard.

I stepped to the side as the basilisk came swooping down for me, waiting for the right moment to strike. When that moment came, my free hand shot forward and grabbed the basilisk's tail. I yanked the surprised monster back and slammed it down into the ground. In an instant, I was jumping on top of it. I didn't hit the ground after a few seconds of falling, curiously…but I ignored that oddity as I landed on top of the basilisk, extracting my Bowie from my strife specibus and driving it up through the basilisk's mouth and out the top of its skull.

The basilisk made a discomforting gurgling sound for a moment before it was rendered down into grist, which I promptly sent into my cache. As I rose back to my feet, however… I noticed something terribly out of place: I was no longer on the roof. I was on the floor of the attic.

I stood all the way up, getting my bearings back, climbing back out onto the roof. There was a big hole in the roof, now… I'd created it. Somehow, I'd managed to slam that basilisk into the roof so hard that it punched right through to the attic below. Maybe Cruz's manipulation of the roof had weakened it, but… I mean, there's no way I should have been able to do that.

"Your aspect is manifesting."

I recognized that voice. God damn it, I recognized that voice. My gaze snapped over to the hole in the roof, where the voice had come from, and my breath caught in my throat as I beheld the shape of the Phantom. The dark, shadowy figure, crouched in the small attic space, just near the hole in the roof, just far enough away from the daylight that I could not see its face or body in detail.

I've been seeing this figure in my periphery vision my whole life, but this…this was the first time it had ever spoken to me. I've seen its face on occasion, but it's never spoken to me, before… And, just like its face, its voice was maddeningly familiar…but I was never able to realize who it was. It was almost like someone had put a block in my mind, specifically so that I never be able to see the Phantom for who or what it really was.

I took a step toward the hole in the roof, but the Phantom was already gone, vanished into thin air. Another wave of frustration surged up within me, but I took a deep breath and suppressed it. Before any more flying basilisks could show up, I quickly rolled all of the cruxite dowels over to the hatch and dropped them down into my room below, climbing down the ladder and closing the hatchway after I was finished.

Half my shirt was hanging down in ribbons, thanks to the basilisk's little swipe.

My hospital gown had been falling apart after my first few brushes with the imps, so I'd quickly changed before anything embarrassing happened. I'd accidentally put on my stage crew shirt—the black one with the skull and crossbones on the front, and the word CREW on the back. That was the shirt that gave me visions of myself being burnt alive…yeah, there was no way I was going to wear that shirt, so I changed into a regular t-shirt, and now it was shredded, so I was going to have to grab another one…

I was going to run out of shirts, at this rate.

The first shirt I grabbed was my stage crew shirt, once again, and I nearly had it over my head before I realized which shirt it was. I tossed it back into the drawer and quickly threw another one on. Now that I had the cruxite dowels, I got back onto my computer and opened up the internet, going to google images.

The first thing I looked up was a gladius—the short sword used by Roman legionaries, back in the day. I right clicked the image and saved it as a jpeg. I then looked up a lightsaber and saved the image of a red blade. I'm no fan of the Sith—I've always gone light-side when I play Knights of the Old Republic—but I did like red lightsabers better than green or blue ones.

I printed out a picture of the gladius, and then of the lightsaber. I then placed the picture of the gladius into the scanner and activated the device. There was a pause, and a window popped up with two options for me to click—captchalogue, or document. I clicked captchalogue, and the scanner glowed with a bright green light for a few moments before going out.

I opened up My Computer and dug through the downloads folder until I found the captchalogue file for the gladius. I right-clicked it and selected the only option that appeared, which read 'extract code'.

After another short wait, a Notepad document opened up, bearing eight numbers and letters—both upper and lower-case. A captchalogue code. I repeated the process with the picture of the red lightsaber and got the second code, as well. I then wrote both codes down on the back of one of the printed pieces of paper, pulled a pair of blank captchalogue cards from my wallet sylladex, and headed over to my window.

I opened the window and climbed outside, taking a brief moment to stare at the reality-defying rivers of my planet that arced all throughout the skies. Cruz had extended a small portion of the balcony over to the wall which my window was a part of, forming a small bridge. There were no safety rails, or anything, so I just had to make sure I wasn't drunk while crossing.

I made it to the balcony and went over to the punch designix, inserting a card into the slot. I glanced back at the piece of paper and entered the gladius's captchalogue code into the machine. There was a loud mechanical whir, followed by a series of noises that sounded like a hole-punch. When I pulled the card out, it had the image of a gladius imprinted upon it, as well as several precise, rectangular holes, punched through the image.

The second card went through the same process before it, too, got punched with the code of the red lightsaber. I then made a captchalogue of my Bowie knife and punched that, too. I then combined all three and took them over to the totem lathe, which was back in my bedroom. I placed the three overlapped cards into the card slot and secured one of the cruxite dowels in the lathe's vice. I activated the machine and waited for the lathe to finish carving the dowel that would create my composite item.

Once the totem lathe had finished its work, I grabbed the cruxite dowel and carried it back outside to the alchemiter, where I placed it on the small scanning pedestal. I must have had enough of the right kinds of grist, for the alchemiter's mechanical arm scanned the carved totem and started to hum. Within the next few seconds, there was a bright flash of light, and an object had materialized on the alchemiter's platform.

It looked like an enlarged version of my Bowie knife. It had the hilt of a Roman gladius, but there was a modern rubber grip around the hilt as well, making it much more comfortable to hold. The blade was a bit straighter, longer, and much sharper—qualities added to the knife by the properties of the gladius with which it had been combined. Oh, and the blade was also composed not of metal, but of bright, shimmering red energy…much like a lightsaber.

After I picked it up, I found that the energy blade could be deactivated with a squeeze to the handle, revealing a normal metal blade underneath.

"Hell…fucking…yes," I muttered to myself, sending it into my strife specibus. I climbed back into my bedroom and closed the window, sitting back down at the computer. I opened up my Sburb server, getting a good look at Cass's house. I checked her grist cache, and found that she had already amassed a good amount of build grist. I didn't see her, but I wasn't looking all through the house for her, either. I just zoomed out so I could see her room.

I used the revise tool to create a series of floors, walls, and stairs, essentially placing another house on top of Cass's roof. Though I only needed to ensure that Cass could ascend, I ended up extending her house because it provided a very stable foundation for that ascent. Much more stability than what would be provided by a lone staircase or latter, stretching all the way up into the clouds.

I then clicked the Select tool, and I used the shift key to select everything I'd just created over Cass's house…and I copy and pasted it. This put a third extension over the house—exactly identical to the one below it, tripling the height of her house. The staircases matched up, so Cass could ascend all the way to the top unhindered. I pasted three more of these extensions before running out of build grist.

I'd leave it at that until Cass was able to gather more.

I turned my attention next to my bedroom door, which was still taking a light beating from the imps piled up on the other side. I took a deep breath as I retrieved my Roman light-Bowie—I decided to just call it the Roman, for simplicity's sake—from my bladekind specibus. As I held it, I could feel how the larger hilt of this modified knife, along with the blade's new weight, allowed for efficient two-handed usage. But it still worked perfectly as a one-handed weapon, which I preferred. I just knew that I could take a stronger, two-handed grip on the weapon if I ever needed to.

Hell. Yes.

I started forward. I grabbed the doorknob, twisted it, yanked open the door. Four imps who had been piled against the door immediately flew right at me. I struck, grinning as I felt the red energy blade pass effortlessly through one of the creatures' bodies. As I took down the first wave of imps, one by one, I noted that the red energy blade was growing dimmer, more and more transparent, every time I used it. If I continued to use it without pause, it looked like it would eventually fade to nothing, until given the time to recharge.

There were nine or ten imps upstairs already when I opened the door, and by the time I was finished with the last of them, the Roman's energy blade still had a good amount of charge left. It would take a lot more than a group of imps to drain it completely. Even so, I squeezed the grip and disabled the energy blade, leaving me with the metal one underneath. I felt like seeing what the Roman could do without its energy-glove.

I made my way downstairs, dispatching another imp about a third of the way down the staircase. I was then swooped at by another one of those winged basilisks, but I activated the energy blade and managed to slice one of the basilisk's wings off, sending it tumbling to the floor.

Switching the blade back off, I cleaned up the downed basilisk with a quick thrust to the back of its neck, up into its skull. I then hopped off the stairs, and…well, I kinda went to town on everything. After slicing open the first three or four imps, I kind of just let my body go on autopilot. When I thought back on how I'd charged through every room in my house, brutally and efficiently murdering entire groups of those imps…it all just felt like kind of a blur. Luckily, I didn't encounter any more of those ogres during my reclamation of the house—just imps. That made it extremely easy. By the time I was done, there were piles of grist scattered all over my house. I spent a few minutes scouring the rooms, finding all the grist that had been dropped and sending it into my cache.

I then headed back upstairs and quickly pasted another two extensions onto Cass's house, then I ducked into the bathroom, shutting the door behind me. I got out some Neosporin, and I put a dab of it on my cheek—right where my Sprite had cut me. I then applied some more to the numerous scratches and the bite I'd received from those imps early on, and the swipe from that flying basilisk up on the roof. Once everything dried up, I put my shirt back on and stepped out into the hall.

I was only halfway down the upstairs hall to my room when the entire house gave a sudden tremor. I hurried into my room and ducked out through my window, investigating that loud noise. I saw a staircase appear out of nowhere, extending from the side of the balcony and up to…the front door. There was another front door up on the roof, set into a wall, with windows… It was like someone had duplicated my house, then placed the duplicate on top of the original.

Even as I watched, a third house appeared in mid-air and was guided onto the roof of the second one. Cruz was doing exactly what I had done with Cass's house—he built a duplicate of my house on the roof, then he copied and pasted it. I'd gotten enough grist for my house to just about reach the three-quarters point from the ground up to the first gate.

That was no problem, though. I'd only cleared out my house—there were imps still swarming around out in the yard, with more of them arriving every minute. It wouldn't be long before they attacked my house again. Then I would get all the grist I needed.

I returned to the bathroom and grabbed my deodorant, dealing with my underarms, and then I brushed my teeth. After I finished my teeth, I swished Listerine around my mouth until it felt like I was breathing ice. Newly invigorated, I went back to my computer, opened up itunes, and started blasting some Franz Ferdinand. I jumped up and down a few times as the imps skittered back into my house below, getting myself pumped up. I retrieved the Roman from my strife specibus, tightening my grip on its handle.

As I left my bedroom and moved toward the stairs, I started to hum along with the music playing from my computer.

"So if you're lonely… You know I'm here waiting for you. I'm just a cross-hair…"