These are my final lines
I've lived all my nine lives
Rob couldn't stand it when his music got interrupted. He would often wait in the car after he had reached his destination in order for the song to finish. That wasn't always possible and he knew better than to try it when anyone else was in the car, but it was a nice little indulgence when he was driving alone. He had really gotten ripped off this time. Only two lines before the song cut out? At least he knew it well enough that it could play inside his head.
But why was he thinking about that? He wasn't in the car. Rob was just leaving his dorm on a bright sunny morning in New York City. Just a few blocks to the west and he would be at the building where the first class of the day would be held. As he approached the first intersection on his route, a woman sprinted past him with a panicked expression on her face. Nothing too unusual; crazy people were a daily sight in New York. Then there was another. And another.
A crowd was gathered to the corner. When Rob reached the end of the street and turned his head, he understood what the fuss was about. One of the World Trade Center's two towers had a huge gaping hole in it. A fire was faintly visible inside as black smoke drifted up into the sky. Who knows how many minutes must have passed as Rob stared in sheer disbelief. It must have been one hell of an accident.
His attention shifted to a plane that appeared overhead. It seemed to be flying at unusually low altitude.
Ladies and gentlemen
Welcome to my life again
Walk with me, every curve, every bend
This promenade that seems to come to an end.
Rob woke up with his head resting on the steering wheel, cushioned only slightly by a deflated airbag. As he sat up, he saw that the empty white balloon was smeared with blood. It hadn't dried so he must not have been out for very long.
The windshield had what looked like thousands of cracks in it but hadn't shattered. The headlights were kaput but the scene in front of him was illuminated by the inside of the pizza place, where shocked onlookers who had stopped by for some quick takeout were starting to creep towards the wreckage. A handful of screwdrivers, wrenches and pliers were resting on his lap, some dripping with blood.
At that point, he glanced in the rear view mirror and gasped. Rob looked like he had just lost a fight with Freddy Krueger. At this point, his face was such a mess that it was hard to tell how deep the cuts actually were but he felt confident he was getting at least two or three scars out of this whole disaster…that is, if he could even get out of the car.
He turned to his left to reach for the car door handle. It only required slight movement from his legs but that was still enough to send a wave of intense pain through his entire body. The right leg seemed okay but something had definitely happened to the left. Upon closer inspection, there was a small bloodstain around his knee that he could make out through his khaki pants, but it didn't look very intimidating compared to his face at the moment.
During that painful attempt at movement, Rob did remember he had a phone in his pocket and was able to dig it out. A few drops of blood fell from his face onto the screen as he tried to call Kate. The phone rang a few times as he struggled to stay conscious. Adrenaline was supposed to kick in at a time like this but it was sure taking its sweet time…or maybe he was just too injured for it to work.
"I was wondering where you were," Kate said as she picked up. "Are you on your way home?"
Rob opened his mouth to speak but only a faint but growling noise came out. He realized too late he hadn't said anything since the impact.
"Rob, are you there?"
"I'm…I'm in some trouble."
"What's going on?!"
"I got in a…a really bad accident."
"Where are you?!"
"The…the parking lot at…at Pizza Mike's."
"What happened? Are you okay?!"
"...No. I don't think I am."
Rob could hear his wife take a deep breath before she spoke again. "I'll call an ambulance and drive over there now. I need you to get out of the car."
"Okay," he said. He reached over and got the car door open. The combination of the rain and the setting sun had made his surroundings much darker than they were when he started this ill-fated drive.
There was a pile of scrap near his car, looking like metal guts which had leaked from some gaping wound he couldn't see from this angle. For the first time, he saw the other car, also motionless in the parking lot with a huge dent in its center. The driver was a young teenager who couldn't have had his license longer than a year. He didn't notice Rob opening the door, but then again he clearly wasn't accustomed to paying attention to his surroundings.
After a few deep breaths, Rob tried to move his left leg again. He managed to lift it over the edge of the car, but the pain was so intense that he cried out and dropped the phone. He couldn't take the time to look for it, if he didn't finish getting out now, who knows when he would feel strong enough again. The right leg seemed uninjured and moved easily.
He decided to stand up and walk, but as soon as he was upright, the left leg and ankle both gave way. Rob toppled forward and his head struck the hard, wet pavement.
Played the game and lost
I wonder how you can
Hold the cards for a dead man
"Rob?! Rob, where did you go?!"
Monika had knows something was really wrong shortly after Kate had picked up the phone. Not long after answering, her face had gotten pale even as she struggled to sound collected.
"Fucking shit!" Kate almost never swore. This was bad.
"What's going on?!" Monika asked frantically.
Kate pulled a raincoat off the rack adjacent to the front door. "Rob was in a car accident. I have no idea what condition he's in, but at least I got him to tell me where it was. I'm headed down there and I'll call an ambulance on the way."
Monika nodded. "Let's go."
Kate gave her a confused look. "Someone has to stay with the boys."
Monika began to panic. She hadn't thought of that, they had been quietly playing with their train set in the other room. "No, I need to see him!"
"Monika-"
"I need to be with him!"
"Monika!" The shock of Kate raising her voice like this silenced her. "If you're going to be part of this family, I need to be able to depend on you!"
"But…but I've never even taken care of them on my own."
"I know," Kate said. "After the ambulance, I'll call a babysitter and hopefully she can come soon and back you up. Now I've got to go."
Not waiting for a response, Kate rushed out the door into the rain. Monika gripped her hair with both hands. What was going on? How could something like this just happen out of nowhere? Rob had been right that day at the cemetery. Life didn't have the predetermined outcomes she had discovered inside the Literature Club. Now she had wrecked their relationship on the day he was going to die. What if he died thinking she hated him? She had said that, after all. But it was obvious she didn't mean it, she was just mad! He had to know that, right? He was smart, he had to know that she could never hate someone who had given her so much, right? But he also had terrible self-esteem - it might not take much for him to believe someone hated him.
Her head was spinning so fast she didn't even realize that the boys had come into the room. "Where did Mama go?"
Monika tried to compose herself quickly. "Your mom went to go help your Dad with something."
They weren't buying it. "Mama needs to come back!" Andrew protested.
"Where is Daddy?" Lucas added.
Injured on the side of the road? Maybe even dying? What was she supposed to say? "Your daddy is…he's in the car." That was accurate, right?
Andrew suddenly changed the subject. "I need snack."
With that, the two of them rushed into the kitchen and climbed onto the counter. Before Monika could react, they had the cabinets open and were pulling out boxes of crackers.
"Boys, your parents don't want you to get on the counter."
"It's a counter day," Lucas replied, as if that made any sense.
"Look, can you please just get down? I don't want you to get hurt."
Andrew tried to reassure her. "I won't get hurt, Monika. I won't."
"I'll get you each a bowl of crackers if you just get down," she replied. Finally they listened. How did Kate expect her to handle this when she was nearly mad with guilt and worry? At least she was coherent enough to pour crackers into two small bowls and set them on the nearby dining table. The boys dutifully sat down and began snacking. They would be still for at least a few moments.
As soon as they were done, they rushed into the living room leaving a trail of legos and magnetic building toys behind them. The boys egged each other on to the point where they were both climbing the back of the couch and then jumping off onto the floor. After the first huge thump, Monika rushed into the bedroom to grab a pillow. At least then would have a soft spot to land for as long as they insisted on these daredevil antics.
Monika sunk into the nearby recliner and tried to make sense of the clawing pain in her chest. When she had discovered the truth about her world, she was certainly scared…but not like this. This was a different kind of terror, a visceral fear that life absolutely could not continue if Rob died tonight. Rationally, she knew it would but it was still impossible to imagine and the thought of confronting that future made her want to escape her own body and hide somewhere where she would never feel again. There was one thing she finally understood. The longing for the player she felt during the game wasn't love, it was obsession. This feeling, this painful sensation that life without another person would be simply impossible…this was love. It hurt.
A knock at the door jolted Monika out of her anguished stupor. Waiting on the other side was a young girl she had never seen before. With her short stature and hair adorned with bows, she reminded Monika immediately of Natsuki.
"Uh, hi."
"Hi! I'm Nicole, I'm here to babysit?"
"Oh right," Monika said, visibly relieved. "I'm Monika, come on in."
Nicole walked inside the house and immediately took charge, inviting the boys to start building a marble maze and blessedly getting them out of Monika's hair for a while.
"You're one of Rob's friends, right?" Nicole asked. "I hope he's okay, you must be really upset."
"Yeah," Monika replied. "I'm…I'm really worried." She caught sight of Rob's laptop and walked over to his desk chair. Despite how angry she had been about Rob and Sayori's friendship, she also felt a strange obligation to her classmate. Sayori had a right to know what was happening, although the part about her awful argument with Rob could probably be omitted without much consequence.
She opened up the DDLC folder and prepared to write another letter when she noticed something. There was a folder named "pics" that hadn't been there when she was snooping earlier that day.
The first picture caught her completely off guard. It was Natsuki in a Spider-Man costume making the most ridiculous pose. Next was Yuri in a gorgeous black dress and her hair tied back looking like she was on her way to an awards show. Rob must have found images of different clothes and put them inside the game for the girls to enjoy. It was definitely attuned to his taste. One of the pictures was Sayori in an elaborate pink dress with a parasol, which Monika knew was Princess Peach's look. If she had seen that earlier today in the mood she had been in, she might have deleted the entire game on the spot. Now she just rolled her eyes. Monika continued to scroll through the pictures and a warm smile crossed her face as she remembered the good times with her friends.
Before Monika knew it, tears were streaming down her cheeks. If not for Rob, her jealousy would have doomed the girls forever. Now she had alienated him on what could be the day of his death. She couldn't go on like this.
Finally, she began to type her message.
I'm a restless soul
I'll make the best ghost
Rob regained consciousness to find himself bleeding again. It may have looked worse because of the rain, but the fall he had just taken definitely added another cut to his forehead. He wasn't sure how long he'd been out this time, but Kate had said she was on her way. She couldn't see him like this. He couldn't help limping or being covered with blood and dirt, but he wanted to at least be standing when she arrived.
This was going to be tough with only one leg. He managed to stretch out the injured leg enough so that his knee was off the ground and wouldn't be aggravated by the pressure required to get up. Next he pushed hard against the pavement with both hands and his unscathed right knee.
It almost worked. Rob almost had himself in a crouching position, but balancing without one of his legs was just too hard and he fell backwards onto the ground. The world around him grew fuzzy but he noticed a pair of headlights. Another car was pulling into the parking lot, but it was hard to see details.
Someone ran up to him and seemed to be crying. She faded away and Rob found himself back in college, rushing back to his dorm. His roommates were already in the lobby. It turned out one of them had a father who worked in the financial district, perilously close to the World Trade Center. With classes canceled, the group decided to make their way downtown to see what they could find out.
This was the only day he could think of where you could walk past people on the street and everyone was talking about the same thing. They passed a bar where people were angrily banging on the table and yelling at the television, a scene he had seen in countless movies. As they walked further on and the flaming buildings loomed larger and larger, Rob remembered the characters in Greek mythology who had made journeys into Hell (or Hades, to be specific). He had an understanding now of how that felt.
Almost an hour after the plane hit the first tower, it collapsed. The building seemed to fall straight down and disappeared into a huge cloud of dust that began to flood down the street towards them. Everything in front of him disappeared into the gray mass.
"Rob?!" A voice said suddenly. "Rob, snap out of it!"
"So much dust," he answered. "So much metal, so much dirt. It's so dark."
"Rob, come back! You're not in New York! That's over!"
But it wasn't. He understood now that in the terror of this moment, he had imagined a future for himself where he lived through this terrible day, but that was done. He was back where he had always been, in a city under attack. He heard loud sirens and had the sense that bright lights were going off near him, but he couldn't see an ambulance anywhere.
There was an open store immediately to his left. He might be able to rush inside in time to avoid the dust cloud. He yelled to his panicked friends and pointed them in the right direction. As he sprinted and finally jumped through the doorway, the debris blocked out all the light coming from above. There was an awful smell of burnt plastic and smoldering ashes. The lights inside the store flickered and shorted out. Everything was dark now.
Soundtrack Update:
Iron Maiden - Stranger in a Strange Land (Chapter 3)
Victoria - Stay (Chapter 6)
Within Temptation - Sinead (Chapter 6)
Anathema - Harmonium (Chapter 10)
GO 2 - Power (Chapter 11)
Katatonia - Pale Flag (Chapter 11)
Sabaton - To Hell and Back (Chapter 12)
The Four Seasons - Oh, What a Night (Chapter 14)
Sonata Arctica - Juliet (Chapter 15/16)
