MAP OF THE PROBLEMATIQUE
Chapter 7: Tyrant Moon

"So why did he kill her?"

"I'm sure it was because she was stepping out with me, although I think there may have been more to it than that."

"Yeah?"

"I overheard Samantha on the phone with him two days ago. Apparently they themselves are fugitives; they did something bad..... Samantha said she had regret over it and wanted to set it right, but Eddie wouldn't have any of it."

"What did they do?"

"Not sure. Stole something, I think. Something big." Joe busted out with a Fred Astaire dance move, and I suprised myself when I laughed. "Glad I could amuse you, love," Joe grinned, winking.

We were making our way through the dark woods, trying to find the highway into Rouge City, when I heard a noise out ahead of us. Out of the woods emerged a man in medical scrubs; behind him, a woman in chef's clothing. We slowly approached them and it wasn't until we were about ten feet away that I realized there were more people out there than just the four of us. I looked over at the chef to find her arm was missing. I looked at it closer and gasped.

"Oh, God, Joe, she's....."

"Yes, they're all Mecha. It's alright, love," he put an arm around my shoulder and smiled slightly. "They're not going to bite."

We hiked on further until we came to a dirt path where a truck had unloaded tons of discarded Mecha parts. "This is where the old and unlicensed Mecha come to get replacement parts," Joe explained. "I've heard of this in passing but never have I actually seen it."

We were about to move on when the atmosphere shifted. Mecha were on high alert; they could..... smell something I couldn't. It was then I noticed the night begin to change. Moonlight, which had been somewhat muted before, grew brighter.

"Oh, God." Joe gasped, his grip around me tightening. A Mecha to my right raised the alarm.

"MOON ON THE RISE!"

"Run, Wendy!" Joe released my shoulder to grab my hand, and we were off.

My heart was slamming in my chest. "J-Joe! What in the hell is going on? What is that?!" I screamed, craning my neck around to look above us. The moon was way too small, and way too close to Earth. I heard voices over loudspeakers and searchlights further lit up the area around us. Whomever it was, they would find us this way. I wasn't sure it would benefit us.

"Flesh Faire!" Joe called out over the din, and my blood ran cold. "This is how they gather their victims!"

"Oh, Jesus!" I looked to my right in time to watch the Mecha in scrubs grabbed up by the moon's undercage.

"Don't look back, Wendy, keep running!"

And it was then that I tripped. I had been running so fast that when my foot caught on the tree root, I slammed into the ground as Joe's hand was ripped from mine.

"Wendy!"

Before either of us could do anything, they had him and hoisted him up into the cage. "Joe!" I screamed for him. "Joe! No! Give him back!"

"Listen to me, Wendy! Find the Flesh Faire! Find it, Wendy!"

"I promise! I promise........" My feet pumped as fast as they could take me until they finally gave out. "Fuck!" I collapsed, sobbing.

"Don't move!"

I screamed, reeling around to find a man in menacing armour behind me on an equally menacing motorbike. "What the fuck do you want?!"

He had a MechaDetector light in his hand, and he shined it in my face. "What do I want?" he asked, switching the light off and hooking it back to his belt. "I want to know why a human is out running around down here with a bunch of renegade Mecha, that's what. You got any ideas?"

"They have my Mecha!"

"Well, if it was licensed, it wouldn't be up there right now, so I'd say that's not our problem, now, is it?"

"That's just the thing, he needs a new one, okay? Now, c'mon, make good and take me to the Goddamn fairgrounds!"

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Music: Chapter named after the song "Tyrant" by OneRepublic. Great song, really reminds me of the whole scene with the moon from the Flesh Faire: "Watching myself when I'm taking strides but here comes the moon and it feels, and it feels like an informer/ quick, run away, hide, before they see you, you know it is all, all aglow..../ Walking on water seems perilous now you got my trust and it feels, and it feels like sabotage when I'm pullin' triggers back on myself you know it is all I know, is all I know...."