Chương 30: A Face That Melts Off Politely

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck! Scillo's shaking hands were gripping the counter so hard that they were going numb. Walker looked back at him from across the display of wilting flowers with the mutilated girl's face, his—or her—expression completely patient and utterly unbothered.

"You're," Scillo stuttered, taking a shaky step back.

"Did—did he send you?"

"Yes," Walker answered.

"But… I thought he was inside Ghenna."

"Yes." Scillo's eyes widened.

"He sent you from inside Ghenna?"

"Yes." He gulped. His reach is that far?

"Are you here to kill me?"

"No," Walker said, much to Scillo's relief.

"I came here because simple-boy said to." It pointed at itself.

"You are Scillo. I am Walker. We have an agreement through simple-boy."

"Simple-boy," Scillo repeated faintly.

"You mean—""The one who made your contract," Walker explained, nodding his head. He pointed at himself again.

"It named me Walker."

"Right," Scillo managed.

"Right…" His heart performed summersaults, while goosebumps and shivers crawled down his skin all over him. Why was this happening to him? Why the hell was he in a flower shop in the middle of the afternoon having a conversation with a creature from Ghenna that was wearing the face of a dead girl? Was this his life now? Why had he even studied so hard for the organization's entrance examinations? Suddenly, a loud sound erupted from behind the counter, startling his self-pitying thoughts to a stop.

Both Scillo and Walker looked down, just in time to see that Fettis Groane had woken up. For a moment, he lay on the floor blinking up at the ceiling. He blinked several more times, until he turned his head and looked directly at Walker.

"Wormwood," Fettis said, unconsciously scratching his bulging belly.

"You're late. The yellow ones need water. Hurry up." He then promptly closed his eyes and went back to sleep. Scillo and Walker looked at each other across the counter in the silence that followed.

"It appears that he thinks that I am someone else," Walker observed.

"He's been like this since I got here," Scillo said weakly. Walker regarded Fettis with a silent expression, then looked back at Scillo.

"Information," Walker continued.

"Simple-boy wants what you know." Scillo took a deep breath, his hand going to where the contract sat cool and steady against his chest. It wasn't like he wanted to betray the organization that he'd held in such high regard all of his life, but he prioritized not dying first.

"The organization knows that the girl is in Ghenna," he explained quietly, keeping his voice low.

"Fifteen field operatives followed her in. I don't know their names or their runes though." He paused.

"What I do know is that the handler considers this a very important mission." Walker listened without so much of a change in expression.

"There's also something else," Scillo continued.

"It's not from the organization. It's from my own investigation." He glanced at the door the old woman had left through earlier.

"Wormwood Moss came back from his last descent frightened. He then stood outside this shop staring at nothing and told someone he was trying to remember something." A moment of silence washed over the flower shop, broken only by Fettis's steady snoring. Then Walker straightened up, the weird mud puddle on the ground rising back up and plastering the organization boy's features back onto his skin.

"Good. Simple-boy will want this," Walker said.

"That's what I assumed," Scillo said, nodding. Walker turned toward the door, then paused.

"The yellow ones do really need water," Walker observed, glancing back at the wilting display. Then without another word, Walker stepped out into the market street and disappeared into the crowd. Scillo let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, cold sweat dripping down his back. Then, he hurriedly moved over to the window to watch. Walker was already halfway down the street, moving through the afternoon crowd with surprising ease.

Even though Scillo was purposely trying to keep track of it, Walker was just so mundane and forgettable that within just thirty seconds, the creature had turned a corner and promptly vanished. This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Scillo shakily let out another long breath, fogging the window glass faintly.

He stood there for another moment, touching the grimy and oily pane with his forehead, watching the ordinary foot traffic of the market street flow past. Then he turned around, walked back behind the counter, sat down heavily on Fettis's stool, and stared at the wilting flowers. From the floor, Fettis snorted.

"I hate this job," Scillo muttered quietly. ◈◈◈◈ For the four years that Arnoal Fetch had been doing field surveillance for the organization, he had seen a considerable number of things he would have preferred not to see. He had watched a man dissolve numerous corpses of a family while signing them a Happy Birthday song. He had seen a woman produce something from inside… a place where objects had no business being in.

He had even once observed, from a rooftop in a northern settlement, two Delvers settle a dispute in such a horrific manner that he still couldn't seem to scrub the smell of spilled blood and gore from his clothes. He had thought, after four years, that his capacity for surprise had been largely exhausted. Oh, how wrong he had been. Just now, he'd been doing his assignment—watching a flower shop from across the street for two hours. Horribly straightforward, and horribly boring. Until he saw a young man enter.

The guy hadn't immediately struck Arnoal as unusual. An average height, average build, and completely forgettable face. Well, he did seem a bit familiar, though Arnoal couldn't place where he had seen him. Of course, the mediocrity had only lasted until Arnoal literally saw the guy's face melt off. Through the shop window, in the narrow gap between a display of orange flowers, he had been able to see the young man's face change.

By the time the transition had completed and a new face sat in place where the old one had been, he had to push his open mouth back up. He leaned against the wall of the bread seller's stall across the street and he stood there, staring at the flower shop window with a shocked expression he failed to hide. For perhaps thirty seconds he just stood there, simply processing what he had just witnessed. Then his training reasserted itself, clawing its way back up through the shock. Report! He needed to report this.

Immediately and in person, not through some stupid messenger birds or compression cylinders. This was that important! A Ghenna monster had come to the surface! He retrieved his notebook from the cobblestones, quickly shoved it into his coat, and began running north towards the organization's headquarters. But then he became aware of someone beside him. He looked left to see that the young man from the flower shop was there. Of course, it wasn't a man anymore.

It had a new face, a woman's this time, a mild expression of pleasantness and mild interest on its face. Arnoal felt a deep shiver go down his spine.

"Were you watching?" the young man asked. Arnoal involuntarily flinched. Fuck, the voice sounded so wrong. Why did it sound like that?

"I—I was just standing there," Arnoal managed.

"Hmm…" the young man said.

"You-saw me through the window."

"No," Arnoal lied.

"No, I didn't see you. The flowers were covering the window."

"You-were watching the shop," the young man said again with certainty in its voice.

"For two hours. From across the street." It cocked its head.

"Are you going to report what you saw?"

"I don't know what I saw," Arnoal said. This, at least, wasn't a lie. In fact, it was the most honest thing he'd said in the last month.

"Yes-you do," the young man said. They continued moving through the market crowd, the afternoon foot traffic flowing around them with complete indifference, hundreds of ordinary people conducting ordinary business in the ordinary city. Arnoal gulped, his hand moving toward his belt where his emergency signal was clipped. But before he could activate it, the young man's hand closed around his wrist. The grip was surprisingly gentle, yet also completely, absolutely immovable.

"I would prefer," the young man said, continuing to talk in the pleasant voice, "that you did not do that." Arnoal looked at the hand around his wrist, sweat pouring down his face.

"What—what do you want from me?" Arnoal whispered. The young man released his wrist and tilted the borrowed head slightly.

"I want to know," he said, "what you are going to put in your report." Arnoal rubbed his wrist. He could see where this was going.

"A young man entered the flower shop," Arnoal said carefully.

"He spoke with the operative inside, then just left." The young man regarded him for a long moment.

"That is all?" the young man asked.

"That's all I saw," Arnoal said with more emotion, trying to get into the act even more. The young man paused for a long time, appearing to turn this over with some deliberation. Then the borrowed face arranged itself into a thin, cold smile.

"That's good," Walker said. And with just that, it turned, and walked back into the crowd. Within seconds it was completely indistinguishable from everyone around him, just another face moving through the afternoon market of Crater City. Arnoal stood in the middle of the street for a long moment. Then collecting himself, he retrieved his notebook and opened it. Fishing out a small charcoal pencil, he quickly wrote down three sentences. When he finished, he closed it tightly shut again.

Then he stood there a little while longer, staring at the place where the creature had disappeared into the crowd. Letting out a long breath, he put his notebook away and walked in the opposite direction from headquarters. He was far too young to die like this. And he was smart enough to not even dare betray that creature. But what Arnoal didn't know, as he walked away with only his faked three sentence report and very sensible decision to stay alive, was that he hadn't been the only one watching the flower shop.

From the rooftop of the building directly across the street, a young man sat precariously on the edge with his legs dangling over the side, having watched the whole exchange below with a patient, content look on his face. He had a cup of hot amber tea balanced on his knee, which he was blowing at periodically. He'd been there since before Arnoal had taken up his position, and had seen everything that had just unfolded.

His deep forest green eyes followed Walker's figure until it disappeared completely into the afternoon crowd below. Then his eyes moved to Arnoal's walking back, a small frown creasing his lips. Then a small smile replaced the frown as he turned away, and unhurriedly stared out across the market district, taking in the morning view. His left hand, gloved in that extraordinarily fine white leather, carefully picked up his cup. He took a small sip.

Then he reached into his breast pocket and produced a small square of crisp white paper. He set his tea down beside him, and began folding, his nimble hands creasing and folding with practice until a delicate crane sat in his palm, its majestic wings raised and its neck curved downward in a posture of elegance. He studied it, adoringly stroking the thin paper head. Then he held it out over the roof's edge on two fingers and released it. It somehow didn't fall, instead catching on some sort of invisible current.

The crane's paper wings fluttered, righting itself. Then it began moving, drifting out over the market crowd below, following the direction Walker had gone. Within seconds it had disappeared between the buildings. The young man looked back down, picking his tea back up with his gloved hand, and looked out contentedly across the city.

"Interesting," he purred pleasantly.