Chapter 56 The Trash Heap of Gods
The hand was giant. It smelled like soap and ink. Its fingers were like mountains of flesh, squeezing my plastic middle until I thought I would snap. I couldn't move my arms. I couldn't blink. I was stuck in a frozen pose, a tiny doll with a painted-on scowl.
"Yeah, the leg is chipped," a voice boomed from above. It was the Reader. "The Kael one is better. I'll keep him on the shelf. The girl goes in the bin."
I felt the world tilt. The hand opened.
I fell.
I didn't hit the floor. I hit a mountain of bodies. I slid down a hill of plastic arms, glass eyes, and broken wings. This was the trash can, the place where every version of Eara who wasn't "perfect" came to die. There were thousands of us. Some had glass skin, some had silver dresses, and some were just half-finished lumps of clay.
I landed at the bottom with a plastic thud.
I’m not a toy, I screamed inside my head. I’m Eara! I’m the Weaver!
The rage started as a tiny spark in my plastic chest. It shouldn't have been possible. I was made of PVC and paint. But the purple fire I had taken from my mother’s heart wasn't digital. It wasn't ink. It was real energy.
Deep inside the pile, a purple light began to glow.
"Eara?"
The voice was tiny, muffled by the weight of the dolls above me. I recognized it. It was the voice of the first Eara, the one who had died in the very first simulation.
"I'm here," I whispered. My plastic jaw creaked as it moved. The paint on my face began to crack as my skin turned back into warm, living flesh. "I’m here!"
I pushed. I used my hands to claw through the heap of discarded characters. I saw an Eara with wings; her face melted by a lighter. I saw an Eara who looked like a queen; her crown snapped in half. They were all silent, their souls drained by the publisher.
I burst out of the pile of trash and stood up. I was human again, but the room around me was impossible. The desk was as big as a city block. The coffee cup was a lake of brown acid. And the reader, a teenager sitting in a swivel chair, was a god the size of a mountain.
"Kael!" I looked up.
Kael was standing on the edge of the wooden desk. He was still plastic, his eyes fixed and staring at the wall. He was a decoration now. A trophy for a person who didn't even know his name.
"You can't have him," I hissed.
I looked at the trash can. It was made of metal. I reached out and touched the side of the bin. The purple fire flowed out of me, turning the metal into a conductor. I wasn't just weaving dreams anymore. I was weaving the real world.
I sent a pulse of energy up the side of the desk.
The reader jumped, his headphones flying off. "Ow! What was that? Static?"
He looked down at the desk. He saw Kael’s figurine vibrate. Then he saw me, a tiny, living girl standing on the rim of his trash can.
"What the...?" The reader leaned in. His eye was the size of a house, a giant blue orb full of confusion. "Is this a hologram? Did the book come with an app?"
"I'm not an app!" I yelled.
I grabbed a paperclip from the floor. To me, it was a silver sword. I channelled the fire into the metal until it glowed white-hot.
"Kael, wake up!" I threw the paper clip.
It didn't hit Kael. It hit the base of the computer monitor next to him. The screen flickered and died. The room went dark, lit only by the purple glow of my skin.
The reader panicked. He stood up, his chair crashing into the wall. "Mom! My computer just exploded! And I think I'm hallucinating!"
He reached down to grab me, his giant hand descending like a falling sky. I didn't run. I waited until his fingers were inches away, and then I jumped. I grabbed his thumb and climbed.
I wasn't a character anymore. I was a parasite. I was the story that wouldn't end.
"Give him back!" I bit into his skin.
The reader screamed and shook his hand. I was thrown through the air, landing on the soft, messy bed. I scrambled to my feet and saw Kael. The shock to the monitor had done it, the energy had jumped into his plastic body. He was moving. He was falling off the desk.
I ran across the blankets, catching him before he hit the floor. He turned back into flesh in my arms, his heart beating fast against mine.
"Eara?" he gasped, looking up at the giant world. "Where are we?"
"In the den of the beast," I said.
We weren't safe. The reader was heading for the door, yelling for help. If he brought more people, we’d be captured, studied, or worse.
But then, the computer monitor didn't just stay dark. It started to bleed.
Black ink began to pour out of the screen, spilling onto the desk and the floor. It moved with a mind of its own. It formed into a shape I knew too well.
The Publisher.
He had followed us out. He wasn't a man in a suit here. He was a puddle of sentient ink, and he was growing.
"You thought the real world would save you?" the ink hissed. "In this world, I am the Word. And the word is law!"
The ink lashed out, grabbing Kael’s ankle.
"Run, Eara!" Kael yelled, being pulled toward the screen.
I didn't run. I looked at the desk. There was a large, open bottle of white-out.
I grabbed it and dived toward the ink.
"Delete this!" I screamed.
I poured the white liquid into the publisher's heart. The ink shrieked, turning grey and brittle. But as the publisher died, the room began to shake. The walls started to peel away, revealing not the rest of the house, but a void of pure, empty static.
The reader wasn't there anymore. The house was gone.
A new figure stepped out of the static. He was wearing a white lab coat, and he held a clipboard.
"Interesting," the man said, looking at me through a magnifying glass. "The subjects have escaped the secondary simulation. Start the third phase. Bring in the 'Mother' unit."
The floor beneath us turned into a giant, spinning saw blade.