Day: 995 (Food Drop-Off)

Days Left: 4485

Lives Saved: 5

Even though he was far from the drop-off, Henry could hear the carnage. Whilst glad that his estimation of its location was correct, he still had to fight to get near the food packets, let alone get his hands on any. Henry clutched his gurgling stomach, feeling a wave of dizziness hit him and wash over his entire body. At the last food drop-off he had attended, Henry had managed to snatch several packets but not enough to keep him fully satisfied.

If he was to keep travelling like this to find his second cousin Corinna, he needed the energy: he needed the food, which was particularly difficult in the Eternal Abyss, especially in the sector he was currently in.

Taking a slow and deep breath in, Henry reached for his mask in his bag and held it to his face. A light shone for a split second along the edges, and then the deep crimson of the mask spread across his body, his skin hardening into rock and scales. Then, his entire being was enveloped in flame, a blanket of fire; he was a bream of light in the suffocating darkness. With a gulp of self-confidence, the fire salamander darted towards the sounds of chaos, to where monsters fought over food. The flat lands of black sand jutted up into towering spires of dark rock, creating winding canyons and chasms below. Both monsters and humans were attempting to climb up the rock walls or were too occupied fighting each other.

Henry waded through the combatants, almost grabbed by a towering ogre, but the salamander's cloak of flames burned the monster's hands, and Henry was once again free and running. He was about to climb up the mountain face when a blinding spotlight blinked on, snuffing out the dark rock canyon into bright light. The portal had opened, the announcer and the countdown completely drowned out by the fighting.

About to climb, Henry paused, noticing a chasm nearby where the light shone down into the deep crevice.

The food packets, Henry wondered, would they fall there too?

It was a risk. Nothing could fall there, and he would be left without food for another month. But the alternative was to fight on the summit for the packets against the other prisoners, potentially risking getting hurt or losing his memories. More and more monsters and unmasked prisoners had finally noticed that the portal was open and rushed to climb to the summit, pushing and shoving, throwing others off the side to their long fall, lying unconscious on the ground from the hard descent.

Another prisoner climbed past Henry, kicking him until Henry lost his grip and fell from the cliff.

It seems that the decision was made for me, Henry thought, only minorly bruised but mostly fine from the fall. He darted towards the split in the canyon.

The sky above grew brighter, and then something blotted that light out, darkening the world briefly as a cascade of silver packets hailed down. Henry could hear the cries of pain and anger from above as prisoners on the summit risked getting hit by the falling packets to get food. He only hoped that his own gamble would pay off.

In a patch of light that reached the bottom of the narrow canyon was a clump of packets that had fallen.

With a grin on his face or as much as a salamander could, Henry bounded towards it, leaping on all fours past the other monsters. His risk paid off; he estimated a whole month's worth had fallen, and a few more packets kept spilling over too. Henry's stomach growled in anticipation of a full meal, having only lived off of rationed scraps for weeks.

The only problem was that in his salamander form, he would risk burning or melting the packets as he was constantly ablaze, leaving a trail of burnt paw prints in his wake.

There was also the matter of the salamander form not possessing any hands to carry the food, and a bag would be set aflame when he came into contact with it. Should he risk transforming back into a human when there were so many monsters around and so much danger?

The salamander reached the small pile of packets, freezing at the sight, how tempted he was to eat all of it that very second.

About to deactivate his mask, there was a shriek from above. The salamander's eyes darted up and saw a giant lizard creature defeated by another monster, and its body fell down the chasm. With its last defeated cry, the lizard creature attempted to halt its fall with its claws, but the earth it clung to quickly broke off, weak and brittle.

The lizard landed with a thud on the ground, motionless and still. From where it clung on so desperately was a crack in the rock. It was only small and thin, but then there was a rumble of fighting above on the summit, and that small split spread wider, travelling up and across.

"No..." Henry transformed into a human and frantically shovelled the food packets into his bag. He dared not look up, focused on getting as much food as possible, but then a clump of rock thwacked down, almost hitting him.

"No, no, no!" In his panic, Henry's fingers fumbled with the packets, accidentally causing some to slip out of his grasp and out of his bag.

There was another rumbling, but not from above; no, it was from behind. Henry turned and saw a giant woolly mammoth charging through the chasm, its long curved tusks barely fitting through the narrow gap, scraping against the rock and causing more cracks to open up.

"No, no! Fuck!" Swearing, Henry made one last attempt to scoop up as many food packets as possible, then stumbled to his feet.

And then he ran.

He ran as fast as his feet could carry him, dodging the falling debris from above. The cracks in the rock continued to spread, bigger chunks collapsing and caving in; the woolly mammoth kept charging through the narrow gap, knocking aside any obstacles in its path.

In his blind panic, Henry had forgotten to close his bag, and a couple of packets flew out as he sprinted; then, he tripped over the unconscious body of the humanoid lizard creature.

"No! Come on!" He hissed, stuffing the packets back in. Henry scrambled back up, pulling at the zip of his bag as he ran, but in his frustration, the zip snapped off, the motion causing more packets to fall out again.

"Please! Please just let me-" Henry darted to the side as an enormous boulder hurtled down, smashing against the ground. Smaller debris followed in the path ahead of him. At this rate, he could not escape; the chasm was blocked off.

Leaving the dropped packets, Henry focused on getting out, with the woolly mammoth still charging behind him, though slower due to the chasm narrowing. The mammoth's tusks sliced through the brittle earth, weakening it further.

There was another creaking and rumbling, only this one was louder than the ones before. Henry dared to look up and saw that the canyon's two sides were collapsing.

Winding through the falling debris, Henry darted to the light at the end of the chasm, the light fading as more rocks piled up. A rock crashed down, and Henry barely dodged it, the rock scraping against his leg. With his last remaining energy, Henry hobbled to the pile of debris blocking his escape and clambered over them, rolling down to the other side in safety, just in time before the whole chasm was caved in.

There was still fighting above, the portal's light having disappeared a long time ago.

Running on empty, Henry fled from the food drop-off and finally found a safe distance to collapse. He opened his bag, the zipper broken, and the contents almost empty aside from...

Three silver food packets.

Just three to last him thirty days.

Henry hugged the packets close to his chest as he cried out, but even then, he felt no energy left to cry properly.

He lay down on the cold ground, huddled in his large coat, and clutching his notebook that contained his missing memories, hoping that this journey to find his second cousin was worth all this.

Day: 1001

"Show it again! Again!" shouted a noble, followed by a chorus of others chanting for an encore.

Antonette Bancroft chugged a sip of her wine, wincing, before rewinding the footage on the large screen to the beginning.

The recordings of the food drop-offs were always popular, but more so when the audience knew one of the prisoners personally. They all jeered and cackled as they watched Henry Best, the former Director of Sector 39, struggle to obtain food packets.

How many times have they asked to see this again? Bancroft wondered to herself, the alcohol affecting her passage of time; at the very least, it helped ease seeing her former coworker suffering in the Eternal Abyss. Even after a year, it was still uncanny to see someone she knew on the screen, someone who not long ago was in her position, hosting the Abyss broadcasts.

Once the clip finished, Bancroft asked the auditorium if there were any other requests for scenes, but all they wanted to see was Henry Best. None of them was particularly interested in the prisoners in their country's sector, only requesting the international videos. The sector that Henry was currently travelling through had the habit of editing the broadcasts with cartoon effects and noises, turning the slaughter over food into a comedic showcase.

Reluctantly, Bancroft obeyed and put on a video of Henry Best fighting another prisoner a few months ago; at that point, neither of them had any masks, and this fight was... Bancroft shuddered, remembering Henry forced to ruthlessly bludgeon the other prisoner with a rock as she had lost her mind to the Abyss even as a human. This clearly brutal and haunting experience was made comical by the voiceover shouting 'fatality' when Henry won.

Eventually, the evening drew to a close, and the nobles applauded for the excellent show and left in good spirits, apart from Duchess Sophia Vipond.

The young duchess barely cheered during the entire broadcast and for the recent ones. With that pink floral mask of hers, Bancroft found it challenging to discern the duchess' emotions, which was concerning as someone of such high stature not finding the broadcasts satisfactory was a cause of concern for the Abyss' profits.

Head Director Bancroft ensured to bid the duchess farewell before she left, but Vipond was uncharacteristically unresponsive as of late. 

Duchess Sophia Vipond left the auditorium, barely saying goodbye to her friends, before meeting her servant outside, waiting with her carriage to return home. Her servant aided her into the carriage, about to wave his hand to magic the horseless carriage forward when his ward stopped him.

"No, wait..." Vipond mumbled. "I want to go to the palace."

Her servant nodded. "As you wish, Your Grace." He cast the spell, and the carriage began to roll out towards the royal palace.

They were stopped at the palace gates by the guards who asked their purpose of the visit.

"I am Her Majesty's cousin," declared Duchess Vipond. "I do not need to schedule to see family."

The guards, however, would not let her pass until one of them returned and confirmed with the queen that they were granted entrance.

Huffing, Vipond exited her carriage and walked up the marble steps to the palace entrance, her servant following a respectful distance behind.

One of the queen's servants guided them to the east drawing-room, where Her Majesty was residing and filling out numerous paperwork and did not desire to be disturbed but would be willing in an hour.

Displeased, Vipond ignored this and headed to the east drawing room, much to all of the servants' horror. They attempted to plead and dissuade politely, but the duchess could not be stopped.

She flung open the door to the east drawing room, finding that the queen was indeed filling out paperwork, and it was not a lie.

"My dear cousin!" Vipond waltzed into the room. "It has been too long!"

"It has been a week," muttered Queen Corinna IX, barely looking up from her work.

"A week is too long for family to be apart!" sighed Vipond, collapsing into a nearby armchair. "Especially since we both have lost our parents; I an only child; all I have left is Your Majesty... and Princess Alfreda."

The queen paused in writing before resuming. With that featureless white mask donned on her face, she was almost unreadable- almost, as Vipond noticed her shoulders tensing at the mention of Alfreda.

"How is Your Majesty's sister?" asked Vipond. "It has been months since I last saw her. Too long! Not only a dear cousin but my best friend since we were little- we were all best friends back then, were we not?"

"Alfreda and yourself were certainly close friends," said Queen Corinna flatly.

"I have invited Your Majesty to all my parties. How can we be friends if we do not spend time together?"

"We have been busy."

Vipond craned her neck, attempting to see what her cousin was so focused on; however, the queen slid the papers out of view. So, instead, Vipond simply snatched a nearby paper before the monarch could stop her.

"Give that back!" the queen hissed, but it was too late, for the duchess had already read enough.

"You are looking for a husband!" Vipond gasped.

Even with the featureless white mask, Queen Corinna's expression was clearly of disgust. "We are merely planning out the next five years of-"

"Oh! Who is it! Tell me! Tell me! I just love weddings!"

The queen sighed. "We do not have anyone in particular in mind. However, We need an heir to the throne, and thus a husband."

Vipond paused. "Wait..." she mumbled. "You're not going to have a political marriage, are you?"

"What other purpose would We have for marriage?"

"For love, silly." Vipond stopped herself, hoping that her casualness was not too overstepping. Though Corinna was her cousin, she was still the queen.

"We do not need love."

"Romantic love, perhaps, but what about family? Or friends?"

The queen did not respond.

"Separating yourself from everyone does not help oneself's mental wellbeing, Your Majesty," hushed Vipond. "Surrounding yourself with people who love you, like your sister Alfreda-"

"If you do not have anything of importance or substance to discuss, then you are dismissed," replied the queen, not looking up from her paperwork.

Duchess Vipond stayed seated for a moment longer, considering, before eventually rising to her feet. "Apologies, Your Majesty." She bowed and then left her cousin alone.

Once she was confident the duchess had left, the queen sighed, her head in her gloved hands.

For a moment, the queen thought her cousin cared for her, but it was all a lead-up to asking about Alfreda. Duchess Vipond seemed relentless in finding out the truth. The queen was unsure if Vipond had figured out that Princess Alfreda, in the recent public showings and parties, was a fake, magically disguised golem. How long was this ruse to go on? For the rest of her life? Perhaps she should consider staging the princess' death instead of wasting so much time and effort on this charade. But would that convince Duchess Vipond, or will that only spur her more into exposing all of the lies?

Or perhaps...

Or perhaps there was a possibility that she no longer had to lie with a fake Princess Alfreda.

It had been about four years; maybe, just maybe, her sister had changed her mind.

Queen Corinna almost laughed to herself at such a ridiculous thought. However, somewhere deep inside of her, she hoped that her sister had changed, that they could set aside the past and repair their relationship. And then another part of the queen remembered Alfreda's personality and knew it was impossible.

Regardless, Queen Corinna did not know what action to take to deal with her cousin's prying behaviour; however, talking to her sister may give her more insight into how to deal with the situation.