Chapter 48 What We Aim to Do Part 1

“If you truly believed in your ideals, you would kill me, no matter the sacrifice.” - Unknown, to Paradigm

‘I forgot something.’

The cat fled over the fence, disappearing from Aiden’s view.

“Stop standing around!” Ranpo yelled from above.

‘I forgot something.’

Ranpo tapped his phone, looking at more jobs available.

‘I forgot something.’

The scent ended here, his nose overwhelmed by the smell of rotting garbage, he threw open the bin, finding a child underneath.

‘I forgot something.’

“Thank you!” the child’s parents cried as they vigorously shook his hand.

‘I forgot something.’

Sarah Sour let him into the store by a backdoor.

“You running a charity or something?” she asked, “Finding that kid barely paid you anything.”

‘I forgot something.’

“The military police are up in arms,” Aiden replied, “I don’t have a lot of options.”

The old woman shrugged, “Well, Blend S.”

Another one of his power candies was made, the fee for that week.

‘I forgot something.’

“Something on your mind kid?” she asked, putting away the scaly white candy.

Aiden shook his head, “Nothing much.”

She looked at him, in the same way a mother might when she knew her child was lying to her.

Not that Aiden knew that look.

“I know your sort, desperate, but don’t go burning yourself out.”

‘I forgot something.’

Aiden sat alone in the park, blankly watching the people pass by.

“What’s on your mind,” Ranpo asked, “you’ve been distracted for the past few days.”

He didn’t answer at first, instead raising his arm. On it, appeared a tattoo of flowering branches.

“I know the sensation of forgetting something,” Aiden replied. “It’s quite distinct once you realise it, that feeling of an emptied space within your mind.”

Ranpo slowly nodded.

“Are all my creations currently accounted for?” Aiden asked.

“As far as I’m aware.”

Then it wasn’t his power.

‘What did I forget?’

A notification on his phone, a new job posted on Sarah’s website.

Capture the person breaking property on Hill Street.

$3000

Appears at 11 pm to 1:30 am.

The world did not stop for him, so he stood up, and made his way to the street in question.

It was definitely one of the higher income districts.

Houses appeared notably better made and more decorated than others he had seen, and he was texted several pictures of the damage left behind.

Trees, fences, lamp posts, all cut into multiple little pieces.

Inspecting the stumps left behind, they found the cuts perfect, straight with no signs of sawing or deviation.

“That’s why they’re asking for meta help huh,” Ranpo remarked.

“This may be a bit dangerous,” Aiden replied, “looks like a cutting ability of some kind… no corpses or blood, which may be why the military police aren’t involved yet… but is it fully limited to that?”

“Should we try it?” Ranpo asked.

He thought about it.

Three thousand dollars, far exceeding every other job he had taken thus far.

“We hide and look at the situation,” Aiden said, “if we can deal with it, we make the attempt, but if it looks dangerous then we simply leave.”

“Heh, and if they leave us a bad review?” Ranpo asked.

“Bad reviews won’t kill us.”

Night set on a quiet street. Somewhere, Aiden was looking at his phone, counting the seconds as the time hit 11 pm.

Nothing happened at first, the street completely silent for the first hour. Ranpo got bored enough that he started to browse the news on Aiden’s phone.

12 pm came and passed.

At this point, Aiden began glancing at his phone, Ranpo shuffling to the side to allow him a better view as they read news from around the world.

12:54 pm, a woman wearing a medical face mask and appearing like she just returned late from work, came into sight. Huddling close to the street lights as if their glow was a safe haven and glancing quickly around the darkened corners of the street.

Ranpo followed Aiden’s gaze towards the woman, but turned back to the phone. Aiden did too, but a shrill shriek quickly tore his eyes back towards the woman.

Blood.

A leg severed and lying on the ground as the woman clutched the cut stump.

“Shit,” he muttered, “it’s attacking people now.”

Ranpo turned to him, but he was already moving. On a nearby rooftop, a patch of roof changed colour as Aiden reabsorbed the various octopi and cuttlefish that he used as camouflage and used their suckers to climb down quickly. His bag slung over one shoulder, his Umbrella held in his left hand.

“Help!” the woman cried, tears dripping down her face and staining her mask. She clutched her leg, cut just above the knee, “Can anyone see me!?”

“I’m here!” Aiden yelled, easily navigating the obstacles of suburbia as he ran, “Just stay there!”

“Aiden!” Ranpo yelled above him.

“Can you see me?” the woman yelled, not yet seeing him.

“Ranpo call the cops and ambulance!” Aiden yelled to him, “We’re dealing with a meta that attacks people, this isn’t a small thing anymore!”

To the woman, he yelled as he stepped onto the road, “I’m coming right now!”

Ranpo flew next to him, “But no one’s there!”

Aiden’s steps slightly stalled as he began to turn to Ranpo.

But the woman turning to face him caught his attention.

“You can s̴̨̳͍̦̐́̅͒̾̔̔́͜e̴̟͙̤̽̿̒͋̊̚͝ê̵̪̲̳̠͖̹̒͜͜ me.”

Suddenly the world changed, colour became inverted as suddenly the night sky became white and everything became overtaken by negative colour. Even Ranpo beside him became pure white.

All except for Aiden and the woman.

He stopped in his tracks as suddenly something restrained him. Looking down, he found numerous zippers of various widths and lengths, wrapped around his body as if glued to it.

He was inside an ability.

Ranpo circled around him, yelling and asking what had happened. It was all white noise, as Aiden’s mind furiously went through what had happened.

“Why are they called boogeyman abilities?” he had asked Trist.

The self defence teacher, had at the time replied, “Abilities with a lot of conditions attached to them have the greatest chance of remaining after death. In this state, many go berserk and attack whoever happens to meet their stringent conditions.”

“Thus people feared them like boogeymen, so the name stuck.”

The woman- no, this close Aiden could see that the thing in front of him only had the appearance of a person, it was still a woman with long black hair and a face mask, but the details were wrong. Clothing and skin bled together without separation, zippers appeared all over the body without rhyme or reason.

“Hehehe…” it was giggling softly, “You can s̴̢̲͓̪͖̙̯̐͝e̴͖̜̊́̄̃̕ẹ̶̖̭͉͑ me. You can ş̵̛̖͇̼̼̟̱͆̄́͛̌́̉ȅ̷̛͓̙͇͖̿͆̽̈͋̅͘ê̶͚̑ me. You can s̵̰̥͎̻̬̝̺͖̥̿ȩ̶̟̖̝̜̲̳̔̇͗̔̓̂̀͘͜͜ȇ̷̩̜̣̩̳̳̄͂͐̕ me…” It continually muttered the same thing just under its breath.

It turned to its severed leg, and in this strange space, Aiden saw that the leg and the stump both had the two corresponding halves of a zipper, wrapped around both circumferences, right where they separated.

“Aiden, hurry up and answer me, what happened!?”

It crawled and grabbed its leg, and then put it back on its stump. Grabbing the zip slider on one end, it pulled the zipper together again, fusing both halves and healing the leg before standing up. With a single hand, it grabbed onto a nearby fallen stick.

“Why are you standing still now!? Is there an attacker? Where are they?”

A closed zipper appeared in the middle of the stick, and pulling the zip slider, the entity severed the stick perfectly in half.

Ranpo suddenly turned to the entity.

“Who broke those sticks?”

Then, it snapped its fingers and both zippers disappeared. It demonstratively stuck both separated ends together, but without the zipper, they could not fuse back.

Suddenly, the entity seemed realer, its strange details lessened as it appeared more like a human woman as Hume flushed through its entire body.

‘A Hand Reveal.’

“Ranpo,” he said for the first time, “Run.”

It took a step forward, straight towards him now.

To his body covered in zippers.

“What run?” Ranpo yelled at him, “What’s happening? Where’s the threat?”

Oros slid onto his scarf, hissing at the zippers that held him in place, but too cautious to attempt to unravel them.

Aiden manipulated another snake tattoo into his bag, finding the ropes he held there. It began working on the normal zipper that held it inside the bag.

He could not do it fast enough, the entity came closer, reaching its hand towards him-

Before stopping, just ninety centimetres away from him.

Aiden was still tightly clutching his Umbrella.

It had a confused look, glancing at its steps that did not travel any distance.

Aiden’s mind furiously went through the past few minutes. Just now fully realising that Ranpo never reacted to this entity.

“Can you see anything in front of me?” he asked.

A pause, but a quick reply, “No.”

There were multiple conditions at play, first, sight- no, was it him acknowledging its existence that set it off? It didn’t attack when he saw it, but when it recognised that he could see it.

The entity tried moving forward and backward, neither steps making any progress or travelling any distance.

Ranpo could not see it for whatever reason, was it because he was a crow or because he was a created entity?

Then it followed his gaze and looked at Ranpo, who was still circling him within the 90 centimetre sphere.

“Can you see me?” it asked the crow.

Cold sweat ran down Aiden’s brow.

“Ranpo, do not acknowledge her.”

Ranpo stopped in mid air, landing on the ground, “I don’t see-”

“Ranpo,” he interrupted before he could speak. “Whatever happens, no matter what happens to me, no one else is on this street.”

“Can you see me?” it asked again, before beginning to mimic the crow’s movements, walking sideways in a circle.

Slowly getting closer to him.

“Don’t speak, don’t turn to the direction I’m facing,” he said, eyes fixed on the entity. “I need you to run, and to tell the person that comes after me to not acknowledge the entity here.”

The crow looked up to him. “After you?”

And Aiden sadly smiled towards him.

“I’m not sure if I can get out of this.”

And the crow stared at him.

“You’re not giving up again.”

“You told me once that you would leave me one day,” Aiden said wistfully, “are you just talk?”

The crow ruffled its wings, shaking, before turning away, no longer facing him, but outwards.

“You better survive, I still need your thumbs.”

“Isn’t it just ‘thumb’?” Aiden jokingly replied.

“You know what I mean,” Ranpo said before he flew off.

Aiden watched him go.

“Live long and well, Ranpo,” he said under his breath.

And the entity stepped into the 30 centimetre unaffected area.

He met its eyes, surprisingly human, as it reached out to touch the zipper on his neck.

Suddenly, a bluish grey snake shot out of his bag, aiming straight for its throat-

It bit down, but bit nothing, as the snake simply phased through it.

Oros however, successfully wrapped itself around its arm, but doing nothing, as a sheer, almost inexorable force allowed the entity to touch the zip slider on his neck.

One hit, but one couldn’t. ‘Why?’

Then he noticed that the snake he had created had its colours inverted, while he and Oros retained their original colour.

Oros turned and hissed at the entity, but now too afraid to attack, Aiden’s throat literally in its hands.

“Am I pretty?” it asked.

Aiden blinked, the question seemingly coming out of the blue as his mind momentarily blanked in surprise.

But it began working fast. ‘Why did it ask that?’

“If an ability does something weird that doesn’t make a lot of sense, it’s probably a condition.”

Abilities followed the general principle of greater risk and cost equalling greater rewards. Darius could manage cross continental teleportation with some minor tweaking, while Trist could completely freeze a target but needed to touch them with her palm first.

This ability seemed to follow the same principles.

Something unknown separated him and Oros from Ranpo and the snake he had made. He was able to see and interact with the entity, that was the first condition. The second must’ve been him acknowledging its existence, or making a move to help it, and being recognised as such.

With both those fulfilled, he was brought into this liminal world and had these zippers automatically applied to him, surpassing the defences of his Umbrella and binding him to this position.

Then the entity gave him a Hand Reveal, forcefully increasing its Hume energy.

Through that reveal, Aiden understood that damage did not occur until the zippers were opened, and could be repaired entirely by ‘zipping’ the two severed halves together.

And now the entity literally had its hand on his throat, but wasn’t yet beheading him.

It was waiting for a response.

The question too, was a condition.

It would solidly fall under the ‘risk’ category, not going for the instant kill, but allowing a chance to slip out, a chance for Aiden to escape.

But the reverse of that thinking was that if Aiden answered incorrectly, he would be hit by an ability empowered by multiple conditions and a Hand Reveal.

Aiden had the sinking realisation that this ability was meant to kill entities far more durable than he was.

But could he avoid all of that? Could he wait until help arrived by simply not answering?

That possibility quickly disappeared, as the entity lightly tugged the zipper.

Aiden felt a spike of pain on his neck, as a small drop of blood seeped out of the tiny opening.

“Are you answering?”

If the target did not answer quickly enough, they would be killed anyway.

“I will,” Aiden replied. Mind working furiously. He didn’t have much, it was a yes or no question, either could be the correct one. A fifty percent shot? Aiden couldn’t tell, but the entity was wearing a bit of makeup and eyeliner, from far away it could even pass as a reasonably attractive female. Was that a clue or a trick? Or did it require the target to answer honestly?

“Answer now,” it said, fingers tightening on the zipper.

“Yes,” Aiden gambled. “Yes, you are pretty.”

The zipper was pulled closed and the bleeding stopped. The entity, its hand still on the zipper on his neck, giggled lightly. “So you think I am pretty?”

“Yes,” Aiden said. “I do think that.”

It did a small jig, dancing and giggling while holding onto Aiden’s neck.

Then, with its other hand, it pulled off its mask, revealing its mouth, slit open wide in a cruel smile, as if someone had taken a knife and carved its cheek until the cut reached the ears.

“Do you still think I am pretty now?” it asked again.

A moment passed.

“Yes.”

It let go of his neck. Smiling wildly as it giggled with its hand shyly hiding its lips. “Oh… Oh… someone finally thinks I am pretty… You… You can go…”

Aiden breathed a sigh of relief, but found he could no longer open his mouth.

“But let’s be pretty together.”

The entity zipped open the zipper that had appeared on his mouth and went all the way from ear to ear.

Oros leapt from its perch, aiming straight for its throat, but it bit nothing, as Aiden collapsed onto the ground, clutching his bleeding mouth.

The world returned to normal, the zippers on his body were all gone, as was the woman.

“Stapler,” he growled, blood dripping from his mouth.

Aiden could feel the familiar sensation of unnatural regeneration and scabbing, his mouth was already healing.

Into two separate halves.

Oros fished the bag he carried with him, pulling out the medical kit. Taking the stapler out of the snake’s mouth, he brought it to his own.

And pressed down.

The staples pierced flesh and cheek, binding the two halves. He pressed again, and again and again and again and again.

The click of the stapler rang through the silent night twelve times.

“You’re alive,” Ranpo breathlessly said.

Already, the sounds of the ambulance and a military police vehicle could be heard rushing behind the crow.

“I think I got off easy,” Aiden said, sitting with his back to a tree, his body exhausted despite not doing much.

He felt the ridges on his mouth, going from ear to ear.

“That’s going to scar.”