Backrooms 2: Kiosk Kingdom - Chapter 43

Forty-Three – Heart to Heart

For a long tense moment, Ed just stood there, frozen, with his hand pressed against the door. Then he gave it a little shove and it swung outward—even though the door had swung inwards only moments before. Just another quirk of the Doorway Anchor system.

Gone was gore-spattered preschool hallway with its squishy pink floor and eyeball studded walls. Gone was Mr. Wiggles, the eldritch horror, who would no doubt put in a few special guest appearances in my nightmares over the days and weeks to come. Gone was the entirety of the twenty-fourth floor.

In their place were well-stocked aisles, bright cheery lights, and the warm chatter of voices as Delvers shopped. Some poor, unfortunate soul was attempting to haggle with Ponypuff about the price of an Uncommon Relic, while a handful of disheveled, shell-shocked Delvers congregated near the concession standing, eating greasy slices of pizza and mounds of nachos. Nearby, several Howlers waited patiently for their turn at the Laundry Room, chatting quietly as they sipped on sodas or munched on snacks.

The store, even as weird as it was, looked vibrant, lively, and safe.

After spending a day in the dystopian nightmare that was Sunnyside, it looked like paradise. An oasis in a barren and merciless desert. I could only image how much more intense it would be for Ed, who’d been stranded here for forty years. I couldn’t see his face, but his shoulders were slumped, and his body shook gently. I got the distinct impression that he might’ve been crying.

“Hey, you okay man?” I asked, approaching slowly with one hand outstretched.

Without warning he tried to step through the entryway but found an invisible barrier barring his way forward. He stumbled back, clearly confused, then reached out with one, trembling hand. Once again, his fingers bumped against the invisible barrier, denying him entrance.

I wasn’t surprised that he couldn’t get through. Although the Doorway Anchors primarily acted as entryways to the shop itself, they also let me set restrictions on who could or couldn’t enter the store. Using the inbuilt “Admittance Credentialing System,” I could deny access based on a wide variety of factors, including gender, age, faction affiliation, educational level, previous or current medical conditions. Hell, I could discriminate based on shoe-size if I wanted, too. The system was almost infinitely customizable.

I’d perma-banned all members of the Skinless Court for obvious reasons, but there were a few additional restrictions. No Dweller could enter the store without a system exception, and the only one who could issue those was me. Those infected with Blight were, likewise, shit-out-of-luck. I wanted to help people, but I couldn’t risk having my store contaminated by the deadly contagion. I’d also instituted a level cap to keep overpowered Delvers from waltzing in and murdering everyone before the store’s defense system could eject their asses.

The cap was current set to thirty. Ed was level thirty-four.

“Ed, you okay man?” I asked again, this time placing my hand gently on his shoulder.

He spun and batted my arm away in a single motion. “Get your goddamned hands off of me,” he snarled, leveling his Colt and pointing it right at my face. “You’ve been lying to me this whole, goddamned time?” The words burned with anger and acquisition. “You had a way to leave this whole fucking time? I knew you were lying to me. Woodstock told me not to trust you!” he screamed, spittle flying, gun shaking in his fist. “She said I shouldn’t trust you. Said there was something off about you.”

I glanced at the bird still perched on his shoulder.

I’d heard the Parrot say a grand total of about twenty words, and almost all of them were derivatives of “I’ll kill you with fire.” Maybe there really was more to the bird than strictly met the eye, or maybe Ed was exactly as crazy as I’d assumed from the get-go. Either way, right now I was in danger. We all were. He was unraveling in real time and even with the gains I’d made, he was still at a higher level than I was.

“I should’ve listened to her,” Ed said, shaking his head. “Should’ve listened to my own gut instinct.” He had a crazed, wild light in his eyes. “I’ve just been so lonely. Do you know what it’s like to be by yourself for nine years? To have no one to talk to but a bird? That’s how long it’s been since I’ve seen other humans. Nine years.” His jaw was trembling and now I could see that there were definitely tears rimming his eyes. “I should’ve known it was too good to be true. Dumb, dumb, dumb,” he scolded, slapping his face with his freehand.  

“It’s not like that—” I started to say.

“Shut up!” he roared before I could finish. “I don’t want to hear any more of your bullshit. I bet Dan isn’t even your real name. I bet you’re with them, aren’t you? With BEACON—”

“—We’re not with BEACON,” I said, but he wasn’t listening.

“It all makes sense,” he said. “You have Spook written all over you. The signs were right there in front of me. Right beneath my nose. This whole thing was probably an infiltration op. You knew I was getting close to bringing down the Singal and you just couldn’t let me do that.” He snarled, an ugly, dangerous look flashing across his face. He was like a wounded animal, backed into a corner. “You’re trying to take me out, aren’t you? AREN’T YOU?! Afarid I’m finally going to bring down you precious little brainwashing experiment for good.”

He licked his lips and started pacing nervously, though he never lowered the pistol. Woodstock watched us from her perch on Ed’s shoulder. Dual plumes of smoke drift upward from the nostril holes on the top of the bird’s beak.

Jakob deployed his steel kite shield with a flick of his wrist, then quickly moved to cover Temp with his body. “Please, Mr. Myrl,” he said, his voice even and neutral. “I do not wish to fight or harm you, but if you keep pointing that weapon at my friends, I fear I will have no choice. This is just a misunderstanding. I realize why this might be confusing, but I can assure you we don’t mean you or your bird any harm.”

“Kill you with fire!” Woodstock shrieked, even as the bird’s chest began to smolder with golden light that bled through its feathers. This was going downhill fast and if I couldn’t find a way to snap Ed out of his paranoia spiral, this was going to end in bloodshed.

“Whao, let’s pump the breaks here,” I said, frantically trying to deescalate things. “Everyone just take a few deep breaths, okay?” I raised my hands to show both Ed and Woodstock they were empty. “We aren’t with BEACON—we’ve never even heard of BEACON, not until you told us—and I promise, right hand to God, that we aren’t trying to destroy Big Bertha. Yes, I didn’t tell you about the shop, but I didn’t think it would be an issue. This is no different than you hiding your identity from us,” I said.

“Remember that?” I asked. “How you neglected to mention that your part Sunnysider and a literal memory vampire? And remember how I didn’t nuke you on the spot, even though we had good reason to? This is no different. I should’ve come clean about this”—I gestured toward the entryway—“sooner. In hindsight, keeping it a secret probably wasn’t the right thing to do. That’s on me. But we weren’t lying to you about taking down the Signal. Hell, that’s why I didn’t tell you about the store—because I was afraid that if you had a way out, you wouldn’t help us sabotage the radio station.”

That, at least, seemed to give Ed a long moment of pause.

“No, no, no,” he muttered to himself. “That doesn’t make sense. Why would you even care about taking down the signal if you already have a way out?” he asked uncertainly, as though his ears might be playing tricks on him. “The math doesn’t math,” he finally declared. “There’s got to be another angle. Some other reason. What’s in it for you, huh? And you better not lie this time.” He tapped his temple with the muzzle of the gun. “I’ll know if you’re lying, and I won’t hesitate to kill every last one of you sons of bitches if you lie to me again.”

I considered the question and tried to decide how much to tell him.

The truth was, I still didn’t know much about this guy, and his real-time descent into madness didn’t instill much confidence. Then I thought about Croc. Friends don’t lie to each other. The words skipped through my skull like a stone over a still pond. Despite the legion of metaphorical red flags Ed was waving, I liked the guy. He seemed earnest. Maybe I was being naïve and stupid, but I needed friends and, as I learned with Croc, lying wasn’t a good way to start any long-term relationship. Besides, better naïve and stupid than bitter, jaded, and suspicious of everything under the sun.

That’s how you ended up like Ed and I had no desire, whatsoever, to end up like him. Alone in the world with all my secrets and no one to share them with.

“Because we’re not trying to find a way out,” I said, “we’re trying to find a way to go deeper, and the only way we can do that is to pass through the one of the kiosks on this floor. Specifically, the fireworks kiosk that was near that barbeque you saved us from. The one surrounded by that army of Kevin’s and Kathys.”

“The firework kiosk?” he mumbled, arching an eyebrow. “The one that just appeared a few days ago?”

“That’s the one,” I confirmed.

He absently kicked at the floor with the toe of his combat boot. “I don’t understand,” he said after a few seconds. “Why is some random kiosk so important to you? I fail to see how that’s going to help you delve deeper into the Backrooms.”

“You ever heard of the Kiosk Network?” I asked, instead of answering his question directly.

“Most Delvers who live as long as I have know about the Network,” he replied, jerking his head in acknowledgement. “And the first thing you learn is to stay the fuck away from them if you want to keep on living. I’ve seen what lives in those kiosks and trust me when I say you want no part of those things. They’re not as bad as Mr. Wiggles back there”—he hooked his thumb over one shoulder—“but they’re close.”

“Yeah well, what you might not know,” I said, “is that the Kiosk Network can be used to traverse floors just like stairwells. In some ways, they’re even better than stairwells. And so long as you have one of these”—I flashed my Kiosk Club Card temporary tattoo—“the Dwellers inside the kiosks will let you pass. That fireworks kiosk, though, is extra special. It’s a spatial gateway that’ll take us all the way down to the forty-ninth floor.”

He whistled and Woodstock mimicked the sound with uncanny accuracy.

“The forty-ninth floor? You must have a death wish going down that deep.”

“The people on the seventh floor would likely say the same about you,” Temperance said, pushing Jakob aside. “But just like you, we don’t concern ourselves with the opinions of sheep.”

I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. Temperance certainly had a flair for the melodramatic.

“What could possibly be down on the forty-ninth floor that’s worth crossing the HOA for?” Ed asked.

“Our great and glorious destiny lies below,” Temperance answered.

“Pipe down there, Ye Old Murder McGee,” I said, before turning my attention back to Ed. “Honestly? I have no clue what’s down on the forty-ninth floor—other than another kiosk that’ll take us even deeper. Not all the way to the bottom, but one step closer. Eventually, though, if we go deep enough and get strong enough, we might find a way to stop something much worse than the HOA. A mean ol’ son of a bitch who calls itself the Flayed Monarch.”

Ed turned white as a sheet and the color drained from his face.

“I take it you’ve heard of the Monarch?” I asked, though based on his expression I already knew the answer.

“There’s not a soul beneath the tenth floor who hasn’t heard of the Monarch,” he said. “Even the suits with BEACON were afraid to get on his shit list.” He grimaced and licked his lips nervously. “I’ve heard plenty of horror stories about the stuff his acolytes like to get up to.”

“Those aren’t just stories,” Jakob said. He dismissed his shield then raised his left hand, which was covered by a leather glove that went all the way to his elbow. The Cendral winced in obvious discomfort as he slowly peeled away the glove, revealing a bloody red limb stripped of skin. “This is what they did to me, long before I ever met Dan. They use special artifacts, given to them by the inner disciples of the court, which prevent the wounds they inflict from ever healing. It also never stops hurting.”

Finally, Ed lowered his gun and let out a deep sigh.

“I think you’re telling the truth,” he finally said, though there was a slight tremble in his voice, “but there are still a few things that don’t quite add up. Like how a couple of level twenty-somethings got the Monarch’s attention in the first place. You damn near can’t throw a rock without hitting one of his bootlicking aspirants, but the Monarch himself?

“Well, he wouldn’t roll out of bed to smite anything below level 100—assuming he’s real in the first place and not just some boogeyman the Skinless Court made up to scare people into obedience. I mean this in the nicest way possible, but you’re not important enough for someone like the Monarch to kill.” He leaned in close and dropped his voice low. “I think you might be a little paranoid.”

I snorted despite how tense the situation was. The sheer irony of Ed calling us paranoid was not lost on me.

“It’s complicated,” I said, “but trust me, we aren’t paranoid. I’m gonna shoot straight here, there are things that I don’t feel comfortable telling you yet. Things I might not ever be comfortable telling you—we all have our secrets, after all.”

“I can respect that, kemo sabe,” Ed said, nodding slowly. “OPSEC. Operational Security,” he added after noting the confused look on Croc’s face. “It’s like we used to say back in ’Nam, loose lips sink ships.”

“Exactly,” I agreed. “But what I can tell you is that we have something the Monarch wants. Something that he will move heaven and earth to get.”

Ed shot a finger gun at the open doorway, “I’m pretty sure your big secret probably has something to do with that fancy pocket dimension you have.”

It was a statement not a question.

“Doesn’t matter,” I said, refusing to directly confirm his suspicions even though he was right on the money. “The point is, he is gunning for me and my friends, and he won’t stop until we’re dead.”

“No, it’s worse than that,” Croc said. “The Monarch doesn’t just want to kill us, he wants to destroy what we’re trying to build.” The mimic looked at Ed with its giant googly eyes. “You said this floor used to be a Safe Harbor? Well, that’s what Dan’s store is. A safe place for good people in a world where nothing is safe or good. Look through that door.” Croc padded over to Ed then dropped down beside him. “Those are the people we’re trying to save.”

Croc bobbed his nose toward a pair of kids who were playing in what remained of the toy aisle. “That little boy there is named Sammy. He’s eight and he was born in the Backrooms. Him and his sister, Lucy, both. They live inside Howlers Hold, which is a Safe Harbor on the seventh floor. They lost their dad during a supply run three years ago. A sand worm ripped his legs off and he bled out on the spot. They couldn’t even recover his body for a proper funeral. Those kids have never seen the outside world and the only thing they’ve ever known is danger.

“Until Dan. Until us. Until that store. Now their mum can get food and supplies without risking her life to do it” He lifted a paw and pointed at Baby Hands, who was busy mopping up a spill near the concession stand. “See that weird monster made out of basketballs and stuff? His name is Baby Hands, and he’s my second-best friend in the whole world, just after Dan. He’s not human, but he’s a good person and that’s all that matters inside Discount Dan’s Backroom Bargains.”

There was a terrible bleating shriek as Princess Ponypuff hurled a soda bottle at a customer in the checkout line.

“What about her?” Ed asked. “I suppose she’s a bastion of goodness, too?”

“That’s Princess Ponypuff,” Croc replied, “and, if I’m being completely honest, she has some deeply concerning anger issues. She also likes to watch me sleep and might be summoning a dark god in the supply closet. I mean, I can’t prove that last part, but the evidence is certainly there. Even with all her faults, though, Ponypuff is still loyal, and I think her heart is in the right place. Or possibly hearts—I’m fairly certain she has more than one.” The dog frowned and shook its head. “Doesn’t matter, the point is, Discount Dan’s Backroom Bargains is a safe haven. We’ve saved dozens of Delvers and there are hundreds of innocent people depending on us. I know you have a lot of reasons not to trust us, but we are good people, and I think you are, too.”

“That’s why we need your help,” I said. “That’s why we want to takedown the signal. Because we’re in a knock-down-drag-out deathmatch with the Backrooms equivalent of a god and the only way we’re going to survive is if we can find Relics powerful enough to hurt him. And we aren’t going to find weapons like those on level twenty-four.

“Now, I understand if you don’t want to help us, which is why I’m willing to make you a deal,” I continued, already regretting the words. “We’ve already made it through the preschool so assuming you’re right about these tunnels, we’re basically in the home stretch. Just give me Big Bertha, show me how to work it, and I’ll let you leave right here and now. I’ll remove the restrictions on this door, and you can be off this floor in three steps.”

“You’re full of shit,” Ed said, though he sounded reluctantly hopeful.

As a show of good faith, I pulled up the Admittance Credentialing System and changed the level-cap restriction from thirty to forty right then and there.

“No bullshit,” I replied shaking my head. “See for yourself.”

Ed squinted, studying me carefully, then reached out once more for the doorway. The invisible barrier was gone and his hand passed right through. Instead of darting through the doorway and into freedom, however, Ed let his hands drop limply and pressed his eyes shut tight as he considered his options. Eventually, he opened his eyes again and pulled the door shut the door with a begrudging sigh.

“You really think I’d abandon this mission?” he asked, staring at each of us in turn. “I’ve been working on Big Bertha for the better part of fifteen years. Taking down the HOA is my life’s work. This bastard of a level has killed more of my friends than I can count, and I’ve spent every waking moment figuring out how to make things right. How to undue all the damage those door donkeys at BEACON did with the Nexus Pulse. You couldn’t pay me enough to walk away from this.

“Not when I’m so close to the finish line. I’ll see this through until the end,” he said grimly. “Then, once I’m done and the signal is down for good, I’ll leave this place behind and decide what’s next for me and Woodstock. But I’m not leaving before that.” He paused then frowned. “Though I mean that figuratively—in the sense that I’m not abandoning this mission. Practically speaking, we should definitely take this opportunity to restock. Forging ahead for purely dramatic reasons is plain, old stupid.

“I am badly in need of supplies, and I haven’t visited a Monolith in the better part of a year. I’ve got Stat points to spend, and we could honestly use every edge we can get if we’re serious about taking on the HOA. I’m also pretty sure I saw a bag of Doritos.” I wistful look passed over his face and he rubbed his hands together in greedy anticipation. “I haven’t eaten a Dorito in twenty years. There’s a good chance we’re all going to die, and I intend for several bags of Doritos to be my last meal…”