The chipped white bathroom door swung inward, and the hallway’s darkness swallowed Virgil.
A wave of panic tore through Seth’s chest.
He scrambled to his feet and sprinted down the hallway, his bare feet slapping against the floorboards.
The sunlight that had warmed the room was gone, replaced by an absolute cold that burned his lungs.
He reached the bathroom and caught himself against the doorframe.
Virgil stood at the edge of the rusted tub.
His pristine wool coat and polished shoes looked grotesquely out of place.
His gaze rested on the girl.
In the tub, Maya lay motionless.
But there was no crimson water. The tub was completely bone-dry. Maya was slumped against the porcelain, her skin terrifyingly pale, her lips blue, and a thick, bruised ring of purple flesh crushed around her throat.
Seth couldn’t breathe. His small hands tightened convulsively on the doorframe, his knuckles turning white. The air in the room felt heavy, thick as water, pressing in on him from all sides.
"What!?"
The words escaped. The numbness he’d clung to shattered instantly.
This wasn’t his memory.
This wasn’t how he had found her body just moments ago.
"The labyrinth will find another way to make you watch."
Virgil’s warning echoed in his mind.
He didn’t look at Virgil. He kept his eyes fixed on the dry tub.
Then the bulb above them let out a loud, violent pop.
The light flickered, died for a second, and surged back to life.
Maya’s chest jerked upward.
A terrible, suffocated wheeze tore through the silent bathroom as her eyes snapped open. They were wide, bloodshot and filled with raw terror.
Her pale hands flew to her bruised throat. Her fingernails clawed at her skin as she fought for air that wouldn’t come.
"H-Help—"
Her voice was barely audible.
Maya stretched a trembling hand over the edge of the tub, her fingers grasping blindly at the air.
Her bloodshot eyes found Virgil, standing beside the bathtub.
"Help... me..." she mouthed.
Seth’s vision swam as static roared through his ears. His ten-year-old body began to shake so violently his teeth clicked together.
Virgil finally turned from the dying girl and looked towards Seth.
Maya followed Virgil’s gaze. When she saw Seth, her reaching hand faltered.
Seth froze. He couldn’t breathe.
"Please..."
The words barely escaped before her fingers tightened harder around her bruised neck.
She tried to speak again, but all that came out was a strangled wheeze.
"Maya..."
Seth took a step forward.
She recoiled so violently that the back of her head struck the tub.
He stopped, looking down at his own outstretched arms.
’Hurt her?’
He wanted to help her. He wanted to pull her out of the tub, save her, and put things back the way they were.
"What are you waiting for? Kill her."
The words hung in the air.
Seth immediately turned towards Virgil.
Then, a sudden, sickening ache bloomed deep in his forearms.
Seth stared at his hands. His knuckles were split, and the skin was raw and bruised. The muscles in his wrists and forearms burned with fatigue, the ache feeling like the aftermath of a brutal struggle.
He blinked, the roaring static in his ears drowning out her strangled sobs.
’How did I get that?’
A memory surfaced. After Maya died, he’d convinced himself that he was responsible. He had wanted to punch the wall until his hands broke, just to feel something other than grief.
’Is this me?’
’Did I do this to myself?’
Something changed.
He felt a frantic pulse beneath his fingers, soft skin, and the movement of a throat struggling against his grip.
The sensation was horribly precise. He could feel the pulse racing between his fingertips, growing weaker with every passing second before eventually dying.
Maya.
His hands were around Maya’s neck.
’No. I didn’t.’
The sensation vanished, but the memory of it remained.
He had never strangled her. He knew that.
The trial wasn’t just creating new scenarios. It was projecting his mind back at him. This chapter is updated first at g.com.
For months after her death, he’d convinced himself that he was responsible, that if he’d only carried more of her burdens, she might still be alive.
He wanted it to be his fault. If he’d caused her death, then he might have been able to prevent it.
He looked from his bruised hands to Maya, still weeping in the tub.
’But that’s a lie too.’
He stepped up to the tub.
Maya recoiled when her eyes met his, letting out a broken sob as she struggled to get away.
Seth stared directly down into her terrified eyes.
The truth didn’t bring relief, only a sickening resignation.
"I didn’t kill you," he said. His voice didn’t crack. It was dead. "But I can’t save you either."
Something inside him went quiet. The emptiness that followed felt bottomless.
"So I’m going to let you die for the last time," Seth said softly. "And I’ll accept your death."
He didn’t turn away. He stayed and watched her die.
Her struggling grew weaker.
Her fingers slipped from her throat and fell against the porcelain. Her bloodshot eyes remained fixed on him.
Her fingers curled inwardly, grasping at nothing.
Then she went quiet.
A thin crack appeared on her cheek, followed by another that split her skin into delicate gray features.
Without a sound, she dissolved.
Her body flaked, turning into a fine, gray ash which settled at the bottom of the tub.
Seth looked down at his small hands.
Acceptance brought no relief, no strength, no sense of triumph.
He felt wretched, emptier than he had ever been before.
He turned away from the empty tub and looked at the doorway.
Virgil was engulfed in a storm of shadow. In the blink of an eye, the young boy was gone. The boy vanished. In his place stood Virgil’s teenage form, wearing the very body Seth had stolen, his blue eyes completely unreadable.
Virgil didn’t say a word. He walked slowly across the chipped floorboards, closing the distance between them.
He stood before Seth, knelt until they were eye to eye, then placed a hand on his shoulder.
The moment Virgil’s hand touched Seth’s shoulder, a blinding heat erupted from his fingertips.
Seth barely had time to gasp before his entire body caught fire. The ache in his knuckles was gone, replaced by the very real, agonizing burn of Minervia’s rot.
The bathroom and the ash were incinerated in the flash of fire, leaving a lone figure standing in the center of it.
Everything went pitch black.