Like many nights after coming back to the loft from a storyline, we eventually found ourselves on the roof, relaxing.

But it wasn’t that we were completely comfortable with each other yet. We were getting there, and a few mixed drinks under the stars couldn’t hurt. Normalcy wasn’t the default in Carousel. It was a choice.

Just as I had come to expect, any conversation could eventually become a conversation about our various experiences in storylines.

Like pretty much every team that had come through Camp Dyer, Nicole’s team had run Delta Epsilon Delta and had its own story to talk about.

“So there I was,” Molly said, flutes of champagne deep, “seconds from death, and Ranger Danger is walking over to me, menacing as the day is long. Nicole here was literally in the other room, sifting through papers, trying to figure out the identity of the killer while pretending she didn’t hear me getting murdered next door. Because we already knew the motive, it was obvious the killer was targeting people who had cheated on a recent math final. And unfortunately, our characters had done it. I understood why I would, but I was most disappointed in Nicole. And as he’s towering over me, about to stab me to death, all I can do is put all of my Mettle into one kick, and I kick him right between the legs. But he doesn’t even flinch, not even a little, so Lorne says—”

“Amber, is that you?” Lorne added without missing a beat. They had told this story before.

“Exactly,” Molly continued, “because there was only one suspect who wouldn’t be crumpled on the floor after a kick between the legs. So she takes off her mask, and suddenly it’s obvious, the killer was a five-foot-five, one-hundred-and-ten-pound sorority girl. How did we not notice before? I have no idea.”

People laughed at the stories. It was a pretty good time.

“Ah, the good old days,” Antoine said. “Getting chased around by Ranger Danger, trying to see what you could make happen.”

Everyone had their Ranger Danger stories. Kimberly had told ours, which always made me embarrassed because they tried to make it seem like I was some sort of genius when all I did was get lucky.

Lorne was resting his head on the table as he said, “Storylines aren’t that much fun to live through, but they’re great to talk about afterward, once you get some distance and forget a little.” He looked at Antoine. “How many times have you all run Delta Epsilon Delta anyway? We must have done it a dozen times.”

“Only once,” Antoine said, “but I heard some stories back at Camp Dyer. Really helps remind you it is a game, no matter how real it feels at the time.”

Before anyone could say anything else, Janet commented, sitting in a lounge chair next to Bobby, “Is this a TV show or what? I’m confused. When did this happen?”

Antoine took a deep breath and looked at Bobby.

“It’s a sort of live action role play,” Bobby said to his wife. “People from all over play it. I’ve told you about it. It’s from the forums, remember?”

“Oh, right,” Janet said, but then she quickly turned back to the rest of us and changed the subject. “So what do you all do for a living? I’m curious what kinds of people can just take off for a horror festival for weeks at a time.”

Bobby had to continuously remind her that that was what was going on, because every once in a while, she would ask him when they were leaving to go home.

The tension was palpable, and the Camp Dyer mentality of just ignoring the NPC in the room was wearing thin.

Lorne was the only person who seemed willing to answer. Most were a bit skeeved out by the Janet situation, and we hadn’t had a good catharsis on that yet.

“I was a real estate lawyer,” he said. “Did some criminal defense pro bono.”

There was always a certain sadness when people talked about the before times. Memories of life before Carousel provided less and less comfort the longer we were here.

“Bobby’s a veterinarian,” Janet said, “He has three clinics and one horse rehab center. I insisted. I love horses. I wouldn’t take no for an answer. He’s a great doctor.”

She cuddled up against Bobby.

The group went even quieter, if that was possible. Because Bobby wasn’t actually a veterinarian, he worked in IT. Bobby did have a background trope that made him a veterinarian for the purposes of a storyline, or, of course, for the purposes of instructing NPCs on how to treat him.

“You know what we need?” Janet asked. “Margaritas. Who wants one?”

She got up and headed toward the bar, which was freshly stocked from our trip to Eternal Savers Club.

Most people were silent, trying to look at the ground or otherwise looking at Bobby.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“I’ll take one,” Isaac said. Then he looked sheepishly at us and said, “What? We might as well get something out of this whole thing.”

Due to the recent influx of players into Kimberly’s loft and the attached apartments, sleeping arrangements had been changed, and for the first time, I had roommates.

My room also doubled as a storage area for some of the various toiletries and other goods we had acquired from our shopping trip, not that I could complain. They were a sign of abundance.

I was sleeping in my Murphy bed, hanging from the brick wall, and staring down at the pallets that had been made for Camden and Isaac. Again, I really couldn’t complain; at least I had a proper mattress. They just had a bunch of blankets and padding.

Still, I found myself unable to sleep. I rolled over onto my stomach and stared out the window at the lights of Carousel at night. I was stuck with my normal decision: do I try to get sleep by unequipping my hysteric trope I Don’t Like It Here, or do I keep that trope equipped just in case and use my instant sleeping trope Out Like a Light?

Which was better in the long term, I had no idea. But it didn’t end up mattering.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Someone was at the front door. Or something.

I was up and on my feet in a split second, running out of the room in nothing but my pajama bottoms that Kimberly had looted for me. I got up so fast that my bed retreated into the wall with a crash. Its springs were extra powerful and operated on a hair trigger to make them a little scarier.

Isaac was right on my tail as I was out of the room and down the hall, and as I turned the corner to see the front door, panic set in because it turned out I wasn’t the first person to get there.

Janet was.

“No!” I screamed, but she ignored me.

Instead, she looked through the peephole on the door and then started reaching for the lock.

All I could do was grab her from behind, put my hand over her mouth, and drag her backward to the ground as the other players made their way out of their rooms. We had told the new group about the Omen delivery situation, and I wasn’t the least bit surprised that on their first night here, Carousel had seen fit to demonstrate the danger of Kimberly’s loft.

Another set of knocks came on the door. It was heavy and deliberate. I could see someone on the other side because of how their legs blocked the hallway light at the bottom of the doorframe.

Isaac had grabbed his fishing pole, and as soon as he hit the little trigger to release the line, the weight at the end had gone horizontal, pulling hard toward the door. Whatever Omen was on the other side must have been very powerful.

He reeled it in and quickly found his place in front of the door, peeking out to the other side. He whispered something to himself about how “that’s not what the hallway looks like,” which triggered his scouting ability and gave him information that would help him repel the Omen, whatever it might be.

It was often confusing and literally a puzzle to figure out what action would be necessary to send the Omen packing, and Isaac had to take a moment. All the while, I was on the ground wrestling with Janet, hoping that she wouldn’t make a sound, but I wasn’t quite that lucky.

Bobby had come over and was quietly whispering to her that everything was okay, but she wasn’t hearing it.

Another three knocks came on the door.

Isaac appeared to have found his solution. He raised his fist and knocked back exactly three times, in the same cadence as the person on the other side of the door had done.

Then there was silence. All we could do was wait and see if his answer had been correct.

Eventually, the shadow on the other side of the door disappeared, and the fishing rod relaxed and stopped trying to pull toward the door.

Still, we stayed silent, frozen for as long as we could bear, just to be sure. Until eventually…

“I think it’s safe,” Isaac said.

At that, I released Janet, and she stood up immediately, turned around, and screamed at me, “What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Janet, it’s okay,” Bobby said. “He didn’t mean anything by it.”

“He didn’t mean anything by it? He tackled me! Could have killed me!”

You’d think it would be that simple, wouldn’t you?

I didn’t know what to say. I had so many things I wanted to scream, mostly at Bobby, but I knew it wouldn’t be productive. It would be better to let someone else do the talking.

“Crisis averted,” was all I said, “For now at least.”

I got up and moved away from the center of attention.

“Don’t say that,” Bobby said to me. “She’ll learn. She’ll get better.”

Scratch that whole let saner minds prevail thing—I couldn’t hold my temper at the moment.

“She’s an NPC,” I said. “She’s not even meta. She’ll do it again next time when the script tells her to.”

“No,” Bobby said desperately. “She’s in there. I can tell. She just needs our help. I need to work on my throughline, and she’ll be fine.”

And then we’ll have the real Janet to deal with, I thought to myself, but didn’t say out loud as if the real Janet would be better.

“Bobby!” Janet screamed. “Do something about this! You’re going to let this child attack me and then apologize to him?”

He never apologized. What was she talking about?

“Sweetheart, it’s okay,” he said. “It was just a misunderstanding. I’ll explain in a minute. Let’s go to bed.”

“I can’t stay here,” Janet said. “Are you crazy? Getting treated like this by strangers; you know, I always thought horror conventions attracted funny people, but this—”

“It’s just a misunderstanding,” Bobby said again. “Everything will be okay.”

Janet was about to respond, but then luckily, Kimberly intervened.

“Janet, are you alright? I saw you took a tumble. You and Riley got tangled in the dark,” she said.

Then Janet blinked a few times, and suddenly her entire demeanor changed. She started to giggle and then said, “Oh, I’m so sorry. My night vision really is awful. We should get some lighting for these hallways.”

Then she walked over to me and gave me a half-hug. She seemed like a normal person, like nothing had just happened.

“Everything’s fine,” she continued. “Just a little accident. You can all go back to bed. Nobody got hurt.” Then she looked at Bobby. “What’s wrong, babe?”

Bobby stared at her for a long time, a look of profound sadness on his face.

“Nothing,” he said eventually. “Everything’s good.”

“Then let’s go back to bed,” she said. “Cancel the ambulance. It was just a little fall. Didn’t mean to cause such a stir.”

She turned and started squeezing back through the different players who were standing around watching, going back to bed as if nothing had happened.

We watched her go, and then, when she was gone, we looked back at Bobby.

“It’ll get better,” he said. “It’s a process. We’re just getting started, right?”

No one said anything, but our faces said a lot in themselves. We were afraid, a little angry, and there was confusion, too—the Carousel trifecta.

Then Isaac said, “Did you see how I sent that Omen away? Good thing too; could have been messy.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep