The water has accepted the imposters without a sound.
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Beneath the glassy surface, cold hands wrap around a warm throat. Desperate, thrashing limbs slowly go still. Terrified, naive eyes—his own eyes—stare back through the gloom as the last bubbles escape. They aren't real, Merc tells himself, suppressing a violent shiver as he dons the heavy, woven robe, the fabric still warm from the stolen life. 'Just fragments. Soulless echoes spat out by the lake.'
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The jeweled crown sits like an anvil on his brow. The guilt threatens to crush his sanity, but the primal will to survive forces a hollow calm over his face. He steps into the role flawlessly.
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When the sun crests the Diamond Hill again, Merc and Jeremy led the litany. They distributed the coins. They watched the ecstatic, compliant youths spent their currency, herding the docile flock toward the promised Outer Ring.
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The vessels wandered for days in the mist, and eventually stops at the bottom of a cliff. Sprawling emerald greenery and towering, pristine architecture bathe in soft sunlight. Rolling out to meet them are... welcoming figures. Their faces are perfectly smooth, their smiles impossibly fixed. They don't walk; they glide smoothly on hidden wheels beneath their sleek chassis. Merc's mind twitches. A word starting with ‘R’ scratches desperately at his fractured memory, but slips away into the fog.
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‘Welcome, Children of the Diamond!’ the greeters chime in perfect, synthetic unison. They glide through the ecstatic crowd, handing out sleek, glass syringes. ‘The final blessing into your neck, and the eternal paradise is yours.’
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Merc and Jeremy feel heavy, the glass tubes cold in their palms. It is the exact same syringe that killed Kate.
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‘That priest...’ Merc whispers, a cynical smile twists his lips. ‘He was helping us stop the loop.’ He looks at Jeremy. ‘Some kind of salvation, huh.’
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The smiling greeters pause, their smooth heads tilting at the priests’ hesitation. ‘Please, your eminences. Complete the blessing. Everyone is waiting for you.’
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In a moment, the boy in front of him collapses. Then the next. Within seconds, the entire flock drops dead in horrifying, silent unison.
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A deep, mechanical groan shakes the earth. The lush gardens and pristine streets begin to descend into the abyss, while a sterile, empty slab of steel slowly rises to replace it.
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‘Recycling complete. Reshaping in progress...’ a synthetic voice booms from the sky.
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‘There never was an exit from the start,’ Merc and Jeremy breathe out, absolute despair washing over them.
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The greeters’ welcoming smiles vanish. Their eyes snap to a piercing, hostile red. Lethal apertures open on their smooth arms, transforming them into heavily armed sentinels. They advance, unleashing a hail of glass darts, forcing Merc and Jeremy backward to the jagged edge of a cliff overlooking the churning black water.
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A sharp hiss cuts the air. Jeremy lunges forward, stepping directly into the trajectory.
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Needles bury deep into his chest. He doesn't bleed. His eyes, wide with the tragic understanding of their doomed geometry, lock onto Merc’s. With his last ounce of strength, Jeremy shoves Merc backward, off the precipice.
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As Merc plummets into the freezing depths, he watches Jeremy fall, but he doesn't hit the ground like the rest. His silhouette flickers, fracturing into a flurry of ash, dissolving into nothingness. Merc sinks into the dark. "Diamon Hill...live for lively… or living…" He sneers.
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and then Add to home screen.