Archive of Our Own ^beta

“ In a dingy town, in an even dingier tavern, two women and four men meet. They may not have realised this before arriving, but this is the battleground for the future of their community. Will the creeping evil beneath the streets finally rise up to subjugate the innocent, or will truth and honour triumph? Can the good citizens purge themselves of the force that threatens to tear them apart? All will be uncovered over the course of several tense days and nights, which for some, may end up being their last. ”

As is normal for young teens their age, the girls are curious about their surroundings and don’t want to be left out of what the grown-ups are doing. Kaeloo doesn’t ban them from playing games with the buddies, but she doesn’t allow it often. She says that it’s important for the girls to socialise within their own age group at this time, and that they can more reliably join in with the others once they get a bit older. When they are permitted to join the buddies, the games clearly take on a much less intense scale. Less real-time action and wild terraforming, and more safe props and milder changes in setting.

Kaeloo promised that as their imaginations grew, the girls would develop the ability to influence Smileyland in ways similar to how she and the buddies could. If their big brother was capable of learning the craft, they should be able to do the same.

“When Stumpy was your age,” Kaeloo said with a fond chuckle, “we had to imagine that the grass was lava as we jumped from rock to rock. Now we have real lava! But,” her tone turned stern, “you have to earn it.” She snapped back into brightness and started making her leave to prepare for the buddies’ next game, but not before turning back to add one last thing. “Oh, and cooperation is key! Mr Cat used to not want to join in, and I’ll bet that had an effect on what we were capable of! So any of you who might be resisting playing together…” She laughed again, and then her voice became a thick growl, “ Cut it out! ”

The reactions to this varied from girl to girl, but all shared a general sentiment of dissatisfaction. A sense that they were not being treated equally.

“‘Course you’re not,” Stumpy said when they brought these concerns to him (by themselves or in pairs, but that didn’t change how he responded). “You’re kids. Get over it.”

When it was Checkout having this conversation, she attempted to explain that she was very mature for a fourteen-and-a-half-year old. Snitchy tried to convey that having friends of all ages is healthy, which Lavenblah backed up by adding friends of all types , too. Mimi tried to convince her brother that she needed attention or she’d die, but did not have a doctor’s certificate to back up this claim. Moldie said she didn’t even want to join in on the buddies’ stupid games anyway. Vitamin was the only one to abstain from the subject entirely.

When Purplish approached, Stumpy cringed deeply and held his breath for whatever the next attempt at argument was going to be. The girls, in his opinion, were wasting their time in this endeavour. Even if he cracked, Kaeloo wouldn’t. They just had to accept that they’d only be joining the buddies on special occasions and they needed to make do with each other for now. Or any sheep their age. You know, the sheep? The hordes of other Smileyland residents and neighbours and potential friends out there?

He was getting ready to make this suggestion to his sister, but Purplish wasn’t there to advocate for joining the central cast. Instead she asked him, “When’s Mom coming home?”

“Soon,” Stumpy lied, and wished that his sisters hadn’t joined him in this place.

“Bienvenue, bienvenida, and welcome! To the Museum Of Games!” This is Game Rule speaking, their horizontally cylindrical body zapping efficiently from the central exhibit over to the front doors. Whenever the security system, over which they have complete control, alerts them to visitors, they do exactly this. It’s by no means a personalised greeting and has as much meaning as saying “hi, how are you” when passing a stranger on the street.

To demonstrate, it’s only after they stop with their little introduction that they actually register who is standing before them. “Ah, it’s Vitamin, Checkout, Moldie, Lav–”

“Yeah, yeah!” Moldie pushes forward out of the cluster of her sisters, waving her hands at Game Rule from where they float just above their heads, like shooing an insect.

“Hey,” says Snitchy sharply. “You interrupted them.”

“Just when it was about to say my name, too,” Mimi agrees. “So rude!”

Game Rule flits to and fro, a group of seven being just a little too big for them to manage alone, especially when they don’t seem to want their guidance. Game Rule’s database on Stumpy’s sisters isn’t extensive yet, but as well as this being an excellent opportunity to show off their curating skills to a fresh audience, Game Rule can take down more information about them during this visit. At the very least, they’re able to halt Purplish, swinging their form into an exclamation mark to really make sure they capture the girl’s attention.

“I’m sorry, miss,” says Game Rule. “Balloons are not permitted past the foyer.”

Purplish’s eyebrows furrow, the corners of her mouth twitching a little. Mimi and Lavenblah double back to flank her on either side as Purplish twists the string of her balloon two more times around her wrist.

“He won’t get in the way,” she tries to say at the same time Mimi barks, “Why?”

“Balloons are not accounted for on the museum’s list of acceptable occupational hazards,” explains Game Rule, summoning the list to their detached limb and showing it to the girls. None seem impressed. “It must be deflated immediately.”

Before they even finish the sentence, Vitamin has grabbed hold of Purplish and dragged her further into the open exhibit space, where Game Rule cannot corner them so easily. Game Rule tries their best to zip-zap over to where they went, but the path is blocked by a supernatural force, a thick sheen of ghostly energy, being projected by Lavenblah.

“There won’t be any trouble,” Checkout says with a veneer of politeness. “Purplish takes very good care of her property, and even if there’s a mishap, me and my sisters can easily handle an emergency situation.”

“Way more qualified than you to handle it,” Moldie adds.

“Are you even capable of holding things?” asks Snitchy, although this is more out of curiosity than putting on the pressure. She takes notes in an open spiral notepad as well as a recorder pen; Game Rule appreciates this dedication to information-gathering, and they ultimately acquiesce to this break in protocol after six of the seven girls sign a brief liability contract.

The girls scatter in pairs of two to explore the museum, the remainder being Vitamin who covers more ground in less time, and is best on her own to do so. Fascinated by her quickness, and confident in their own ability to keep up with some minor adjustments, Game Rule chooses to monitor Vitamin personally, keeping a more passive eye on the other sisters through the security’s CCTV network.

A little time spent overclocking shouldn’t do too much damage, Game Rule reasons — but decides not to report it to their parents. If they take notice of a spike in processing power in the monthly diagnostics, they’ll cry glitch. Law and Order will believe them.

“Bonjour, buenos dias, and good morning,” Game Rule says to Vitamin, meeting her at her first stop, and she seems to startle a little.

“Hi, how are you,” says Vitamin without conviction.

“I am very well, operating at peak performance! Thank you for asking. How are you?”

“Oh, yeah, I’m good.” She appears much too invested in the exhibit to hold a proper conversation.

“Shall I tell you about the graphics displayed here?” Game Rule asks, gesturing a limb at the mounted wall in front of them. “These are background visuals used primarily for decoration and advertisement, coming in both pristine and defaced variants.”

Vitamin nods, tapping the plaque that says pretty much the same thing. “Thanks.”

Game Rule hasn’t matched her pace perfectly, she’s still faster by a small amount, so her voice and movements are as if she’s been set to 1.75 speed, however she’s perfectly legible and it’s easy to bear. From Vitamin’s point of view it would be the same way, only with Game Rule being slightly slower. Game Rule is too caught up in these logistics to notice that Vitamin clearly wants them to leave her alone.

They go from exhibit to exhibit, occasionally crossing paths with the other sisters, whose slowed selves amuse Game Rule. What an interesting way to live this must be. Exhibit to exhibit, explaining each one and only getting about halfway through before Vitamin is moving on again. She does linger awhile at the chainsaw collection, most of them previously wielded by her brother in various dangerous and inappropriate stunts, which Game Rule prepares to tell her all about, however the museum’s owner is walking by at this time and it would be impolite not to acknowledge him, so Game Rule comes out of overclock mode.

“Good morning, sir,” they say. “Do you have any special duties for me today?”

The owner, a young gentleman of the sheep variety, turns to them with a grave look on his face. “Just one, Rules of the Game. It’s to–” and the facade cracks and a huge grin comes shining through. He reaches up to try and nudge them affectionately. “Ha ha, take it easy! Relax, ROTG, loosen up. The overbearing schtick ain’t no fun unless it’s from an antagonist.”

They’re alike in plenty of ways, as noted by Kaeloo, and Petit Mouton seems to think that this automatically means there’s a friendly connection between him and Game Rule, but for them this is purely a business relationship. “Understood.”

His smile falters as he surely has to recognise this on some level. “Hanging out with Vitamin, eh?”

Fully expecting the girl in question to still be at her side, Game Rule gestures without looking. “Oh yes, we’re enjoying our time together.”

“Well, tell her I say hi! I’m in a group chat with her and Snitchy and Checkout, but it’s mostly sharing memes, Wordle scores, brainstorming Connections, y’know. Quack-Quack’s there, too, he just doesn’t–”

It’s at this time that Game Rule notices that Vitamin is no longer present, and they whirl into an exclamation mark and cry out, interrupting Petit Mouton in the middle of his banal anecdote. Without bidding him a proper farewell as would be proper protocol, Game Rule zips away to locate their runaway tour group of one.

In the short time spent separated, it’s been longer for Vitamin, so she has had the opportunity to visit and appreciate about as many exhibits as the ones Game Rule interfered with. She cranks her music high, feels the cool breeze of the air conditioning, and takes her time in the specific way she taught herself, to eat up as much empty space as possible. There’s lots of interesting things to look at, props and toys and setpieces, each with a plaque noting the games in which they appeared. It’s far better to experience at one’s own pace than dictated by another, or at least that’s how Vitamin feels about it. Her opinion does not have to represent anyone’s thoughts but her own.

This is probably why she has opted not to involve herself in the discussion surrounding the sisters and buddies playing together. Among other topics.

She’s found herself wandering a particularly dimly-lit section of the museum. It makes sense, it’s mostly lighting displays. What doesn’t make sense, however, is what appears to be a giant crayon set on its base atop a marble pillar – behind a barrier of velvet ropes, of course. The exhibit is entirely unlit, yet set out with plenty of space as if it expects to draw a huge crowd. Vitamin approaches, squinting to read the plaque, the words engraved on the gold plate that adorns a corner of the pillar.

“‘ The Gruel ’,” she murmurs, and becomes temporarily blinded by a sudden flash, a spotlight activating and shining down from above. Vitamin isn’t nearly as fast as the speed of light, so she experiences lights shutting on and off as suddenly as anyone else, but there is a quality to this spotlight that cannot be generated by electricity, or any sort of man-made power. Vitamin looks up to locate the source of the light, and cannot find it. The spotlight only goes endlessly up, long past the bulbs used by the rest of the museum, higher than the tall storage containers, into the cavernous ceiling — and Vitamin knows it’s ridiculous, but it feels as though the light continues even beyond that. The light would surely go on forever if it could, but it stops at its destination, at the crayon, which she can now see is as gold as the plaque that bears its name.

The sustained angelic choir that easily drowns out the music in her headphones is unaffected by Vitamin’s accelerated perception of time. The urge to reach for the crayon is immeasurable.

All at once, Vitamin sees activity around her, her sisters noticing the impressive display and coming to see it with her. Vitamin looks between them with careful consideration, then again, and again, because that’s how much time it takes. She sighs and groans at Game Rule also approaching, but her sisters will be with her soon and then they can all tough it out together. The continued choir ringing in her ears makes it feel far too serious and significant as her sisters surround her in slow-motion. Coming in from the left, Mimi and Purplish with her balloon still held tight; from the right, Moldie and Lavenblah; and from behind, Checkout and Snitchy. For them, this reunion feels practically instantaneous, like they were summoned the moment the spotlight came on.

“What’s that?” asks Mimi.

“It’s a crayon,” says Checkout.

“No duh,” grunts Moldie.

“It’s shiny,” notes Purplish.

“It’s gotta be important, or it wouldn’t be here,” observes Snitchy.

“It’s supernatural,” finishes Lavenblah.

All eyes turn to her. She blinks rapidly and her shoulders tense, one hand going to her throat like she can take the words back. Her sisters take no mind of this and lean in from all angles.

“Well,” she says, much more quietly than a moment ago, “it is .” She sheepishly waves her hand at the exhibit. “Don’t you hear the singing?”

This is when Game Rule catches up. “The what? Oh!” They hover around the standing crayon, proud to show it off. “How wonderful, you’ve located one of our most popular exhibits. Behold, young ladies! What you are looking at right now is The Wholly Gruel.” And as they say this, the spotlight dips out just long enough for it to be noticeable when it flashes back down, this time enveloping Game Rule’s body as well as the crayon. The choir, likewise, is renewed with gusto. “Yes, the Gruel.” It happens again. It’s going to keep happening. “An ancient artifact from a lost civilisation, the Gruel,” spotlight, choir, “contains the power of pure creation. This magnificent implement is known to impress and inspire the hearts and minds of the people who gaze upon it, often compelling them to have it for themselves. For this reason it has served as a highly appropriate reward for many quest games and treasure hunts.” They pause. “Would you like to hear more?”

“Yes,” Snitchy and Moldie and Mimi say, each enthusiastic in their own way.

“Gruel!” shouts Purplish, and the spotlight is summoned to shine upon her instead. Pleased with her experiment, she laughs and takes one step left. “Gruel!” she shouts again, and again the spotlight follows.

“What does it do?” Checkout wants to know. Beside her, Vitamin has already read the entire plaque several times and would love to tell her what it says, but she’s just going to have to wait for the little blue robot-alien to do it instead.

Game Rule seems to be taking a moment to load up the information. When they’re done, they proudly recount absolutely everything they know. “The Wholly Gruel is a magical crayon. If someone draws a picture with it, the events depicted in the picture will happen in real life. The name ‘Wholly Gruel’ is a parody of the Holy Grail,” with each instance of the name replenishing the spotlight and choir. Game Rule pauses, opening their mouth and closing it again without having said anything, and looks embarrassed to have done so. Then they mutter, “This article is a stub.”

“You’re a stub,” says Mimi.

“Who cares? We know what matters.” Moldie steps over the velvet rope. “Artifact. Magic. Power .” She outstretches both hands in preparation to grab the crayon off its platform, which she’d need a boost to actually accomplish, but finds herself being yanked back by her clothes. “ Hey! ”

Lavenblah’s fingers start to go white clutching the fabric of her sister’s hoodie. Around her pulsates the energy of the spirits also keeping their hold on Moldie. “I don’t think we should be messing with it.”

“Certainly not!” cries Game Rule in agreement. “It's the property of the museum!”

“Think of all the good it could do for the world,” says Snitchy, doing the more traditional action of lifting the velvet rope to duck underneath it. “We should test it, at the very least, to be sure it’s real.”

Game Rule insists, “It’s not real! It’s a prop!"

“Then explain the chorus,” Checkout says, although she is demonstrably on the side of not interacting with the crayon as she’s followed Snitchy to hold her back. “It’s clearly magic.”

“We know magic is real, Miss Rules, you don’t have to lie to us,” says Lavenblah gently. She takes on a similar tone to when she told Stumpy he didn’t need to keep pretending Santa was coming.

“If it’s not magic, explain this: Gruel! ” yells Purplish, to the expected and intended effect. The spotlight shines back on her, leaving the crayon on its pillar in temporary darkness as everyone’s eyes must adjust to the new location of the light source. It’s during this time that Vitamin makes her move, using Moldie to climb up so that she may reach the artifact.

Her hands close around it, but even with the lengths of both her palms there’s still some unoccupied space. It’s bigger than it looked from below, as thick as a decent tree branch, yet it weighs practically nothing. As much as a regular-sized crayon would. Vitamin just holds it for a minute, as she can afford the time to do so, before climbing back down to the museum floor, but doesn’t stick around with her sisters. After some time spent figuring out the best way to carry the damn thing, she takes it out far enough to have ample space on the floor as well as best dodge any attempts to stop her. Vitamin kneels down and wrangles the crayon into a usable position, pointed and ready to draw on the floor…and halts.

What now? What next? What does she want?

A door to take her home. The remote from the movie Click . Grandma. A stack of new vinyls. Vitamin thinks she’s not very good at drawing even with a normal-size crayon, how could she possibly make anything legible with this huge thing?

“Ball,” she whispers. Then, at a regular speaking volume, “I want a ball.” She stands up and uses one leg like a compass, spinning to draw a near-perfect circle. Something still seems to be missing, so after a moment of thought Vitamin takes one step back from her creation and points at it with the crayon. “Gruel,” she says.

To the others, it happens in a flash. One moment the girls are in a clamour to either get ahold of or prevent getting ahold of the exhibit. Game Rule flies about trying to get in between them, trying to protect the exhibit, calling and begging for the skirmish to end. The next moment, the exhibit is gone and the spotlight is freshly summoned several feet away, shining upon Vitamin, the crayon, and her creation. Everyone falls still and silent, staring in anticipation.

Nothing happens, though. Vitamin only drew a circle on the ground.

“Goddamn it,” says Moldie, and Lavenblah smacks her.

“What a ripoff,” says Mimi, and Checkout rolls her eyes.

“That’s a…shame,” says Snitchy, and Purplish tugs her balloon down to bump her sister on the head. It’s intended as a gesture of comfort, but no one likes static electricity messing up their hair, so it often goes unappreciated.

“See?” gasps Game Rule, looking at the sisters in turn. “See?” A mirthless laugh escapes their body before they’re ready to go over to Vitamin. “I told you. It’s not really magic. It’s a prop.”

“Replica.”

All heads turn to Petit Mouton. Who knows how long he’s been standing there, not far from Vitamin, with his hands gathered behind his back. She goes to his side and hands over the crayon, which he handles without a whole lot of care – he plunges the sharp end into the concrete ground and leans his elbow on the base, slightly smushing the wax material on both ends in the process. Game Rule wheezes in pain at this shameless act.

Petit Mouton smiles with sincere enthusiasm. “Oh, it’s fine, there’s plenty more where that came from. I make ‘em myself. Like I said, a replica. The light, though,” he waggles his finger enthusiastically, “ that’s legit. Super cool, right? Don’t you just love it?”

“Gruel,” Purplish must have said, because the spotlight goes back to her.

Snitchy approaches to inspect the replica crayon, which Petit Mouton gladly allows. Lavenblah takes a wise step away from Moldie, who hisses and swings a fist where Lavenblah’s shoulder would have been. Checkout lifts her visor and rests it on her forehead as she rubs her eyes, grumbling.

“It’s so cool,” Mimi agrees, skipping over to poke and prod at Vitamin – she easily dodges, which is the point of the exercise. Enrichment purposes. “It looks like actual gold! Can you make me one?” She points at the crayon he’s leaning on. “Can I have that one? Can you show us the real thing?”

Petit Mouton passes the crayon to Mimi, who immediately starts dancing around with it, drawing lines and loops as she goes, her attention scattered to the wind. Still, he answers the query, addressing the rest of the girls and Game Rule. “I don’t know where the real one is, but Kaeloo should. Being Guardian and all.”

The title is familiar to Game Rule, something they were told by her parents in an instruction brief that also functioned as a bedtime story, but has no great meaning beyond that. No, the thing they’re focused on is the legitimacy of the artifact. “Why did I not know about this?”

The corners of Petit Mouton’s mouth twitch, but he keeps up the smile, even when Moldie goes right up to him to start jabbing her finger in his chest.

“Why didn’t we? ” she demands. “Huh? There’s actual IRL reality-warping stationary, and we don’t get to know about it?”

“It’s highly suspicious that it was kept a secret,” agrees Snitchy, narrowing her eyes. “I need to know why. Let’s open it up for an official investigation.” She speaks directly into her recorder pen. “Is this so-called Gruel ,” spotlight, choir, “the key to this strange dimension? Could it be used to navigate out? Is there still a way to get home?”

“You know there isn’t,” says Lavenblah quietly, eyes fixed to the floor.

“No,” Snitchy snaps, whirling to point the pen at her sister. “No, we don’t know that. All the evidence you’ve come up with is circumstantial at best; I’m not here for theories , I’m here for the truth . If there…” Her voice cracks a little. “If there’s any chance– ”

“Why don’t we ask Kaeloo to show us the real thing?” suggests Purplish. “It could be fun! We could all have a turn drawing something for ourselves. That would be nice.”

Here in the dim section of the museum, beneath its cavernous ceiling, each of Stumpy’s sisters are developing their own agenda, right before Petit Mouton and Game Rule’s eyes. None of their ambitions or lack thereof are of any consequence, however. What matters most, it’s quite clear to Game Rule, is that they must locate the Wholly Gruel as soon as possible and deliver it straight to Law and Order.

It has been an agonising three days. Kaeloo doesn’t think she can stand a single moment longer.

The social deduction game of Mafia, also known as Werewolf, also known as Among Us; a classic staple of roleplay enjoyed by strangers and friends alike. It is made up of two factions of players; those who must rid their community of anyone who would do them harm – be they vicious gangsters, supernatural beasts, or malicious aliens – and those who would do that harm.

The buddies have played with this scenario so many times that they’ve lost count (Quack-Quack claims to know but clams up whenever Kaeloo asks for a number). There have been good games, great games, bad games and… boring games. For Kaeloo, this latest iteration is certainly the latter. She understands what led them to this point and all the contributing factors; they’ve done this too many times, everyone knows each other too well, there are a limited number of roles to play and on a long enough time scale you can learn the best strategy for each one. What’s worse than all that is how the others still enjoy it anyway. If anything, the more they delve into the metagame, the more they enjoy it.

It is the third day and there have been no deaths. There have been no exiles. There’s been nothing . But the buddies – sans Kaeloo – are all sitting around the tavern grinning at each other anyway, like they’re having the time of their lives.

Pretty says, “So during the night I–”

Stumpy interrupts, “I shoot Pretty.”

Quack-Quack responds, I healed her last night, that carries to the day.

“Oh my god, you can’t even let me speak?” Pretty hisses. She’s sitting over at the bar with Eugly and Quack-Quack. Stumpy sits with Olaf at a table, Mr Cat at the next one over. Kaeloo sits on the stairs with her head in her hands. “I was going to say I checked and it’s–"

“I know you’re lying about being the sheriff,” Stumpy declares, pointing at her with his fingers fashioned like a gun. “Give it up already.”

“It’s Mr Cat,” she says over him. “Mr Cat is the killer. I pointed at him and Kaeloo nodded. Kaeloo,” she calls over. “Tell them.”

Without removing her face from where it is buried in her palms, Kaeloo says for about the sixth time, “The GM can’t participate in the discussion.”

Mr Cat throws his hand across his heart, feigning offence. It doesn’t come across as authentic with the glee in his eyes. “You jezebel! I’ve been nothing but an upstanding member of society. Forty years of my life–”

“Not a chance,” Olaf scoffs.

“ Fifty years of my life spent slaving away–”

“Listen, slick,” Pretty interrupts. Her voice is raised, but she doesn’t appear to be actually annoyed. “Basic process of elimination, okay? Stumpy,” she points to him, “is the vigilante, Quack-Quack,” points to him, “is the doctor. Night one I point to Olaf, he’s clean. Night two, Eugly, she’s clean. I point to you, I get a nod. You’re the killer.”

“I haven’t actually killed anyone,” protests Mr Cat. “We’re all still here. You have no reason to suspect me. No probable cause!”

“You’re gonna be a killer,” she insists.

“And me,” Stumpy amends, “when I kill you. ”

Which I won’t let happen , says Quack-Quack.

Olaf, to his credit, seems to be the only one getting tired of this. “If those are all the actions of the day, may we proceed to the vote?”

Kaeloo lifts her head but keeps her eyes shut as the headache threatens to worsen. “All in favour of exiling Pretty?”

“She’s not the sheriff,” asserts Stumpy. “Aye.”

“Aye,” agrees Mr Cat. “I bet she’s the killer. The killer who hasn’t killed yet.”

“All opposed?”

Three “nay”s. Four total, but Pretty’s doesn’t count.

Kaeloo uses her fingers to gently massage circles into her temples. “All in favour of exiling Mr Cat?”

“Aye,” says Pretty – the last two days, Eugly has done the same, but today she does not, and her sister’s eyebrows shoot up her forehead.

Olaf says, “Aye,” and Quack-Quack concurs.

Stumpy and Eugly share a nay. Mr Cat pours them both fresh drinks and raises his own glass in cheers.

“And all in favour of exiling Stumpy,” sighs Kaeloo.

All say “aye” at once, except Mr Cat, whose glass Stumpy clinks. The unanimous voting system makes it quite impossible to beat a contrarian.

“Okay, that’s day three, then.” Kaeloo straightens her back and puts her hands on her knees. “And you’ll be wanting to act this out before the night round, will you?”

Her friends tell her yes, so she leaves them to it and goes upstairs to take a nap. Down in the tavern, everyone roleplays an initially quiet but no less tense morning, leading into a dramatic gunfight breaking out and an intense on-scene surgery. As noted, they’re having a great time. Kaeloo just wishes for an exciting variable.

She gets one when Stumpy makes a snap decision to shoot Olaf. Olaf accepts this and dies, but not before revealing his role as the veteran. He shoots at Mr Cat, but Eugly as the bodyguard leaps ahead and shields him – taking the bullet herself and falling down dead. Quack-Quack as the doctor is still caught up in protecting Pretty from Stumpy’s attempt to shoot her, so he can do nothing to stop this. Pretty sits up mid-surgery and argues that the vigilante can only shoot one person a day and Stumpy can’t have both, he needs to choose who he shot, her or Olaf, and Stumpy is yelling back that the game is more interesting this way, and someone else says something inflammatory and it all goes up into a huge argument. Bullets are flying, furniture is breaking, everyone is screaming and bleeding everywhere – and then the tavern doors swing open and it all comes to a swift and silent stop.

Stop.

Kaeloo’s eyes snap open, because the collective imaginations of the buddies can only be interrupted or overwritten by a group bigger than theirs. Anyone less would only be swallowed into the reality of the game. She hurries downstairs, stopping on the landing to observe the scene and who has intruded on it.

Standing in the wide-open doors are all of Stumpy’s sisters, each with a glint in their eye. Moldie stands in the middle with her arms folded, projecting a tough stance. To her left are Purplish, Snitchy, and Mimi; to her right, Checkout, Lavenblah, and Vitamin. And then in comes Game Rule, swooping over their heads and positioning themself in the centre of the tavern where everyone can see them.

The buddies get up from their various states of being on the floor. Stumpy still holds his hands like a gun, Pretty continues to press on the wound that has ceased to exist. Olaf returns to his barstool and Mr Cat needs to freshen his drink. He gets one for Eugly as well, patting her on the back before getting in his seat.

Kaeloo tilts her head from side to side, cracking her neck as she does so. “Not at the museum today, Mx Rules?”

“I was,” says Game Rule imperiously, “until–”

Mimi interrupts, “We just found out about the magic crayon and we want it.”

“ Please ,” adds Purplish, winking at Stumpy who rolls his eyes. That’s what he gets for telling her it’s a real-life cheat code. Eugly is very clearly charmed by this, and so she’s the first of the buddies to look to Kaeloo for her response. The others follow shortly after.

Kaeloo has not blinked, nor her gaze faltered, since she and Game Rule locked eyes. She keeps her expression perfectly neutral. Game Rule does the same. They’ve been matched up in barbichette before, this could go on for an eternity if they were left alone.

The way Kaeloo tells it, she does not hate or even dislike Game Rule. Stumpy and Quack-Quack have grown to like them a lot, Pretty and Mr Cat tolerate them, and although Eugly and Olaf don’t care for them, neither would make it anyone else’s business unless pressed, which they are not. Relations between the organic and non-organic residents of Smileyland are good. It is peacetime. There’s no need for conflict here.

But…that…little… parasite…

Kaeloo shakes her head like the thought will go away with it, smiling with a closed mouth to hide her gnashing teeth. She clasps her hands together, hoping no one will notice how they tremble as the circulation is cut and she risks breaking her own fingers. Hot rage builds behind her eyes and it’s as if she’s blinded by it, despite her vision being perfectly clear.

“Oh, you mean the Gruel?” Spotlight. Angelic choir. Shining down on Kaeloo, highlighting her as an angel, a psychopomp, a servant of the celestial. She is perfectly placid and unmarred by mortal flaw. “That sounds just fantastic! It’s been years since we last centered a game around it, isn’t it, buddies?” She looks to them in turn and they nod, only once or twice each but no less like devoted acolytes. Her precious charges. “I can organise a treasure hunt, or a quest, or– Ah!” She snaps her fingers, enlightened, all-knowing. There is nothing she can say wrong. “We could do a game show! With questions and quizzes and lots of fun challenges, and we can set up a tiered selection of prizes based on points, all leading up to the grand–”

“I wanna keep playing Werewolf,” says Stumpy. The timing on this is perfect enough to make the spotlight and choir cut out entirely.

“You can’t call it Werewolf if it’s a game where there isn’t a werewolf,” retorts Pretty. “We’re doing Mafia.”

“You don’t know I’m not a werewolf,” Mr Cat points out, and she barks a laugh and snaps her fingers at him like he’s caught.

“He admits it!”

“ Excuse me. ” Snitchy steps out from her sisters, joining Game Rule at roughly the centre of the tavern. She addresses the group clearly and confidently. “We’re not talking about playing a game about the…” she pauses in brief consideration, clicking her tongue against her teeth before continuing, “item at hand.”

“The Gruel,” Moldie clarifies, and enjoys how the spotlight illuminates her against the others.

Another click of the tongue and a quick roll of her eyes, imperceptible if you weren’t looking right at her, and Snitchy goes on. “Yeah, that. We’re interested in it as a subject and not an object."

“Like if we wanted to look at a golf club but without playing golf,” explains Checkout.

“ ‘Right to know’ is a human right enshrined in law in several countries, ” Game Rule announces, and the Wikipedia article of which they’re quoting flashes up on their arm. “ It is often defined in the context of the right for people to know about their potential exposure to environmental conditions or substances that may cause illness or injury. ” They fly over to hover at the stairs, as tall as Kaeloo would be standing if she were beside them, but as Kaeloo is still on the landing it puts them at the same height as her stomach. “Knowledge of this artifact and its usage falls under that definition; we as citizens are outraged to have been left out of the loop, and your lack of consideration means you can’t possibly be responsible enough to continue to act as caretaker. Relinquish the artifact to the care of the Museum and its curator.” Game Rule bristles with pride. “Me.”

There’s a moment of shared silence as everyone looks at them with reactions all across the emotional spectrum.

“That’s quite enough excitement for me,” grunts Olaf, hoisting himself down to the ground from his seat at the bar. “It’s been a pleasure to play,” he says politely to the buddies, offering a short bow. “I’ll leave this dilemma to you.”

Quack-Quack returns the bow in a much more formal fashion. Have a nice evening , he signs.

“Catch ya later,” says Stumpy.

“Drive safe,” adds Mr Cat.

“Thank you, thank you. Excuse me, ladies.” Olaf squeezes through the blockade of sisters and goes out the tavern doors.

Once he’s definitely gone, Mimi asks, “Who the hell was that? Have we met that guy before?”

“Oh, gimme a break,” groans Stumpy. “It’s Olaf! You already know him, he’s the old guy!”

“We saw he’s an old guy,” says Lavenblah. “I don’t think I’ve met him.”

“You don’t know Olaf?” Snitchy asks, bewildered by her sisters’ inexperience. “I visited his house for tea just the other day.”

“His wife’s a vegetable,” Moldie snorts.

“You should have introduced us, Stumpy!” Purplish scolds her brother.

“Yeah, Stumpy,” Mr Cat joins in, leaning back in his chair – not out of legitimate agreement but because he knows it only takes a little bit of outside encouragement for the sisters as a group to get riled up into a fervour.

Which they do. They erupt into all talking at once, Purplish and Lavenblah grilling Stumpy on why they hadn’t properly met the bearded Russian gentleman, Mimi and Moldie trying to get them back to the point of why they came here, and Snitchy and Checkout calling over to Game Rule and Kaeloo for a conclusion to their negotiations. Vitamin goes up the stairs to the landing, circling Kaeloo, trying to see if there’s any sign that she has the Gruel on her person – in the pockets of her short overalls, tucked into the belt, or tucked behind her ears into her hair. None of these spots yield sight-based results and the only way to investigate further would be to do a frisk.

Vitamin considers it, but ultimately does not touch the Guardian of Smileyland.

She goes up the rest of the stairs instead to search for the Gruel there, and during this time does not witness whoever it was that escalated the sisters’ noise to include the adults, but Stumpy and Moldie seem to be about to tackle and strangle each other when Vitamin comes down. Pretty is kicking off into a march, destination not currently clear. Quack-Quack’s head is turned toward the stairs, and Mr Cat appears to have overestimated how much he could get away with leaning the chair back and is going to fall, but he’s only just started going backwards and doesn’t realise it’s happening yet.

Vitamin charitably fixes the chair so he will only perceive it as a brief wobble. She sees the glass of water slipping out of Eugly’s hand and gently adjusts her arm so the glass will drop on a table instead of the floor. She looks at Game Rule, fluttering above their heads, and then at Kaeloo, eyes still fixed to the cylinder. Vitamin sees Kaeloo’s fingers twitching and flexing at her sides, closing into fists, then splaying back out at the same time her arms start moving, up, up, and Vitamin looks away, turning up the volume on her headphones. She goes back over to stand near her sisters, just off to the side, and observe the world slowly moving around her.

Quack-Quack’s eye catches Vitamin on her route, but can’t follow quickly enough to say what her movements are for sure, just that she went up and down the stairs and circled the room a couple of times.

To everyone else, it’s about ten seconds of sustained shouting, attempted violence, and near accidents, and then Kaeloo loudly claps her hands two times and they all sit down and shut up at once.

“ Alright, enough! ” her deeper voice rings out. “I see we’ve got some conflicting priorities right now, but I think I can find a way to satisfy everyone. We all just need to be a little bit patient, okay? ”

They’re totally fucked.

“Great narration, Kaeloo,” says Pretty after the rehearsal.

Smiling appreciatively, she replies, “Thank you. That’s an interesting outfit you’ve chosen.”

Pretty snorts and rolls her eyes, but does so without malice, a little smirk playing at the corner of her mouth. “Oh, this? It’s nothing. Just a little inspiration for what role you could give me.”

She’s come prepared in a slim evening gown and feather boa. Usually everybody picks out their outfits after roles have been assigned, but Pretty has jumped the gun a little. Not unlike her to do so, looking fabulous as she does it. Sitting close by, Eugly has a garment bag laid neatly across her lap, betraying her own similar kind of preparation.

“Actually, no,” says Kaeloo, and goes back to addressing the group at large for this next piece of information. “Your roles will be given at random! Yes, it’s my job as the Game Master to know your roles and direct you in them, but I won’t be picking them myself.”

Purplish raises her hand. She and the other players are spread across the theatre seating of one of the Game Museum’s demonstration spaces, so it’s a highly appropriate way to call for attention. Kaeloo stands on the rectangular stage before them much like a professor addressing her students, and she nods at Purplish to give her the floor.

“Can we pick our own role?”

“No way, then there’s no point,” Stumpy chides her, turning back to look up the two rows behind him where she’s sitting. “If we get to pick ourselves then we all know what we are and there’s no point in playing at all! We can’t know!”

Game Rule had politely tucked themself into the cushion of one of the seats, and now hovers up higher to get a look at the other players. Puzzlement is written across their simple face. “I-I don’t understand. Do the players know what role they have? What are all the roles? What do they all do?” They look at Kaeloo. “What are the–?”

“–the rules of the game, silly me!” Kaeloo presses a finger into her cheek in a performance of shock. “I’m so sorry, Mx Rules, let me explain in more detail.

“We are playing Mafia, a social deduction roleplay classic! Every player belongs to one of two factions, the village and the mafia. The village wins when all members of the mafia are out of the game, and the mafia wins when they make up the majority of players, which they achieve by getting the villagers out.

“During the daytime, everyone is awake and free to move and talk, and before the end of the day they can vote to exile a player from the village.” Kaeloo tilts her head at this. “Versions vary between it being a majority vote or a unanimous one. We’ll go with the majority today, but for the mafia choosing to kill players during the nighttime unanimous works better, so we’ll do that, too. The nighttime is when everyone is asleep and can’t see what the mafia are up to, of course.” She straightens and clasps her hands together in front of her chest, continuing, “Luckily they aren’t only ones who can take action during the nighttime! There are a number of specialty roles that villagers can have as well, which they use in the interests of winning the game against the mafia as they wake up through the night. But if you haven’t been called on, you have to stay asleep and unaware.”

“I think I’d like to observe this rather than participate,” says Game Rule in a small voice.

“Nonsense, you’ll learn much faster this way! Besides…” Kaeloo opens her arm to the stage wing, where Petit Mouton is climbing the steps to come stand at her side. He smiles and waves to everyone as he goes. “We already have an observer! The whole game, only Petit Mouton and I will know absolutely everything that’s going on. The rest is for you to discover. That’s what makes it fun!”

“I don’t have fun when I don’t know things,” Game Rule continues to protest.

“Then let’s talk about all the villager roles and what they can do,” says Kaeloo, tugging on a rope that pulls a projector screen down from the ceiling. In sequence, she goes through the slides and explains them. They go as follows:

• Sheriff. Once per night cycle, they choose a player to learn if they are a member of the mafia.

• Deputy. Once per night cycle, they learn if the sheriff found a member of the mafia, but don’t get to know who it is. They also don’t know the identity of the sheriff.

• Doctor. Once per night, they choose a player to provide medical care to. They may choose themselves. If their chosen player would have perished, they survive instead.

• Bodyguard. Once per night, they choose a player to protect. If their chosen player would have perished, they survive, and the bodyguard dies in their place.

• Vigilante. Once per day, they can choose a player to kill, but do not have to.

• Nurse. They have no special powers unless the doctor dies, at which point they take over the role.

• Veteran. They have no special powers unless they are killed or exiled, at which point they choose another player to kill.

“That’s only seven roles,” says Snitchy. “But there’s thirteen players.”

“There’ll be multiple mafia members,” points out Kaeloo, “but it’s true. The rest of the players are civilians.”

“What special power do they get?” asks Mimi.

“Nothing.”

“That sucks!”

Kaeloo offers her hands with a sheepish shrug. “Sorry! It’s the luck of the draw. If it makes you feel better, it’s a lot simpler to be a civilian! You only have to worry about getting the mafia out.”

“And not getting killed or exiled,” mutters Lavenblah. “What happens after that?”

“You get to come up here with me and Petit Mouton and watch the rest of the game,” says Kaeloo. “But you’re not allowed to say anything! No participation in the discussion from observers, players who are out, or the Game Master.”

“That sucks, too!” Mimi wails.

“Don’t sweat it, kid,” says Mr Cat, picking his nails. “All you gotta do is stay in the game and off that stage.” He wipes his hand off on his sleeve and raises his voice for the whole group to hear. “It’s been fun listening to your lecture, tadpole, but when are you gonna get to the important part? This great treasure you mentioned — is it the prize for winning?”

“The Gruel!” says Moldie, perking up with interest after having nearly drifted to sleep with boredom. She’s thoroughly woken by the spotlight and angelic choir. “The winner gets the Gruel!”

“That’s just the thing,” Mr Cat goes on. “This is a team game. The village could get all the mafia out without losing any of their own, which makes a dozen people the winner. If the mafia wins, it’s less people, but still an issue.” He leans forward onto the back of the seat down in front of him, squinting and smirking at how Kaeloo’s face settles like stone. “Who wins among the winners?”

“Very astute, Mr Cat,” Kaeloo says snippily. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it. Besides, you’re not playing for the grand prize, you’re just playing to play.”

“Maybe I don’t wanna just play to play,” he throws back. “Not if the winner keeps the crayon.”

“The winner can keep the grand prize for 24 hours,” Kaeloo decides, “no more and no less, to do whatever they want with it. After that, it goes away again. How’s that?”

Mr Cat settles back in his seat, resting his jaw against a closed fist. “Eh. Didn’t want it, anyway.”

Me neither , signs Quack-Quack. The game is good enough on its own.

“Hell yeah, buddy!” agrees Stumpy, and throws his hand up for a high five that Quack-Quack happily returns. “Let’s get this party started, already! Come on!”

“Yeah, I…” Checkout turns to her sisters. “Guys, let’s just forget the whole crayon thing, alright? This is our chance to play with the grown-ups. I want that more than anything I could draw.”

The sisters mumble and murmur but offer nothing substantial in argument, not that that necessarily means everyone is convinced. Game Rule, too, is silent, but no less set on their goal. This game is strange and new to them, but they have the power and intellect to work it out and win. The grand prize of the Wholly Gruel will be theirs.

Kaeloo completely misinterprets the look on Game Rule’s cylindrical face as the beginning of resignation, and she smiles widely. Beside her, Petit Mouton produces a top hat from behind his back, which he flips upside down to reveal that it’s full of folded scraps of paper. He looks at Kaeloo and she nods back, and he shakes the hat enticingly.

“C’mon, gang! Grab a role and we can get started!”

The adults and kids alike do as they’re told, forming a semi-orderly line along the stage to each stick their hands in the hat and pull out a piece of paper. Kaeloo watches closely, making sure no one is peeking at what might be written on the papers before they pick one; the buddies are all good at keeping a poker face after reading what they get – they’re not going to give the game away before it’s even started. The sisters are less skilled at this unfortunately, and some of their faces fall while others brighten, but Kaeloo isn’t worried about the buddies using these reactions against them as it wouldn’t be fair. Despite the girls’ inexperience and younger age, Kaeloo is actually glad to have them playing along. Maybe she was too harsh in her earlier judgement of what they were ready for. If this game goes well, Kaeloo might decide the sisters and the buddies don’t have to play separately after all.

Even if it doesn’t, she’ll still have to teach them workshops on maintaining a look of neutrality in games with secrets. The buddies wouldn’t use meta info against the sisters, but the sisters will doubtlessly use it against each other as soon as they realise they can. And that’s the kind of behaviour that leads to boring, boring games.

If the girls are going to stay in Smileyland – and they are – then that’s something to nip in the bud right away.

“Y’know, if we do this in real time,” Mr Cat says, gesturing at the tall windows with a pipe, “before you know it another three days’ll have passed and you’ll be back where you started, tadpole. Bored to tears. Sitting there, simmering...”

He has procured for himself a fine dinner jacket and wire-frame glasses. Moldie is standing right at his side like a dutiful second-in-command, imitating his stance and gesturing like he is, just with a lollipop – a big one, the kind that you’d get bored with sooner than you’d finish. Kaeloo is pleased to see the two of them getting along, even though some bullshit always happens when they do.

But what was that he just said? Kaeloo sputters, “Y-You knew how I felt and you didn’t do anything?”

“I was doing something,” he replies. “I was enjoying it. ”

“I wasn’t even angry!”

“Sure you were, there’s no way you were making it to the next round. If these jokers hadn’t come in,” Mr Cat elbows Moldie, “you would’ve been choking me out in five minutes.”

“I’d like to see that,” says Moldie.

Kaeloo huffs and folds her arms, turning pointedly away. “Then I’m very sorry to disappoint you!”

“Ah, froggy,” Mr Cat says affectionately. He steps up behind her to put a comforting hand on her shoulder. “That’s what I’m trying to tell you! In a couple of days you’ll be back to being my nasty little beast.”

She glares at him.

He tries again, “Big beast?” which does get her to crack a smile.

“Gross. Get a room,” Moldie tells them.

“No time for that,” declares Stumpy, sliding in on a pair of black roller skates with Quack-Quack and Vitamin right behind. All three of them are wearing matching pairs of mirrored aviators. “It’s time to start the game, already!”

Everyone’s ready, Quack-Quack signs, then points with his thumb back at the stage. Rules wants you to do the lore.

Kaeloo straightens her back in preparation. Backstage, she carefully draws on a pencil moustache – Pretty nods her approval of the look when she takes back her compact mirror – before heading out there before her players to begin the show.

The stage has changed so it is much longer vertically as well as elevated, a short staircase installed at the side and all edges affixed with railings. The rows of theatre seating now take up the free space at the back of the stage; twelve spots in two rows of six, enough to potentially seat every player who gets out. Up the front, there’s a pair of barstools for Kaeloo and Petit Mouton to use, which he’s already doing.

While everyone else was getting ready in the costume department, he was here unpacking all of his gear, creating the perfect layout for any director of photography. He’s set up two tripods, one to carry a professional video camera that’s pointed down at the player space, and the other carrying his phone, pointing at himself and Kaeloo. There are cameras down on the museum floor as well, so there can be closeups on the players. Petit Mouton has also gotten a small folding table to keep a drink for him and Kaeloo each, as well as his tablet when not in use. It’s in his lap right now, its keyboard attached so he can best take notes, with emergency paper and pens if technology fails him tucked in his bag. He intends to use the footage and notes for editing together an episode-like record of the events of the game.

After all, only Petit Mouton and Kaeloo can see everything that happens from up here. Even the players who get out – spectators, at that point – won’t know what happened before they were let up on the stage. The record is both for his own entertainment and so everyone can see what was really happening after the game is over. Kaeloo thinks that’s very thoughtful and clever of him.

Down on the museum floor, there are thirteen chairs arranged in a big circle, plenty of space in between each one, facing inwards. After what Mr Cat had to say, Kaeloo opted not to run the game in real time; night/day cycles will happen one right after the other. Sure, it means there can’t be a discovery portion, which is usually very fun, but the game will take less time to complete this way and overall it’s just a more efficient way of doing things. The players have all gone along with this without complaint and selected their seats.

During the day, the players will be standing and free to move about, but during the night they have to remain seated with their eyes closed until they’re called upon to act. Kaeloo will regularly go down to the floor to physically direct everyone who needs it, but right now she’s up on the stage, and all the players are sitting in their chairs looking up at her. She smiles widely, and launches into her narration.

“ Every city has its secrets, and where there are secrets there will always be those determined to uncover them. Every city has its seedy underbelly, which must be kept in check else it leads to suffering. Every city has its people, who can be united in communities great and small, good and bad; or isolated, only out for themselves and their own interests.

“ Our scene opens at the steps of the city’s museum. Once prosperous and popular, the days of freely shared knowledge and smiles have long passed, but the dilapidated building is far from empty. Some use it as shelter when they have nowhere else to go, others still take it as an opportunity for sight-seeing. The more private corners make fine meeting spots for criminals and their shady dealings, which in turn inspires servants of justice to make their rounds here.

“ On this particular day, there are thirteen souls within the walls of the museum. But that’s not all. ”

A loud crack of thunder. A bolt of lightning flashes outside the nearest window.

“ These thirteen souls are trapped, held indoors by an intense, nearly-supernatural thunderstorm. Going out into it would mean certain death, and it will not yield until its prisoners bear their true selves to one another, in turn bearing the true self of the city in which they live. Only then will the doors reopen…and only then will the museum’s great treasure reveal itself. ”

Pretty nods. She likes it even better now that she’s hearing it properly.

Lavenblah shivers, but doesn’t seem unhappy about it. Her eyes are alight as she turns her head around, listening to the pouring rain. “Very cool!” There’s a ghostly energy at her shoulders, as if she has spirits settling there to serve as a coat. The silk, buttoned shirt she selected to wear gains an eerie glow.

“We start at the first night, so everyone close your eyes,” Kaeloo instructs the players, and they obey. “No peeking, or you’re out!”

Game Rule mutters something to themself, adding this latest tidbit to their internal database. For the duration of the game, the CCTV system has been disconnected, and for the night, the lights dimmed. Game Rule doesn’t have access to light controls to begin with, so it must be Petit Mouton at the helm on this particular detail. As for control over the weather, well, that must be the group’s collective will giving credence to Kaeloo’s words. Game Rule doesn’t quite understand it, much like their issues with grasping imagination as an actually tangible resource, but that’s okay; they don't have to understand for it to work regardless.

Smileyland is not limited to Game Rule’s capabilities, as much as they may be under that impression. Kaeloo knows better. She was here first.

“While everyone is asleep,” Kaeloo says, “the mafia have a secret meeting to decide what they’re going to do while they’re trapped here.” As she goes, the relevant players open their eyes to make their game actions. Once they’re finished, she moves on to the next role. “The sheriff gets up in the night and does a patrol, looking to catch any of the mafia members while they’re unaware…and then goes back to sleep. The deputy hears the sheriff come in and takes a look at the report he’s written…and they go back to sleep as well.”

Petit Mouton takes his notes. The clacking of his keyboard can be heard up on stage, but not down with the players. Kaeloo gives him a nod before she starts down the stairs and continues instructing the players.

“The doctor can keep one person in good health. Who will that be?” The doctor player chooses and closes their eyes again. “And the bodyguard can protect one person, who will that be?” The same, just with someone else. “Hm…” says Kaeloo, in a whimsical tone. “There’s no way to know. No way for anyone to track the movements of others in their midst, not when they’re all paying such close attention to themselves! In such a self-absorbed environment, no one even noticed the player who is new in town.”

“The what,” says Purplish – but she’s a good girl, she doesn’t open her eyes when it’s not her turn. The others also dutifully follow the rules, which Kaeloo greatly appreciates.

“‘New In Town’ was not a role included in the explanation,” Game Rule adds. “This is unprecedented!”

“It’s a secret role,” Kaeloo goes on. “None of you know it’s even a possibility. The person who is new in town might tell you who they are…or they might not.”

She tilts her head as the player she’s making eye contact with agrees to what’s being communicated, points to another player, and then goes back to closing their eyes.

Kaeloo goes on, “The storm outside is terrible,” and to punctuate this there’s another rumble of thunder, “but you all get some sleep. Soon enough the morning comes! Dawn is breaking.” She climbs up the top step, back onto the stage. “And it’s a new day.”

The buddies are more than familiar with how Kaeloo runs the game and open their eyes right away. It still takes the girls some time to make the connection without a direct instruction, and so Stumpy skates a lap around the circle of chairs, clapping in his sisters’ faces to get their attention.

“It’s the daytime, wake up, wake up! We’re playing now!”

Checkout startles, “Oh,” and stands up. She wears her normal visor, but discarded her white sweater to wear just the black shirt beneath.

“I knew that,” grumbles Moldie as she does the same, biting down on her lollipop without making a dent.

Pretty makes her face perfectly neutral as she draws all of her fingers together in a pinch in front of her face, her usual prep before a scene, then her eyes snap open and she takes a couple energised steps out from her chair, striking a pose. Mimi watches this with awe and appreciation.

“My god,” says Pretty with an upper-class affectation, “I don’t know what was harder to sleep through; that wretched thunderstorm, or Eugly’s snoring.”

Eugly’s seat isn’t right next to Pretty’s, she’s more on the other side of the circle, and there are enough eyes on her to see how her face twists, nose wrinkling up. She pulls her mouth inward, small and tight like she sucked a lemon, because that’s a preferable expression to the scowl that she’d otherwise be forming.

“That’s a horrible thing to call your sister,” Lavenblah hisses at Pretty.

Stumpy clears his throat and prods Lavenblah with his elbow. “That’s her name,” he tries to mutter.

She looks like she’s been struck. “ What? ” Nearby, Purplish and Mimi are similarly surprised – they all must have thought Eugly’s name was something else.

“It’s still a horrible thing to say about your sister,” points out Checkout. “Besides, snoring isn’t a big deal.”

Moldie barks a laugh. “Says you, snorer! The only one worse than you is–”

“Calm down, pipsqueaks, I’m being in-character,” Pretty interrupts, snapping her fingers at Checkout and Lavenblah. “Eugly doesn’t care.”

Eugly very clearly cares and they can all see it. Quack-Quack grasps her hand in his, even if it means his communicative ability is halved.

“Such is the way of every sibling relationship,” Mr Cat says, gazing off into the middle-distance, a level of world-weariness about him as he holds his pipe to his chin.

Narrowing her eyes at him, Moldie asks, “What do you mean?”

“You’re always hurting each other,” he says matter-of-factly, waving his hand out over the group. “Come on, people, you all know what I’m talking about. Not one person here is exempt. Except maybe you, beakface.” Mr Cat gestures at Quack-Quack.

Quack-Quack’s expression appears to remain placid behind the aviators, but his jaw definitely clenches.

Then, as if he hadn’t said what he just said, Mr Cat goes, “So it looks like the mafia was inspired by my strategy in the last game. I’ll say it, I’m touched.” His smarmy smile gives that lie away pretty easily. “I like a slow burn.”

Her eyebrows knitted in thought, Snitchy clicks her tongue against her teeth. “So…to clarify… no one is dead?”

“When you’re dead you lie down in the middle,” Stumpy gladly explains, pointing to a spot on the floor. “Then ya go up there,” points to the stage, “‘cause you’re out. No one’s lying there, no one’s dead.”

She breathes a sigh of relief. “Okay.”

“You don’t know the mafia didn’t try to kill anyone,” Pretty says to Mr Cat. “The victim could have been protected by the doctor.”

“Or,” Checkout starts to say, then stops. “Nevermind.”

“Who’s the doctor?” asks Snitchy, taking out her notepad. She procured from the wardrobe an excellent trench coat with a dozen pockets. It’s two sizes too big but that only serves to enhance its effect.

Mimi is squinting, looking from person to person carefully as she considers each one. Purplish is making mouth sounds while she tracks her balloon’s shadow on the floor. Vitamin has gone back to sitting in her chair even though it’s the day; she was standing just a minute ago, but from her point of view it would’ve been longer than that. It seems only fair that she should be allowed to sit if she wants. Eugly and Quack-Quack are standing together and holding hands, quiet as usual in shades of perturbed.

“Anyone?” Snitchy presses.

“The player with the doctor role may wish to keep their identity a secret to protect themselves from harm,” says Game Rule. “Otherwise they might feel obligated to use their power on themselves every night, which prevents the protection of others. It makes sense.” They flit to and fro, grandstanding a little. “But I have no compunctions with identifying myself. I have the role of the deputy, and I would like to know who the sheriff is. We should be affiliated.”

“But you see how it’s dangerous for the sheriff to identify themselves too, don’t you?” Checkout asks.

Game Rule says much the same thing just in different words: “I want to know which players I should be associating myself with. The identity of the doctor would also be helpful despite the risk they face.”

“Ah, come on.” Mr Cat waves his hand dismissively. “You just want an easy next target handed to you. Don’t just ask for answers.” He points his pipe at Snitchy. “Find them yourself.”

Snitchy’s mouth tightens in a similar way to how Eugly’s did, refusing to meet Mr Cat’s eye. He doesn’t appear offended by this, instead raising his eyebrows above an amused smirk, the one a person might make when they have a suspicion confirmed.

With no further discussion. Kaeloo calls down from the stage, “Do you wish to vote anyone out?”

There’s a collective, “No,” with one “yes” mixed among them, coming from Moldie who laughs when people’s eyes turn to her. “Made you look,” she says.

“Is that the end of the daytime?” asks Kaeloo.

A collective, “Yes,” followed shortly by Game Rule flying up high and protesting, “No! I need to know who the sheriff is!”

“No one’s gonna admit that on the first round,” Pretty says. “Did they even find anyone?”

Game Rule falters. “No.”

“Then who cares right now?” She calls up to Kaeloo, “Yeah, honey, we’re done for the day.”

Kaeloo responds with a thumbs-up, then nods to Petit Mouton, who dims the lights for the night round.

“ Honey, ” Mr Cat can be heard saying.

Pretty doesn’t miss a beat. “Yeah.”

“Since when .”

“I dunno, since you never use terms of endearment?” She shrugs. “ Someone’s gotta do it for her.”

“I use terms of endearment,” he hisses, then raises his voice to reach Kaeloo, “You know when I say ‘tadpole’ I mean ‘baby’ , right? Tadpole? Baby?”

“Gross,” says Moldie.

“Yuck,” agrees Mimi.

“I know, Mr Cat,” Kaeloo calls back. “Thank you.”

His voice is a little strained. “A-And you know I love you, right?”

“Let’s move on to the second night,” she announces. “Everyone sit, please!”

Stumpy needs a minute to shake off his laughing fit, but eventually they all do as they’re told. Sitting and shutting their eyes, the next night round begins.

It runs longer than the first. This is mostly due to the mafia members needing to negotiate with one another – this negotiation takes the form of lots of gesturing and mouthing their words, as it needs to be silent, but it’s a negotiation nonetheless. Their choice, after all, must be unanimous.

When it’s the sheriff’s turn, he points to one of the players who is in the mafia, and Kaeloo gives a firm nod to tell him so. He nods back and returns to his chair. When it is the deputy’s turn, Game Rule looks at Kaeloo, who now nods at them. Having paddles for hands, it’s not very easy for Game Rule to communicate in pantomime, but it’s very clear that they want more detail. Detail that their role is not inherently entitled to, which Kaeloo reminds them of with a stern look, before sending them back to their chair to “sleep”.

The doctor has a funny feeling – a sixth sense, if you will – that influences her choice on who to protect. Kaeloo and Petit Mouton hold a brief discussion on the validity of this before Kaeloo makes a decent point that Petit Mouton is happy to acquiesce to. After the doctor, it’s the bodyguard’s turn to choose a player to protect, and after that, the player who is new in town.

Kaeloo comes down to help the relevant players arrange themselves, and all who remain in their chairs hear Game Rule cry, “What?” followed by, “Keep your voice down,” and Game Rule coming back with, “But–” which Kaeloo interrupts by shushing them. Then she departs from the player area once more, returning to the stage and directing everyone to wake up for day two.

The players see it right away: two of their ilk lying in the middle of the circle playing dead. Lavenblah is doing a tremendous job at holding her eyes open, glassy, unseeing; whereas Game Rule is just sitting despondently, their holographic face deeply twisted up in what can only be interpreted at this time as sourness over getting out.

“No,” gasps Stumpy, going down on one knee. He reaches forth and grabs hold of Lavenblah, cradling her close to his chest. “No!” he cries, and then throws his head up to the ceiling to wail, “NOOOOO!”

Lavenblah giggles at his theatrics and greatly enjoys the snuggle. Checkout hides her smile by adjusting her visor, Moldie scoffs, and Mimi and Purplish get in on the dramatic action.

“Oh no!” whimpers Purplish.

“She was so young!” gasps Mimi.

Quack-Quack sees that no one is mourning Game Rule and obligingly comes over to pay his respects. Mr Cat and Pretty look at one another as he does this and roll their eyes in sync, failing to be impressed.

“This isn’t fair,” mopes Game Rule.

“Ah, ah!” Kaeloo says as if she were scolding a dog. “Dead players have to be quiet, please!”

“But I–”

“ Ah, ” she says again, deeper, a warning, and points behind her to the stage seating. No one is going to argue against that, so Game Rule floats up off the floor and flies on over to the stage.

But they don't sit at the back. They stay at the railing, to observe, and see that Lavenblah has already made it here before them. It should be impossible, but then Game Rule catches the flash of dark green coveralls and realises that Vitamin kindly provided her sister the “express route”.

Quack-Quack snaps his fingers to get everyone’s attention so they can see what he has to say. Mr Cat , he signs in sharp hand movements. What does this add to your theory?

“What theory?”

That siblings are always hurting each other.

Mr Cat flashes his teeth in a nasty grin. “Sure, I think the psychic kid getting killed adds to it.”

Quack-Quack’s face twists up in distaste, having clearly hoped for a different reaction. Eugly grumbles and wraps her arm around his shoulder, which Mr Cat obviously finds very funny, because he continues.

“Statistically, at least one sibling has to be in the mafia in this game. And that’s just talking about nutcracker and the acorns, not accounting for the bunnies.” He sticks his thumb beside him at Pretty, who clicks her tongue against her teeth. “Whoever’s in the mafia, they’re complicit in sororicide. Now.” It’s his turn to snap his fingers, squinting as he drags it across the group, picking who to land on. “What did the sheriff learn last night?”

“Are you the sheriff?” Snitchy asks, flipping open her notepad with her pen poised. “What do you know, Mr Cat?”

“It’s not me, kiddo,” he tells her. “But it’s someone, and they’ve got something to tell us. Why else would Rules care about getting killed?”

“Well, that’s just the thing,” Pretty says. “Are we gonna talk about it? There being two deaths?”

“No, because no one cares,” says Mr Cat.

“I care!” chimes in Checkout, and Mimi nods vigorously in agreement.

Purplish’s head snaps up from looking at the floor, her gaze going from person to person. “What happened, were there two deaths?”

Moldie barks, “Yeah, stupid, weren’t you paying attention?”

“I’m kind of bored,” admits Purplish.

“No, no, hey,” says Stumpy, crossing the circle to pat his sister on the shoulder. “Purplish, come on, it’s really fun, I promise. Come on guys, let’s include her more. Who do you think killed Lavenblah?”

“I dunno.”

“Do you know anything that can help us figure it out?” asks Snitchy. “What’s your role?”

“I don’t have one.” Her outfit doesn’t provide any hints to the contrary; Purplish only draped a sheer scarf over her normal clothes.

“A likely story,” Moldie says suspiciously. “ Miss Sheriff. ”

Mr Cat starts humming I Shot The Sheriff .

It’s me, signs Quack-Quack. I’m the sheriff. He takes his aviators off his face to perch them atop his head, as if it’s a big reveal.

“Did you find a mafioso?” Pretty asks, leaning toward him.

He sighs deeply. Mr Cat’s grin widens. Snitchy’s eyes flicker back and forth between them. Checkout chews on her fingernails. Mimi holds her hands behind her back as she rapidly bounces up and down on her tiptoes.

“Yeah, buddy, what did you find out?” Stumpy says, poking Quack-Quack, who points at Moldie.

She scoffs in outrage, throwing up her hands and landing them on her hips. “Bullshit!”

“I told ya, no swearin’,” Stumpy hisses. “Wait ‘til we’re at home!”

“When I get my hands on that Gruel,” spotlight, angelic choir, “I’ll zip your mouth shut and I can swear all I want.”

“You won’t,” he replies, but does not specify which part of the threat he’s responding to.

Ignoring this interaction, Pretty asks Quack-Quack, “Can you prove you’re the sheriff?”

Game Rule shrieks up on the stage and Mr Cat stifles his laugh, continuing to hum. Snitchy pinches the bridge of her nose.

“Not with the deputy dead,” she mutters.

Pretty says, “We don’t know for sure Game Rule was the deputy.”

“Yes we do,” protests Snitchy. “You’re just playing devil’s advocate.”

“Well spotted!” She nods approvingly. “That’s why you’re the smart one.”

Snitchy’s shoulders tense up and she glowers at her notepad. “I’m not the smart one.”

“Don’t be modest–”

“I’m not being modest, I am smart!” she snaps. “But my sisters are smart too, there’s no smart ONE.”

“There is one, and it’s me. I’m the smart one,” says Moldie.

“No you’re not,” argues Mimi. “Checkout can do long division and you can’t!”

“I told you not to tell people that! I’ll kill you!”

“Kill me because you’re in the mafia!” Mimi cries triumphantly, pointing accusingly. The several rings she’s wearing all glimmer in the light.

“THE SHERIFF DID FIND A MEMBER OF THE MAFIA,” shouts Game Rule, because the options are to either share their information or potentially explode from stress. Kaeloo grunts angrily and whaps Game Rule on the side. Regardless, they go on, “If Quack-Quack is the sheriff and he says he found someone, I can back it up!”

“No you can’t!” protests Lavenblah, grabbing hold of Game Rule and dragging them down into her arms. Game Rule shrieks and struggles, but Lavenblah holds tight, aided by various ghostly magics. “Dead players can’t talk! Disregard!”

Moldie folds her arms and gives a smug smile. “You heard the ghosts: we can’t hear the ghosts. You got nothin’ on me.”

“I trust Quack-Quack’s word more than yours,” says Checkout.

“ Him? ” She goes over to Quack-Quack to fully gesture at his entire being, which he doesn’t appreciate, recoiling. “ This thing? You’ve known me your whole life!”

“Yeah, that’s why I trust him.” Checkout adjusts her visor and takes a step forward. “I’m, um. I’m the bodyguard. And I promise to protect whichever player who can give me their best reason why I should.” She steps back, exhaling.

“Protect me,” Moldie demands.

Curtly, “Fuck off.”

“How come she gets to swear, huh?” Moldie shakes Stumpy’s arm petulantly. “Huh?”

“It was funny,” says Stumpy, and looks over at Checkout. “You’re hilarious, sis.”

She smiles.

“Hey,” says Pretty in a sickly sweet tone, and everyone familiar with it knows right away her plan. “Could you protect me? I have an important role.”

“That depends on what it is,” Checkout responds diplomatically.

“Can I tell you privately?”

Checkout looks up at the stage, calling to Kaeloo. “Can she tell me privately?”

Kaeloo and Petit Mouton have a moment of discussion. Game Rule wrests themself from Lavenblah’s grasp and flies in a furious circle, glaring and looking like they’re seriously considering getting her back.

During this reprieve, nothing is said by the players, but they’re all standing there thinking their various thoughts. It’s also wise to break up a long stretch of dialogue so the reader doesn’t get bored. Mimi is back to considering each player, her hands now clasped in front of her lap, occasionally wiggling and rearranging her fingers with a wily smile on her face. Mr Cat has noticed this and nodded his approval, which got Pretty to notice and also get in on the praise in case it helps any, putting up her hands in a mock surrender pose. She doesn’t look over at Eugly at all, who has had better days. She’s standing there, silently stewing in her own thoughts.

Even if Pretty didn’t mean it, and Eugly was almost sure she didn’t, that didn’t detract from how it hurt her feelings anyway. Nasty little comments like that hardly got to her back in the days when Pretty was always slinging them around, but in this present era where Pretty was treating her better as a sister, that only made it more painful when something does slip through.

Eugly does snore. She finds it really embarrassing, she thinks it’s a distasteful and unattractive thing, as much as Quack-Quack has tried to get it through her head that it’s simply a function of the body. As long as it’s not hurting her, there’s nothing wrong with it. Still she struggles to accept it, as she does other things about herself. Her body. Her name. She is ugly .

And what Mr Cat said about siblings hurting each other just kinda hit her at the right place at the right time. Whatever. It’s not that bad. She just…can’t really look at her sister right now.

Purplish has gone back to looking at the floor, humming a little song, tapping her feet absentmindedly. Her head is not in the game. Snitchy is similarly distracted, which is not like her at all, and Checkout knows this and does not like it, and assumes the worst. Vitamin, in her accelerated perception of time and total lack of a special player role, wonders if anyone would notice if she took off. She looks over at Quack-Quack, who is glaring at Mr Cat, and thinks it’s possible. She looks over at Eugly, who is very pointedly not looking at Pretty, and decides to stay.

Vitamin picks up her chair and carries it over to be next to Eugly’s.

“We’ll allow it,” says Kaeloo, and the game resumes. Only seconds have passed.

Pretty starts to walk over to Checkout with intent to whisper in her ear. Mimi blocks the way, holding out her hands flat to ensure no one moves a muscle.

“Wait. I had an idea.” She twists her body to look back at Checkout. “You don’t have to choose between Pretty and Moldie. Oh, and by the way, who’d you protect last night?”

Checkout hesitates. Thankfully, her visor hides how her gaze flickers all over the place. “Snitchy,” she admits. “But now…”

“What? What?” Snitchy’s voice raises an octave, her fists clenching. “You protected me but now you regret it?”

“Don’t make a thing out of it,” Mimi says, waving one of her hands. “I was just curious! The important thing is that Checkout can just protect Pretty tonight. Watch.” She points a fingergun at Moldie, closing one eye as she aims. “Bang! I shoot Moldie.”

“ What? ” shrieks Moldie. Her lollipop clatters to the floor, rendered inedible.

“Yo!” shouts Stumpy, and joins in with Pretty when she bursts into laughter.

“You can’t do that! She can’t do that!” Moldie appeals to Kaeloo, pointing back at her sister who blows imaginary smoke off her fingertip. “Hey, flabby! Tell her she can’t do that!”

Mr Cat smacks Moldie upside the head. “Don’t fucking call her that.”

“Don’t hit my sister!” Stumpy spits at him. “You don’t get to do that! Only we get to do that!” He gestures nebulously around him, but it’s clear he means only his relatives.

“Right, sorry,” says Mr Cat disingenuously. “Sibling-on-sibling violence only.”

Cut that out, Quack-Quack throws at him. It’s not funny.

“No, it’s not,” Mr Cat agrees, although he still looks like he’s telling a joke. “It’s deadly serious.”

“Mimi, do you consent to your role being made public?” Kaeloo calls down.

“Yes,” she says proudly, puffing out her chest.

“Okie-dokie! Sorry, Moldie!” Kaeloo spreads her hands and shrugs. “Mimi is the vigilante, she can shoot another player during the day!”

Moldie skids across the floor and throws herself down on her knees in front of Checkout. “Protect me!” she implores. “Don’t let her shoot me!”

“Sorry, Moldie,” Kaeloo says again, but is very clearly not. “The bodyguard’s protection can only carry over into the daytime for the person they chose at night!”

“So if she shot her instead,” Moldie says, pointing between Mimi and Snitchy, “then I’d be fine?”

“Today, yes.”

“Shoot her!” Moldie orders Mimi.

But Mimi is resolute. “No,” she says firmly. “I shot you. You! Bang!”

“ Why? ”

“Because I think Quack’s telling the truth, and even if he isn’t, it’s funny. Bang bang bang!”

“Moldie,” Kaeloo calls down. “You’re dead, so you’re out. Come up on the stage.”

“I’m not dead!” Enraged, she jumps back up to her feet. “You’re dead!” Whirling around the circle, glaring at everyone. “You’re all dead!”

Up on stage, Lavenblah bites her lip and looks away. Checkout looks guilty, and Snitchy screws up her entire face. Stumpy is clenching his teeth behind his shut mouth. Purplish is briefly snapped out of her distraction and giggles.

“Wouldn’t that be weird, if we were all dead?”

“We are, ” says Moldie, nastily. “We’re all dead in this place.” She looks at Stumpy. “No swearing until we get home, yeah right! We’re never getting home!”

“Our home here,” Stumpy murmurs.

“Jesus.” Mr Cat lights his pipe and takes a huge drag. “Are we actually having this conversation.”

“Kaeloo!” Pretty yells.

“I know, I know,” says Kaeloo, reaching the bottom of the stage steps. She grabs hold of Moldie’s red leather jacket and starts dragging her away. Moldie kicks and thrashes, which makes the jacket stretch, so Kaeloo picks her up and hauls the girl over her shoulder, effortlessly carrying her away. “Dead players don’t talk, Moldie."

“You can’t silence me!” shouts Moldie, still thrashing, shaking her fist at Mimi. “You’ll pay for this. You’ll pay. The mafia will kill you next!”

“Does that count as an admission, or are we not allowed to be hearing this?” Snitchy asks.

“No, you can know since she’s dead,” says Kaeloo. “Moldie’s in the mafia.”

“Ah-ha!” cries Game Rule. “Score for the good guys!”

“You’re dead, too,” Lavenblah reminds them.

“I can still celebrate,” they say snippily.

“Mimi next,” Moldie reiterates. “Mimi next!”

“I won’t let that happen,” swears Checkout. “I’ll protect her.”

“That was a fabulous play,” Pretty tells Mimi, patting her on the back. She looks at Checkout and flashes her a smile as well. “And you, you’re good, too! We really should have them join us more often. Mr Cat?” She turns back to him. “You're with me, aren't you?”

Mr Cat raises his pipe in what appears to be agreement. Eugly inhales sharply, breathing out very slowly as Quack-Quack and Vitamin take a hand each.

“Stumpy?” Pretty asks him now, and he nods enthusiastically in pleasant surprise.

“W– I mean– Yeah! Totally! Kaeloo?”

Having deposited Moldie to the stage and returning to her post, Kaeloo sighs and brushes her hair back, doing a little shimmy to freshen herself up. “What was the question? Right, the vote. Are you voting to exile anyone?”

Quack-Quack looks at Mr Cat. Mr Cat looks back. They both know Quack-Quack pointed to him on the first night, and they both know Mr Cat is not in the mafia. Quack-Quack sighs and hangs his head and Mr Cat grins.

Checkout flexes her fingers. “Snitchy?”

Snitchy whirls to gawk at her sister. “N-No!”

“What’s the proof?” asks Stumpy.

“Bad vibes,” suggests Pretty.

“I’m not in the mafia!” cries Snitchy.

Pretty holds her hand against her chest. “Oh, sweetheart, don’t worry, I’m not going to vote for you.” She holds out that hand and waves it blithely. “I’m having a great time.”

“Me too,” says Mimi.

“Aww.” Pretty opens her arm to her. “Get over here, you scamp. You can stick by me.”

And Mimi does, she goes to Pretty’s side and wraps both arms around her waist, looking out at all the other players with the sun shining out of her face. Pretty cranes her neck and holds herself tall, looking equally pleased, like she’s just scooped herself up a little clone, and Eugly feels the knife twist deeper.

“All in favour of exiling Snitchy?” asks Kaeloo.

“Nay,” Checkout says quietly. “I was just… Yeah, nay.”

“Too late,” Mr Cat says. “Already hurt her. The theory stands.”

Cut it out! demands Quack-Quack.

Kaeloo asks, “Any other suggestions?”

“Nope,” Pretty and Mimi say in unison, then look at each other and share a grin.

“Violet,” says Mr Cat. “She’s bored out of her skull.”

“Purplish,” Stumpy corrects him.

“Purplish is stupid, Violet sounds better.”

“Her name being stupid is the point,” argues Stumpy. “I mean, it’s what our parents meant to do! They picked our names and they’re stupid and that’s fine!”

“Hey. Hey, listen to me. Fuck your parents,” Mr Cat says, leaning over to Purplish. “You can pick your own name. Anything you want.”

“I like Purplish,” says Purplish.

“You can like your name and still have another one,” he points out. “Like a backup. Just for fun. Do it, come up with one right now. First thing that comes to your head.”

Purplish thinks about it for a second. “Violet.”

“Aha!” Mr Cat raises his hand to her, which she high-fives. “Nice. I just renamed your sister, nutcracker.”

Stumpy waves his hands, “Ah, shuddap,” but he’s smiling, he’s just happy to see his friends and sisters getting along. His two families.

“All in favour of exiling Purplish-slash-Violet?” calls Kaeloo to no response. “Alright, wonderful. Let’s move to the next night round. Everyone sit, please! And a note to the nurse: you get to be the doctor now.”

“ Oh, ” says Pretty, her eyebrows raised. “Little ghost girl was the doctor.”

Up on stage, Lavenblah turns to Moldie and nods. “I was.”

“Oh yeah? Why didn’t you protect me?”

“I– What? I was dead, I couldn’t–”

“Dead players don’t speak,” Game Rule interrupts them. “It’s the rules.”

“You can talk, just go over there,” says Kaeloo, pointing at the back of the stage. “No spoilers for the active players.”

Wordlessly, Game Rule follows Kaeloo’s direction, followed by Lavenblah and Moldie as if they were being puppeteered. An automatic action.

“Who are the other mafia players?” Game Rule wants to know.

Moldie laughs at them. “Yeah, I’m really gonna tell you.”

“As quickly as possible, yes.”

Lavenblah clears her throat. “Miss Rules…”

“Quiet for a second, Lavenblah. Moldie is about to tell me who the other mafia players are.”

“I protected Quack-Quack last night,” she says anyway. “I had a funny feeling he needed it. And he did! I’m glad I protected him, so he could get you,” jerking her chin at Moldie, “out.”

Moldie scowls. “And I’m glad we voted to kill you.”

“You don’t scare me,” Lavenblah says in a quiet voice, looking at her sister from beneath her brow in a way that resembles a Kubrick stare. “And you didn’t scare anyone out there, either. You’re not telling anyone anything they don’t already know.”

“Purplish doesn’t know,” hisses Moldie.

“Purplish isn’t ready, and that’s okay. And she won’t hear you until she is. You can’t force it.”

“Not like what you’re trying to do with Snitchy, that’s totally different.”

Firmly, “It is.”

Game Rule observes with great interest and makes plenty of notes in their internal database.

There’s a story their parents have told them for as long as they can remember – which is their entire life, being a piece of machinery and all – that’s been integral to forming their understanding of where they are and why. The story begins with the manufacture of the universe, how it is so tightly layered yet full of endless potential, like a stack of printed circuits with no beginning or end. No computer can calculate these layers, which is a frightening concept in itself, but that’s only the context in which the rest of the story takes place.

On the mortal plane, beings live and die, and they are observed by the celestial plane but cannot observe it back. The celestial sees the mortal and correctly observes that their existence is finite, and for reasons too varied to list, the celestial creates dimensions between the planes that override this design function in the mortals, keeping them preserved for amounts of time up to infinity. Some intelligent organic beings on the mortal plane worked this out somehow, and named the dimensions in accordance to their personal beliefs. There are infinite of these dimensions, but the beliefs of the mortals who travel there often result in amalgamation, a joining of originally separate worlds into bigger, widely shared ones.

Hells, heavens, purgatories. That’s what these dimensions started being called on the mortal plane. On the celestial plane, again for reasons too varied to list, emissaries were assigned to guard, guide, caretake, and otherwise keep these dimensions in operation. These emissaries became what mortals understood as gods, angels, saints and celestial beings, when really they were just servants of the plane itself. But look, if we sat down to talk about everything the mortals got wrong, we’d never leave this spot, so once again we just have to accept this as necessary context for what follows.

Infinite of these dimensions, none more important than the other, and this one was no different. Specifically an impermanent place, where a mortal soul was supposed to enter, get scrubbed up, and then sent back out to its final destination. Its emissary called it Pays Trop Mignon, Super Cute Country, Smileyland, and their methodology of “scrubbing up” took inspiration from mortal concepts of the unfiltered joy and innocence of childhood play. Then the souls started getting there and they were…resistant. The emissary was unprepared for this; emotion, humanity . The mess, violence, filth , of real people clashing with what should have been a perfect, idyllic heavenscape.

In arriving, the mortals had become more celestial, and in receiving them, the celestial had become more mortal. Smileyland had failed as a purgatory. Kaeloo had failed as a psychopomp. Stumpy, Quack-Quack and Mr Cat had failed to move on because now they belonged here. Together they sustained the world they had created. The celestial plane saw this and thought, maybe she’ll change her mind if we up the ante, and it did. Smileyland integrated with other purgatories, which allowed the sheep to join and populate the world. Four more specific mortal souls entered but still Kaeloo was resolute in her defiance, because it wasn’t just her and her friends who failed, it was also the mortal plane. It had not cared for the souls that were sent here. No one had ever cared for her . Well, someone had to do it. They would all do it for each other.

Measured by mortal standards, many years had passed, Smileyland grew, evolved, changed, as did its residents, as did its guardian. The will of the world became too strong to influence from the outside; the celestial plane could not reverse this or put an end to it, and so it acquiesced.

“Very well,” said some godly figure up there somewhere. A cube in a canal. “We accept that you’ve twisted a temporary stopgap into a permanent fixture. You can keep your dimension of undying friendship. But now that this is official, you are subject to regulation.”

Regulation. Law and Order.

And Law and Order decided that the original Guardian of Smileyland had obviously been corrupted by everything she had done, which meant the dimension required a new emissary as its caretaker, so Law and Order created their perfect progeny, the Rules of the Game, to fill this role.

That’s where the bedtime story ends and the instruction brief begins:

Where are they? Smileyland, the world of eternal play. Why are they here? To keep it functional.

Who are these girls? Those men and women out there? The droves of people of all kinds that litter this land? They are residents of this world. Among them is Kaeloo, the Guardian of Smileyland. Game Rule is here to do her job.

“Anyway, what matters is you got out. Now you won’t get your hands on the Gruel.”

The what? What’s that? Why didn’t anyone tell her about it before?

“Oh, I’ll get my hands on it, just watch.”

“Watch you fail!”

Moldie growls ferociously and lunges at Lavenblah, and both girls go to the ground, hissing and clawing at each other like a couple of rabid squirrels.

“Girls!” cries Kaeloo as she comes over, firmly placing herself between the fighting siblings with a hand planted on each of their foreheads, pushing them away from each other. “That’s enough! Rules, do something!”

Game Rule looks at Kaeloo blankly, as if with fresh optic lenses and a wiped data bank.

“Come on, you hunk of junk!” she barks. “Help me!”

Game Rule blinks back online and manifests their wheel form, a circle of limbs surrounding them, lighting up in sequence, at first quickly and soon slowing, coming to a halt, on a paddle that indicates imprisonment. A pair of glowing, alien handcuffs manifest on both Moldie and Lavenblah’s hands, binding them together, and the same happens to their feet. Both girls go down, limp on the floor as they writhe against their bonds. Kaeloo breathes a big sigh of relief, wiping invisible sweat from her forehead.

“ Thank you,” she says, and scoops Lavenblah up in her arms, carrying her over to the theatre seating to plonk her down there. Lavenblah isn’t mindlessly obedient but she is well-behaved, and so she settles down right away. Moldie keeps struggling even after Kaeloo dumps her down on her seat. Brat.

Forget all this, weren’t we playing Mafia?

“Let the girls cool off,” says Kaeloo to Game Rule, ushering them along back to the railing. “Stick by my side while it’s the night round.”

“I’m looking forward to this,” Petit Mouton gushes, grinning down at the remaining players in their chairs. “What’s everyone going to do next?”

With Moldie out of the game, there are only two mafia players left. While it’s just the two of them, they hold a brief but still somewhat fraught debate over who to kill, then return to their places. Sheriff Quack-Quack is next, and he points at Snitchy. Kaeloo shakes her head. Quack-Quack nods his acceptance and sits back down, closing his eyes.

“Controversial,” comments Petit Mouton, which gives Game Rule the confidence to speak again, but their protestations go ignored.

With the nurse player upgraded, an entirely new person stands when the doctor is called upon to act. The nurse gives it a moment’s thought before pointing at Eugly. Checkout makes her choice.

“And the new in town player wanders alone, just as dawn begins to break,” narrates Kaeloo. “Ready for the next day?”

“Oh, god damn,” says Pretty as soon as her eyes open.

Checkout and Mimi are sprawled, playing dead. The way they’ve arranged themselves is kind of cute, giving the impression that Checkout threw herself over Mimi to protect her, but both perished anyway. Mimi’s fully stuck her tongue out like a character in a cartoon, and Checkout’s visor lies just out of reach, smacked away in the struggle that led to her demise.

“Fuck!” cries Stumpy, his hands leaping to the sides of his head, grabbing fistfuls of his own hair. “At this rate I’m not gonna have any sisters left!”

Indeed, the girls have gone from the majority to the minority, the remaining players being made up of Snitchy, Purplish, Vitamin, Mr Cat, Pretty, Quack-Quack, and Eugly. And Stumpy, of course.

“All the buddies are still in,” Checkout grumbles a little bitterly, sitting up with her face turned downward to hide her eyes.

“‘Cause we’re the most fun,” says Mr Cat, flashing his teeth. “I really gotta hand it to the mafia for this game, you guys are doing great.”

“Why are there still two,” Pretty says, flatly, her face blank. “Why… Why do they get to kill two?” She reaches out both hands, and Mimi and Checkout each take one to help themselves up off the ground.

“New in town is probably responsible for one,” Mr Cat says, giving Checkout and Mimi a congratulatory pat on each of their backs before they trudge on over to the stage. They abide by the rules and don’t say a word. “Why else would that role exist?” He taps his temple. “Basic law of conservation of detail.”

“It could be there to throw you off,” suggests Purplish, and all eyes turn to her. She smiles and shrugs. “It could just as easily be a protection role, y’know. Maybe the nurse accidentally kills the player they try to protect because they’re not as skilled as the original doctor.”

“Purplish,” says Stumpy, his eyes welling up. “That’s so metagame-y of you. I’m so proud!” He goes over to her and gives his sister a hug. “Kaeloo,” he shouts, muffled by Purplish’s sweater, “they’re ready! They’re ready to play with us.”

“They’re already playing with us, Stumpy,” says Kaeloo, not unkindly. She greets Checkout and Mimi as they reach the stage floor, and fills them in on the drama with Moldie and Lavenblah before sending them to check on the matter.

“You’ve got some good points, kid,” Mr Cat admits, holding his hand at his chin. “But you could be the one throwing us off the scent.”

Purplish shrugs again, still smiling. “Okay.”

Eugly rubs the back of her neck before rolling her shoulders and clearing her throat. “Well, I…” and she starts to flex the fingers on her right hand, the same side Vitamin is sitting next to her.

A text notification flashes up on everyone’s phones, even in Game Rule’s head. Though it appears that she hasn’t moved from her seat but to occasionally turn her head, Vitamin obviously decided to get in on the conversation in as close to real time as she can.

And although everyone, all buddies and sisters and Game Rule, are able to read it, Quack-Quack still signs, She says she’s new in town.

“What does new–” ping, “–in town do?” Purplish gets out her phone even as she’s still speaking, and reads aloud, “ ‘Nothing. It’s a red herring.’ Really?” Ping. “ ‘Yes.’ ” Purplish closes her phone – it’s a clamshell design, very cute and retro – and spreads her hands to the group. “Guess that explains that!”

“If you believe her,” says Mr Cat.

Snitchy has untied her hair and redone it up a little higher on her head, as well as tried to roll up her coat sleeves. The harsh fluorescent lighting of the museum seems to be affecting her quite badly. “Maybe I do,” she says, and squints as Mr Cat turns his attention to her.

“ There you are, little miss journalist,” he says. “I was wondering when we’d hear from you again. That’s mighty suspicious, isn’t it?” He glances back over at the others for their reactions.

“Don’t be a dick,” Pretty snaps.

“Yeah,” agrees Stumpy. “Jerkass.”

“Thanks, guys,” says Snitchy, her hands trembling a little. “But I got it. I only wasn’t saying anything because I was too busy thinking about how Mr Cat is obviously in the mafia.”

“Oh, please,” Mr Cat scoffs. “Oldest trick in the book, accusing someone else to take suspicion away from you.” He leans forward, smirking. “I know you, Groucho. There’s only so much quiet observation you can get away with. Tadpole! Open up the vote. Because mine goes to her.” He points at Snitchy with a steady hand.

Quack-Quack whistles to draw eyes to him. Snitchy’s not in the mafia, he tells everyone, and Mr Cat’s face falls into a frown, because what motive would Quack-Quack have to lie?

Snitchy just stares at him, and whatever Quack-Quack interprets this to mean, he responds with a short nod.

“If it’s vote time, I wanna go out,” says Purplish. “It got interesting for a sec but I’m bored again.”

“Purplish, no,” whines Stumpy. “You’re just getting good at it!”

“My legs hurt from all the sitting and standing,” she whines back. “Vote me out!”

“Don’t you wanna win?” he presses. “Don’t you want the Gruel?”

The choir starts up and the spotlight falls, but not on him. On Purplish, to emphasise that it’s her choice to make.

“Not really,” she says. “I kinda wanna go home. I miss Mom, I want to see her. We haven’t seen her in forever. ”

Stumpy slumps, all his breath coming out of him at once. In the corners of his vision, he sees his friends clamming up and looking away, almost guiltily – for as much as any of them may wish to enlighten the girl, it’s not their place. Her sisters have tried, the debate has been long, Vitamin preferring to ignore the matter and Snitchy firmly in denial. The only one with the power to clear it all up is Stumpy, if he laid it out for them.

He peeks over his shoulder at Kaeloo, watching from above. Her eyes wide and brow furrowed, her hands gripping the railing. His spectating sisters come up beside her; Lavenblah, Moldie, Mimi, Checkout. They all stand looking down on him. What kind of stupid symbolic bullshit is it that all of them who know are up there while he’s stuck down here with the ones who don’t?

Stumpy looks at Vitamin, then Snitchy, then Purplish. Everything hurts.

Mimi raises her hand like a student in class, leaning over the railing to see Kaeloo a little better down the line. “Can I shoot from beyond the grave?”

“No, sweetheart,” says Kaeloo.

“Kill Vitamin next!” Moldie shouts down, pointing at the sister in question. “Mafia! I’m giving you an order!”

“Don’t listen to her!” cries Lavenblah, slapping her hand over Moldie’s mouth, then taking it back just as quickly. “Ew!” There’s a wet spot on her palm where Moldie licked.

“Just vote me out,” insists Purplish.

Pretty groans, “No one’s gonna vote for you, Violet.”

“No. We’re not,” Mr Cat agrees. “I vote Snitchy.”

“I’m voting for Mr Cat!” Snitchy snaps back.

“ Alright! ” Kaeloo bellows, releasing the railing and balling her hands into fists, her knuckles cracking as she does so. All around her, Petit Mouton, the four sisters, and Game Rule flinch, but there’s no need for alarm. When Kaeloo next speaks, her voice is calm and placating. “Let’s do this the right way.” She unfurls one hand, laying it out in Snitchy’s direction. “All in favour of exiling Snitchy?”

“Aye, says Mr Cat.

Eugly raises her hand in agreement.

Pretty’s neck nearly snaps with how quickly she turns to stare at her sister. “ Excuse me? Take that back, you don’t mean it.”

Eugly lifts her chin and squares her shoulders. Not standing to her full height, but closer than she usually allows herself. She looks Pretty in the eye and says, “Her or you.”

Pretty withdraws, but does not take her eyes off Eugly. Her face is a contorted muddle of emotion, plenty that can be identified but just as much a mystery – not just to those looking at her, but very likely to herself as well. One of the identifiable ones is…fear. Eugly surely sees that one, and she feels a burn in her chest like acid reflux. That’s a good reaction, right? That’s triumph she’s feeling?

Eugly doesn’t quite understand. She thought it would feel different. She thought she would feel better.

Mr Cat looks at Quack-Quack with his eyebrows raised. Quack-Quack says, Don’t even think about it , but of course Mr Cat will anyway.

“Two votes for Snitchy.” Kaeloo’s voice cuts through the tension. She gestures now to the man she loves. “All in favour of exiling Mr Cat?”

Stumpy and Pretty say, “Aye,” in unison, then look and point at each other. “Jinx, owe me a–” and this is where their words branch off; Stumpy finishes with, “soda,” while Pretty goes for “milkshake.” Both look annoyed at their failure to keep up the synchronisation.

Quack-Quack raises his hand to vote as well, side-eyeing Eugly. It pains him to see her lash out, even if standing up for herself is a good thing to do. There are better ways to do it. But this is not the time for such a conversation.

“Purplish, Vitamin?” Kaeloo prompts them.

“I’m voting for myself,” says Purplish.

“You can’t do that. Vitamin, what–” Ping. Kaeloo fishes her phone out of her pocket. “Vitamin is abstaining. That’s two votes against three. Mr Cat, you’re out.”

“ Finally, ” he says, pointing his fingers at Stumpy like a gun. “Blam. Veteran.”

“Dude! What the hell!” shrieks Stumpy, holding a hand to his chest, nursing the wound even though they aren’t using weapons for this iteration of the game. “Why me?”

Mr Cat grins widely, putting his pipe to his mouth while tucking his shooting hand into his pocket like putting the gun back in its holster. “You know why.”

“No!” Stumpy rages, stamping his feet. “No, I don’t!”

“Whatever. You don’t have to.” Mr Cat points the pipe at Quack-Quack. “But you do.”

Quack-Quack is pale enough to begin with. He blanches.

“I’m not in the mafia,” lies Stumpy, heading for the stairs, “but if I was , I’d say kill Pretty next.” He shakes his head. “Fuckin’...milkshake.” And it looks like that’s the end of it as he ascends to the stage, but then he adds, a little quietly, “I want my sisters to win.”

The four who are already up on stage meet him in a group hug. They all hold on tight, like they’ll be separated to different planes again if they don’t.

Something deep inside Mr Cat wants to join Kaeloo in her fond appreciation of the touching scene, but he makes himself sneer instead.

Now that the number of alive players are outnumbered by the dead, who are all spectating, we can comfortably describe the nighttime actions as plainly as possible. Kaeloo has the remaining living players sit, Petit Mouton turns down the lights, and the next night begins. But not before, strangely enough, Kaeloo asks a favour of Game Rule, to see if they can put up a soundproof barrier over the stage. Game Rule does their best, but it’s not perfect. Lavenblah summons her ghosts to cushion the material, which does a lot to help. The players will hear muffled noises of possible speaking, but nothing more.

Kaeloo sits on the stairs where her voice will not be affected. It reminds her very much of sitting on the stairs for the last game, only this time she’s far from bored.

Outside, the storm goes on. There has been more rain than thunder lately, the sound of which can be a comfort even if it is very heavy, and for a minute everyone stands still in their places, listening in the dark. Of course, it’s much more than a minute for Vitamin, but her music – low volume, so she still can hear the Game Master’s directions – keeps her entertained.

“The numbers in the museum are dwindling fast,” narrates Kaeloo. “If the mafia are going to keep their power, they have to act even faster.” She gestures at Eugly, who stands.

Mr Cat laughs as Checkout and Mimi howl. “Knew it,” he says, and turns to the others. “And duckface does too, he just doesn’t want to admit it. Now we can all watch,” he looks back down at the players, “as the despair starts to set in.”

Lavenblah’s voice is small. “What is wrong with you?”

Eugly selects Vitamin for death, and the spectators go into a fit.

“Yes, bitch!” shouts Moldie, triumphantly punching the air. “I’m the godfather!”

“Woo!” Mimi joins in, then goes, “Why are we celebrating?”

“Goddamn it!” This is Stumpy, rubbing his hands all over his face. “Come onnn, I need one of you to win!”

“Oh, don’t sweat it, big bro,” chuckles Moldie, shooting him a sly look. “This is all according to plan.”

Eugly sits and Kaeloo goes on, “The sheriff makes his nightly rounds, hoping to catch a criminal in action…” and Quack-Quack stands, tall and still but not looking so confident. He looks at Eugly sitting in her chair and his hand moves an inch, like he’s considering it.

“He could win right now,” Checkout says in a whisper.

“He won’t do it,” Mr Cat assures her – and he’s right, of course. Quack-Quack points at Pretty, and Kaeloo shakes her head. He nods once, slowly, not as steady now, before returning to his chair.

Pretty chooses to protect herself.

“Hey,” says Mimi to Lavenblah, “what does new in town do?”

“You’ll see,” murmurs Lavenblah, turning her back on the scene below.

When Kaeloo calls on the player new in town, Snitchy stands. There’s an entirely silent interaction between her and Kaeloo, one that’s happened every night round, where Snitchy looks into her eyes with the unspoken question, “Do I have to?”

The answer hasn’t been no yet.

Snitchy bites her lip as she takes in a big breath, then points to Purplish without looking.

“Good pick,” says Mr Cat.

“ Good pick? ” Stumpy practically screeches. “Now it’s just her left!”

“She’s just honouring what Purplish wanted,” Lavenblah says without looking.

Checkout nods solemnly. “Yeah. It’s the best choice to make.”

Game Rule snaps to attention and interjects, “Apart from choosing Eugly, which would wipe out the mafia.”

“She doesn't know Eugly’s the mafia,” Mimi points out.

“We don’t know that,” says Moldie with a shrug. “But it doesn’t matter. Everyone got what they wanted.”

No one knows what to say in response to that, so the others just look at her with varied intensities of glares. Even Petit Mouton gets in on the action. As Kaeloo moves everyone into the next day round, Game Rule and Lavenblah lower the soundproofing – it was wise of Kaeloo to suggest it. She knew there’d be plenty of discussion up on stage.

Another wise choice of hers is to not make Vitamin play dead, as it would be more time wasted for the poor girl. She just sends her straight up the stairs. The four remaining players – Quack-Quack, Eugly, Pretty, and Snitchy – are clever enough to work out what Vitamin’s sudden absence means.

Pretty gets straight down to business. She’d been letting her feather boa hang casually at the crooks of her elbows for most of the game, but now she winds it around her neck and throws the longer end over her shoulder for good measure. The three others look at her expectantly, as do the spectators.

Except for Moldie and Vitamin. They break off from the group at the railing and go over to the seating at the back, and hold a conversation entirely in text message. It lasts hardly a minute, concluding with Vitamin putting her phone away into the side pocket of her coveralls, and zipping away, off the stage. Gone.

Pretty says, “Two more dead. How long are we going to let this go on?”

“I don’t mind,” says Purplish as she gets up off the ground to join the spectators onstage.

Pretty goes on as if she hadn’t spoken, “This is very simple. There still has to be a mafia player left, otherwise we’d have automatically won after the night.” She points at herself, “Nurse.” She points at Quack-Quack, “We know you’re the sheriff,” points at Snitchy, who hangs her head, “and he said you’re not the mafia.” Pretty tosses her ponytail before setting both her hands on her hips, looking across at Eugly. “That just leaves you, sis.”

Not necessarily, argues Quack-Quack.

“Oh?” She feigns surprise. “I’d love to hear how. Wait – no I don’t!” Pretty waves one of her hands at Snitchy, whirling her wrist. “Come on, smartypants, I know you agree.”

Snitchy says nothing, staring straight down at her feet.

If Vitamin was new in town , Quack-Quack desperately tries to reason, and new in town didn’t mean anything… No. Maybe Purplish… He clenches his hands into fists and makes another attempt. Purplish could have been the remaining mafia–

“That makes no sense and you know it,” Pretty snaps at him. “Answer me this, lawman. Who’d you point to last night? You only had two options. I wonder which one you went with.”

Quack-Quack’s hands shake. This can easily be interpreted as stammering. Snitchy certainly takes it that way, and it looks the same for Eugly, whose face is frozen, her mouth clamped shut like she has words fighting to escape her mouth.

“Hm? Shy all of a sudden? It was me , and what would that have told you? Admit it, Quack-Quack.” Pretty points at Eugly, while keeping her eyes on him. “Look at her. Say she’s the mafia.”

Quack-Quack covers his face with his hands. Eugly opens her mouth to speak. Snitchy roars incomprehensibly, like a wounded animal, and throws her notepad and pen to the ground.

“Enough!” she yells, throwing off her trench coat as well and kicking it away. “Enough. I can’t do this any longer.” Her voice breaks as she looks up between the grown-ups, the tears already streaming down her face. “I’m sorry. It’s me. It was me.” She clutches her hand to her chest. “Purplish wasn’t the remaining mafia, it was Vitamin. She…took the fall for me. I’m the one who’s new in town. And new in town is…” Snitchy sobs. “A werewolf!”

Eugly goes over to comfort her. Quack-Quack takes just one step forward, his hands continuing to tremble. His expression has rapidly changed away from despair, but no one is looking at him right now, so no one sees. Pretty’s feet are bolted on the ground, staring stunned at Snitchy.

“B-But,” she says, “no. That still doesn’t explain why–”

“Just vote me out,” blubbers Snitchy. “Vote me out. I don’t want to play anymore.”

“No!” Moldie shouts from above. “You have to win the Gruel!”

This time, when the name is spoken, no heavenly spotlight comes down. No one hears the angelic choir. At least, no one who’s present.

“I don’t want it,” Snitchy says, leaning into Eugly’s arms. “Not anymore.”

“You wanted to find out the truth,” Checkout says without conviction.

“I didn’t want the truth. I wanted to use it to go home. But Lavenblah was right. Moldie was right.” Snitchy lifts her head in time to see Kaeloo approaching, reaching out to put her hands on her shoulders. “Smileyland…isn’t just another world. We’re here because…” Even now she can’t bear to say it.

Stumpy jumps the last couple of steps and rushes over to scoop his sister up in a hug. “It doesn’t matter,” he says firmly, but Kaeloo can see his eyelashes are wet. “It doesn’t matter where we are, and it doesn’t matter why. Tell me the reason, Snitchy. Huh?” He pulls away to look her in the eye. “Tell me why.”

She can’t. Her sisters envelop her and Stumpy at all sides, joining arms in a big group hug, a much more complete one, although not quite there yet.

“Because…we’re together.” The person who speaks is unexpected, but that doesn’t make it any less Purplish. “Like family should be.”

Mr Cat is still up on stage with Game Rule and Petit Mouton, and he is leaning against the railing, arms folded, facing away. Pretty looks over at Eugly and Eugly looks back. They share a long moment of quiet, then start walking over to one another, meeting in the middle to take each other’s hands.

“I’m sorry,” says Pretty, her voice a little strangled. “I… I’m still learning to be good. But it’s no excuse for hurting you.” She squeezes Eugly’s hand. “You’re my family, and we’re here together. I should be grateful for every second.” A shorter moment, then she adds, “You don’t snore.”

Eugly mumbles and murmurs, then clears her throat. “I do,” she says quietly, voice hoarse from lack of use – which will remain the standard, for it is her preference to be non-verbal, lending greater importance to this moment. “But that’s…okay.” She closes her eyes and takes a deliberate breath, then squeezes Pretty’s hand back. “You’ve still got a lot to learn. You…mean bitch.” And this time, the words lift a great weight off her chest.

Pretty’s tears spill as she laughs, and leaps up to wrap her arms around her sister’s shoulders where Eugly meets her in a warm embrace. “Whatever,” she says as if she can still play it cool. “I love you, too.”

Kaeloo senses the sadness that permeates the air, but she knows it’s not all there is, and not all there ever will be. She inhales and exhales deeply, clasping her hands together something like a prayer. Outside, the storm wanes.

“I think…that this is a good place to end the game,” she says. “Everyone, you all played very well. Let’s all sit down now and–”

Quack-Quack claps his hands, loudly, that causes a ripple in the air that catches absolutely everybody’s attention; there’s no missing it, and there’s no ignoring it. All heads and eyes turn to him, to see what would warrant such a call for attention, and all see his face. Lavenblah’s Kubrick stare does not hold a candle to his, his eyebrows deeply furrowed, with such a terrible sneer on his mouth that it bares his teeth.

We’re not done yet, he signs so clearly that it’s as if the words take on audible form. We haven’t determined a winner.

“Quack-Quack…” Kaeloo says, totally trailing off as she realises she has no idea what to say in reaction to this unprecedented move. “The game is over.”

Not that. Quack-Quack makes a sign that none of Stumpy’s sisters recognise, they haven’t seen it used before. Some kind of proper noun, directed at Mr Cat, whose face contorts in pain.

“Don’t call me that,” he says, probably intending it to sound much more authoritative, but instead coming out pathetic. Quack-Quack ignores this, as well as ignores how Kaeloo’s eyes alight with rage.

The winner of our debate, he says. Your theory.

“You’re still on about that?”

Look around you. Siblings do more than hurt each other. We all know it’s true, not one person is exempt. Except maybe you.

Mr Cat barks a laugh that really only serves to emphasise how much this gets to him. “Oh, you’ve been waiting hours to throw that back at me, haven’t you?” He fishes around the inner pockets of his dinner jacket, but doesn’t come back out with anything. “Lonely little duckling needs to live vicariously through everyone because his family isn’t dead like the rest of us . Boo-fucking-hoo.”

I gave my life for my family, Quack-Quack asserts. As they live, I’m still with them. That’s the TRUE nature of a sibling relationship. Together through thick and thin, hurt and healing, life and death. You don’t know the first thing about it.

“No. I don’t,” says Mr Cat flatly. “My brothers killed me before I got to see the nice part.”

Kaeloo grabs Quack-Quack by the throat with one hand. She holds him up off the ground for a few moments, throttling him, before she slams him bodily into the concrete floor, cracking it, making a hole. Eugly sharply inhales and Pretty dramatically exhales. Stumpy’s sisters have a wide array of reactions, none of them positive, and Stumpy stretches his arms as far as they can go to make sure he’s holding all of them. Three in the left, three in the right… Stumpy startles and does a headcount.

“Quack-Quack say sorry,” grunts Kaeloo in his face. “Right now.”

“Tadpole.”

She turns, releasing Quack-Quack immediately. He wheezes.

Mr Cat smiles sadly. “It’s okay. He got me fair and square. I’m not mad. Just hurt.” His gaze flickers to Quack-Quack. “And that’s how I know you’re my family. Thick and thin, right?”

I’m sorry, Quack-Quack signs.

“Forget about it. We’re all jerks.” The way he says this makes it sound like something worth celebrating. Like this is his way of affirming everyone’s care for one another, always there, no matter what horrible things they do to each other — and there will always be horrible things.

Yes, they are all jerks, and it’s something that unites them. Thank the celestial plane. Any other way would be wrong.

There’s no winner to the debate, just like there’s no winner to the game, because there doesn’t need to be one. Everyone was playing to play, and although this ended up being more of an emotional ordeal than anyone expected, it was good to do it. It’s all about being together as one group, not about some grand prize.

Except for Moldie and Vitamin. They break off from the group at the railing and go over to the seating at the back, and hold a conversation entirely in text message. It reads as follows:

V: ?

M: playing fairs for suckers

M: get the 🖍️

V: I don’t know where it is

M: ur the only one who can find out

M: do it and ill let you use it 1st

V: (typing bubble…)

V: (typing bubble…)

V: OK.

Vitamin puts her phone away into the side pocket of her coveralls, and zips off the stage.

Where does one hide a magic crayon? Not in the same building where the fake is being kept, is Vitamin’s first thought, but her second thought is realising she’s asking the wrong question. Where would Kaeloo hide a magic crayon?

Vitamin knows there’s plenty about Kaeloo that she hasn’t experienced, and may never will. People contain multitudes, so many that it is impossible to fully understand a person who isn’t oneself – and it’s far from Vitamin’s intention to understand Kaeloo in such excessive detail. She’s fourteen and a half, she’s too busy trying to work herself out before anyone else, and Kaeloo is certainly not at the top of the list of people for Vitamin to work out afterwards.

But to share a space with someone, you have to understand them at least a little bit. So Vitamin draws on what information she does have, and goes from there.

From there, to there, to one exhibit to the next. Visiting, reading; re-visiting, re-reading, and exploring the museum along its very edges. It’s here somewhere. Call it instinct or intuition – Vitamin might discuss it with Lavenblah to see if it’s a latent psychic ability – she knows it can’t be further than these walls. Too precious to simply hide without the contingency of someone else who can find it in the event that Kaeloo is indisposed, the Gruel is here, and someone Kaeloo trusts knows about it. Who here in the Museum Of Games does Kaeloo trust?

Well. Not Game Rule, that’s for sure. They didn’t even know the Gruel was anything more than a prop. Vitamin can picture it now, Stumpy or perhaps Mr Cat advising her in her ear, suggesting that that’s just what Game Rule wanted her to think, but there is such a thing as overcomplicating matters. When a person tells you who they are, you should listen to them, and Game Rule has done nothing but tell everyone who they are with every little thing they’ve ever done.

Vitamin doesn’t know Petit Mouton well on a personal level; he has never told her who he is with words, but he tells her with his actions, so she feels he’s a good guy. And when it was her holding what she thought was the Gruel, who did she pass it off to?

Hidden amongst shelves of storage, Vitamin finds the door to Petit Mouton’s office.

The Wholly Gruel is a magical crayon, seemingly made of gold, which does not deplete upon usage. Anything it is used with to draw becomes tangible, but its user must have the appropriate combination of conviction and imagination for it to truly work. In the right user’s hands, it can even respond to description and direction not depicted in the image, and its size can be changed at will. Anything the Gruel creates can be destroyed by the artifact known as the Magic Eraser, current location unknown.

In addition, when the name of the crayon is spoken with intent, a spotlight is summoned to shine upon the speaker – or the Gruel itself, if it is nearby with a witness.

Almost all the way on the other side of the museum, Moldie shouts, “You have to win the Gruel!”

The dark room lights up in an instant. It’s a fascinating flash of one man’s favourite place filled with his favourite things. For a character study on Petit Mouton, this would be the perfect place to start. But that’s not why Vitamin is here. She’s here for the Gruel, and there it is before her in an open pack of crayons, nestled between its wax companions. The angelic choir drowns out the music playing in her ears, and she takes off her headphones to hang around her neck as she slowly approaches, step by step.

For the first time in her life, or at least since her death, Vitamin has never felt so slow.

The spotlight fades, as it does without being summoned again, and Petit Mouton’s office dims, but now that it’s been identified the Gruel continues to shine through the cardboard, through its companions. Through Vitamin’s fingers as she gingerly slides it out of the pack, and holds it in her open palm.

It’s warm. It’s cold. It’s anything she wants. She draws a circle directly onto the wood of Petit Mouton’s desk, but the marking won’t be permanent. It ceases to exist as soon as the tennis ball manifests; a rubber core and felt casing in optic yellow. Real.

She goes to bounce it and it falls relative to her speed. Somehow she expected differently, and can’t help but laugh.

Everyone is up on the stage arranged all over the place, on chairs brought up from the player space, at the theatre seating, standing or sitting on the floor. Moldie, for example, is standing leaning against the railing, keeping an eye out, and Game Rule is hovering close by.

Petit Mouton is sitting with Snitchy and Checkout. They’ve solved the day’s Wordle and Checkout is working on the purple row on Connections with one guess left. Mimi and Purplish are sitting with Pretty and Eugly, sharing favourite movies and quoting them at each other. Quack-Quack and Mr Cat have donated their respective eyewear to Lavenblah, both of which she wears at the same time, while the three of them show off little tricks they can do; optical illusions, ghost junk, blowing rings of smoke.

Kaeloo sometimes – often, more like – worries she’s not taking good enough care of the world and the people in it. But this is…not quite one of those times. The buddies are set in their ways and the sisters are young and still learning who they are, but that doesn’t mean they need to be separated from each other. It’s all the more reason to keep them together. Kaeloo’s hardly going to let anyone go wild, but she knows now she was too hasty trying to distance Stumpy’s sisters. They can handle more than she thought, and that can only ever be a good thing, right?

“Kaeloo,” says Moldie, standing up on her toes to tap her on the shoulder, about as politely as she can. This doesn’t go unappreciated, and so Kaeloo smiles as she turns to face her. “I was just thinkin’... What now? I mean…” The girl leans in, lowering her voice a little. “Don’t you think we’ve earned something special, after this whole thing?”

“I’ll whip us up a great big dinner,” suggests Kaeloo. “Everyone can help out a little, we invite Olaf and Olga along, and it can be a nice party! And there’ll be plenty of dessert to go around.”

Moldie nods along. “Yeah, yeah,” she says, sounding unconvinced, so Kaeloo knows she needs to sweeten the deal.

“The rain will stop soon,” she adds, “so we can go outside and enjoy the fresh air while I set up the party. We can have it at your house, and there’ll be no curfew, and it’ll be a sleepover…”

“Are you being stupid on purpose?”

“I don’t know,” says Kaeloo, hunkering down a little, baring her teeth at the brat. “Am I?”

“You promised the winner would get,” Moldie pauses and peeks over Kaeloo’s shoulder before finishing, “the Gruel.”

The spotlight comes down right behind Kaeloo, the heavenly choir breaking out in full force as if the wailing angels are right there on that stage. There she stands, bathed in the holy glow; Vitamin carrying a full knapsack slung over one shoulder, the strap held securely in one hand, and in the other, the Wholly Gruel. Everyone, absolutely everyone, gathers in a crowd behind Moldie and Kaeloo, to gawk at her.

“I didn't promise shit,” Kaeloo murmurs disjointedly.

Vitamin makes a flurry of hand movements all at once, absolutely incomprehensible to the average human eye, but Quack-Quack is far from the average human. He steps forward and signs back at her, almost just as quickly, no one can follow along. But he reports at a much more readable pace to the others: She has a good idea, and holds out his hand to Stumpy.

Somehow, Stumpy instinctively knows what’s been asked of him, and plants his phone in Quack-Quack’s hand, who unlocks and opens it up to a message thread, evidently the one shared with Vitamin. There’s already an audio recording she’s sent that awaits them. Quack-Quack hits play, and they all hear Vitamin’s voice at the same speed as theirs – it may have been fast when she recorded it, but her phone has the tools to slow it down, and from there she can be understood just a little easier.

“Hey,” says her recorded message. “Sorry I missed the end of the game, I went and found the crayon.” As it plays, Vitamin zips around, putting objects into people’s hands, emptying the knapsack. “I tested it and it works, and I drew something for everybody. It’s not much. I didn’t want to go too crazy.”

“When I said you could use it first,” snaps Moldie, and Stumpy’s phone lights up with a fresh message. “I didn’t mean like that!” She grips the tennis ball tight in her hand, gives it a bounce, and the corner of her mouth twitches into a bit of a smile. Stumpy’s phone goes off again. “Thanks.”

“If you wanted to be in charge of how it gets used, you should have come with, but you didn’t, so there,” says Vitamin’s first message, followed by the second, “Yeah. I knew you’d like it. Ass.”

She gave Kaeloo a star-shaped hanging Christmas ornament, which Kaeloo turns over in her hands, feeling a pang in her heart. “Vitamin…” she says, and again Stumpy’s phone goes off. “No, wait, don’t play it yet–”

Too late, Quack-Quack has hit play. “I haven’t made anything else, promise. I was gonna make the remote from Click but then I thought I should rewatch it to make sure it was a good idea.”

“You rewatched Click ?” cries Stumpy.

“Yeah,” says the next recording. “And I’m glad I did because then I was like, oh right, the point of Click is that you don’t want a remote control for your life. The Click remote sucks.”

Stumpy is still hung up on the slight committed against him. “You rewatched it without me? ”

“When we watch Click together it goes for like eight hours!” Vitamin cries back. “You know just having this conversation is hard enough!” Another recording, “I probably could make a Click remote that isn’t garbage like the one in Click –”

Mr Cat groans exaggeratedly. “Quit saying click, it doesn’t sound like a real word anymore.” But he doesn’t mean it nastily. Vitamin drew him a small revolver; it’s a little wonky and the chamber doesn’t move, so she obviously doesn’t know enough about guns to accurately create a functional one, but it’s the thought that counts, and he is touched. He tucks it into his jacket.

Moldie snaps her fingers several times at Vitamin. “Hand it over. Give me the Gruel.” Spotlight, choir, but only very briefly.

Pretty chuckles. “Kids,” she says with a shake of her head, recognising that fervent desperation. She’s holding a small bottle of pink nail polish.

“Maybe I could make a remote to control my speed without consequences,” Vitamin goes on, “but that’s not… I mean, I want one. I really do. But it’s not for me to decide. So I just made some small things. I hope that’s okay.” In a fresh recording, “I’m sorry for going through your stuff, Mr Mouton.”

Petit Mouton presses his hand to his heart, eyes welling. He clutches the cloth lamb tight in his grip, already deciding where to put it among his most prized possessions. “You trusted me ,” he whispers, looking to Kaeloo, “with the Gruel?”

Choir, spotlight, on her. She nods at him with a look on her face as if to say, “Of course.”

All around, everyone examines their gifts. Gaudy costume jewellery for Mimi, a scented candle with a swirling pattern in the wax for Eugly. Quack-Quack gets a friendship bracelet made out of Scrabble pieces, a gift both summoned and constructed, and Stumpy gets a fidget toy with a couple of noisy buttons. Checkout rubs her thumb over the markings on a medallion, and Snitchy holds the fresh notebook to her chest. She hears a small sniffle beside her, and looks to Purplish, crying quietly on the protective glass of her picture frame.

It’s true that Vitamin is not an artist, however the Gruel doesn’t need the literal drawing to be perfect in order to create what the user wants from it, as long as they can see it clearly enough in their mind. Vitamin couldn’t draw a person to save her life, but it still understood, and so the photograph of Stumpy and the girls’ mother is her exact image, just the way she is in their memories.

Purplish wipes her face with her sweater sleeve, and Snitchy puts an arm around her. Purplish lifts her gaze to meet her sister’s, and then they both look at Vitamin.

“Thank you,” says Purplish, Vitamin’s arms also around her before she’s done speaking. She hugs back, which Snitchy joins in full, then Checkout, and before you know it the siblings are once again all clustered together for their final, and complete, group hug.

Eugly smiles at Pretty, then at Quack-Quack, and the three of them huddle up to Kaeloo and Mr Cat, who are holding each other’s hands so sturdily it’s any wonder they could ever be separate. Stumpy steps out from his sisters to join his friends, and they all hug, too. His two families. His one family.

When the tears are done being shed and the hugs are all squeezed out, Quack-Quack holds up Stumpy’s phone above everyone’s heads, almost like a boombox, to play the most recent audio message. He’s already wearing his bracelet.

“Here,” says the recording of Vitamin’s voice. At the same time, the girl steps out in front of Kaeloo – the others gather in a circle to properly witness the scene. Vitamin holding out her closed hands, ready to release, and Kaeloo positioning her open ones beneath, ready to catch. “This doesn’t belong to me.”

Vitamin is about to open her hands, then she sees in the corner of her vision how Mimi’s eyes catch on something and begin to widen. She turns her head to get a better look at Mimi, her mouth slowly opening into a shout, and while Vitamin is waiting for the sound to come out she turns her head the other way, to where Mimi is looking. To Game Rule, who had been passively flying nearby, observing all of this going down, waiting, biding their time. And now they’re swooping, their simple little face twisted with determination, reaching both their paddle hands out to swipe the Gruel.

They’re moving fast, but not fast enough for Vitamin not to have time to take out her phone and record another message to send the group. “Okay, so, the tube is trying to steal the thing, but don’t worry, I got it.” She feels a rare spark of pride as she concludes, “It can’t catch me.”

Game Rule inches incrementally lower, closer, while Vitamin fiddles with the audio file, stretching it out so it’ll play right, and sending it to Stumpy, before putting her phone back away in her pocket. She holds the Gruel firmly in one hand, and she quickly navigates out from the centre of the circle, weaving through her family and friends to get out into a clear part of the stage, and then making for the stairs.

“ Stub! ” shrieks Mimi in warning.

Heads turn but Game Rule is already dropping down, and they hit Kaeloo’s hands, startling her. Taken aback for only a second themselves, Game Rule whistles, then releases a screeching alarm as their body flashes red. It only lasts long enough for a few beeps and they very shortly turn back to being blue, but it’s clear that this doesn’t mean anything good.

Kaeloo goes to close her hands around Game Rule, to trap them, but she fumbles, and they break free and fly up above her head, out of reach. Below them, the buddies jump to try and grab hold. Game Rule whirrs in frustration, failing to connect back into the security system as they flit all around, looking for their target.

Stumpy spots her before anyone else, standing down on the museum floor where the game was being played. “Go, Vitamin, go!” he yells, and his sisters join him immediately, shouting their support as Game Rule flies down there.

Their body crackles with electricity and effort. They change their form and they grow, big, bigger, as large they can make themselves without getting trapped by their surroundings. Vitamin is fast but being enormous is a helpful advantage, and Game Rule’s current strategy seems to be to crush her like an insect. Their voice is much deeper to match their modified size, and they boom, “Give!” and smash their paddles down on the ground, just missing her, “It!” another smash, another miss, “To!” smash, miss, “ Me! ”

Mr Cat figures it’s worth a shot trying to use the revolver anyway, and points it after Game Rule. It clicks uselessly, he goes, “Damn it,” and swaps it out for a whole bazooka, blasting effortlessly. Those inner jacket pockets can hold anything. Likewise, Pretty whips a stiletto knife out of her stiletto shoe. She takes off into a somersault jump over the railing and off the stage, throwing the blade at her peak height. Eugly knocks her knuckles together, baring her teeth in a growl, and she joins Kaeloo, charging forward in a more direct attack.

“Hey!” Stumpy calls his sisters, waving his arm for them to follow him down the stairs, and all but one do so, following their big brother to the chainsaw exhibit. There’s more than enough to go around, and he grabs the one at the top and revs it. “Let’s get nuts!”

“Yeah!” Mimi’s the first to get her hands on the next one, pulling the cord right away. “Come on!” Moldie, Checkout, and Snitchy grab theirs, and the lot of them run, hollering at the top of their lungs, swinging the chugging blades wildly in attack.

Purplish makes sure her balloon is tied tight around her waist, picks up the first bollard that makes up the velvet rope barrier, and sighs weightlessly; the balloon lifts her up off the ground, the rest of the barrier carried up as she holds the first in the line, and she starts to swing it like a whip at Game Rule. At her side, Lavenblah is floating of her own power, eyes wide and glowing white, as she summons a flurry of spirits to bombard the enemy.

Petit Mouton disappeared somewhere. He’ll be back soon.

Game Rule roars as they are assaulted, now wapping their giant paddle limbs around everywhere, trying to strike not just Vitamin but any of the buddies at all. Kaeloo gets hit but she can take it; Eugly gets hit but she can’t, and she skids across the floor. Pretty squawks and starts to run over to her, but Quack-Quack gets there first. He draws his favourite sword from its place at his hip and tosses it over, Pretty catches it one-handed and doubles back to keep up the fight.

“ Game Rule stop! ” bellows Kaeloo, gone Bad, thrashing and bashing with full strength at the cylinder. “ Gruel not for you! ”

Vitamin, holding the Gruel overhand, draws three circles perched on golf tees, each with a line coming out from the middle, and three classic cartoon black bombs manifest, already lit and ready for launch. She kicks each one off with style, they go flying in slow motion in the path of Game Rule’s face, and she moves positions again just to be safe.

But she was right. Game Rule can’t catch her, and she’s not the only one keeping it in mind. Game Rule themself is harried, stressed, and beginning to sustain some damage from all the different ways they’re being attacked. On one paddle, they are confused and even a little scared. Why are the organics behaving this way, why have they suddenly turned so feral? Is this the true thrall of the Wholly Gruel? On the other paddle, they are resolute and angry, but this anger is focused. Of course it is, it all makes sense. This artifact is clearly too dangerous to be wielded, and knowledge of it was deliberately kept from them by a corrupt ex-Guardian who only wished to retain her power and exclude those better suited to it.

It’s times like these that they are almost disgusted. Disgusted by the organic, the mortal, the celestial, this world; but not their duty, never their duty. Their duty is noble, and they must dedicate their entire being to it, even if it hurts them. And this certainly will.

Game Rule cannot generate the energy required to do what they must at their current size, so they shrink down to normal in an instant. They have a lot more space around them now, and suddenly the buddies are all missing and doing pratfalls, incapable of stopping them. Their insides, steel mechanisms and alien biology, crunch and squish painfully and they feel more crackling of electricity around them than they should. There’ll be no way to get away with calling this a glitch in diagnostics, but their parents will understand. Their parents will understand and even praise them for overclocking so extremely if it allowed them to secure the Wholly Gruel.

The first thing to suffer is their vision as it degrades into severe chromatic aberration, and the near-frozen of everything around them wrecks their frame blending. But they’ll make do. Only one thing will be moving, and that’s what they need to find. They do it so easily.

Overclocking with Vitamin for the first time, she was still a little faster. This time, she is pathetically slow. Game Rule descends on her, mid-jog, and laughs at the look on her face as they open her hand, finger by finger, and pluck the Gruel right out. They spin two dozen circles around her before returning to the middle of the museum where they’ll be seen by everyone, and with a tremendous deal of sludge-sweating, gear-grinding effort, return to normal speed.

Vitamin undergoes her involuntary g-force centrifuge, her time decelerates, and she falls to the ground unconscious, also at normal speed. Lavenblah and Purplish drop out of the air and go to her, followed shortly by Snitchy, Stumpy, and Pretty. Quack-Quack has managed to rouse Eugly and is holding her steady, joined by Checkout and Mimi. Kaeloo and Mr Cat meet Game Rule at the centre of the room, furious and prepared for a final standoff, but are quickly disarmed by how terrible Game Rule looks.

The overuse of energy and pushing their hardware to the limit has taken a great physical toll; there’s a crack in their cylinder and the hologram of their face flutters in and out. They glitch and jerk, preventing them from hovering steadily. Despite all that, Game Rule’s expression projects triumph as they hold the Gruel.

“Y-You thought you could k-ee-ee-p it from m-m-m-me,” they struggle to say.

“Mx Rules, you’re hurt,” Kaeloo says, reaching out and getting accidentally zapped for her trouble.

“Let it be hurt,” says Mr Cat with a sneer. “It did it to itself.”

“Not fit t-to be Guardian,” Game Rule manages. “Caretaker. Cur-ator. M-My job. J-J-J-Job.”

Kaeloo flexes her hand, the pain fading, as she glowers at them. “We’re just going to have to agree to disagree. Smileyland needs someone who has a heart.”

Game Rule cries, “I’ll show you my h-heart-arr-t!” and positions the Gruel for use.

They draw in the air in front of them, a gold line following along their movements. They are shaky and the line is uneven, but the magic of the Gruel corrects and smooths out the image as it is created. Game Rule completes their drawing, a heart shape as promised. The gold drawing lingers for a moment, for another. All is quiet and still. The gold line fades away like dissipating smoke.

“I don’t. I don’t. I don’t understand,” creaks Game Rule.

“That’s what you get,” says Mr Cat, “for having no imagination.”

Game Rule twitches and bleeps, their internal fan making a terrible noise, until the labour of keeping themselves online is simply too great, and it abruptly stops.

“Au revoir, adiós, and goodbye,” Game Rule says. “Thank you for visiting the Museum Of Games.”

Their face switches off, their lights go out, and they drop – but don’t hit the ground. Kaeloo catches them and cradles their small body against her chest, sighing.

“I can’t hate them,” she admits, not meeting Mr Cat’s eye. “They’re an uptight little control freak. They think they know best when they’re really doing the opposite.” Kaeloo looks at him now. “They’re like me.”

Mr Cat points out, “Not as curvy.”

“Gross,” says Moldie, and Kaeloo and Mr Cat look down on the floor.

Game Rule took such priority to the point that when they dropped the crayon, neither Mr Cat or Kaeloo cared to catch it. But Moldie, who had skulked after them and been witness to this entire interaction, was ready with her hand out. And now she’s getting up from her strategic crouch, her fingers curling around the Gruel, running her thumb over its tip. Kaeloo transfers Game Rule’s body to the crook of her arm, raising her hands as if she were surrendering to a firearm. The power of creation from imagination in the hands of an artificial being is nonexistent. In the hands of a young teenager? Limitless.

“Give it here, kid,” Mr Cat orders, reaching out to take the Gruel off Moldie. She swings her arm back, but stays standing in place. He glares at her. “You might want to reconsider. I won’t go easy on you in this game.”

“Sis!” It’s Stumpy, coming up behind Kaeloo and Mr Cat, so now it’s the three of them facing off against Moldie. To his friends he says, “It’s okay,” and to her, “C’mon, sis. You don’t need that thing.”

Her grip on it tightens.

“You already got what you need,” Stumpy implores. “Me. Us. Everyone!” Moldie’s face is blank, seemingly unmoved, and he takes a tentative step forward.

“Stumpy.” This is Kaeloo.

“Careful.” This is Mr Cat.

“We’re family,” he presses. “We love each other.”

Moldie mumbles something. Kaeloo and Mr Cat don’t hear what it is, but Stumpy must understand, because he replies, “And we protect each other, too. That’s what families do.”

Kaeloo blinks and catches up. “Through thick and thin,” she says, looking at Mr Cat, and his face flushes.

“Hurt and healing,” he adds.

Life and death, finishes Quack-Quack, joining them with Pretty and Eugly in tow, saying the words at the same time. Behind them, the rest of the sisters, filling the gaps and spaces in between, almost like additional dimensions between mortal and celestial planes.

Moldie hesitates. Then she hands over the Gruel to her brother. He snaps it in half, letting the pieces of just an ordinary yellow crayon skitter to the floor.

From above them all, a voice so powerful that it echoes. “How very touching,” and when they look up, they are faced with the enormous vertical cylinder that makes up the body of Law.

“It is,” agrees Order, horizontal at her side – Game Rule takes after him in that way. “There’s still much to learn from these creatures.”

The creatures in question stand in frozen silence with wide eyes, all but Kaeloo, who offers up her hands to Law and Order, presenting the broken body of Game Rule. “And now,” she says to them, “it’s time for you to take care of your family.”

There’s a spark of electricity, and Game Rule’s body glows as it rises; they float up, up, and the buddies can already see their body being repaired, some sort of nanotechnology activated by their parents, who take their child back into their care.

Order notes, “Rules Of The Game is fortunate to have such good friends, able to answer their distress signal before we could. They might have sustained worse damage if it weren’t for you.”

Stumpy chuckles nervously and Quack-Quack elbows him.

“We will see to it that they are fixed,” Law promises. “Fixed, operating at peak performance, and ready to rejoin their playmates.” She pauses, then adds, “Guardian.”

Kaeloo straightens her back.

“Thank you for your cooperation.”

She opens her mouth to respond, but the two giant artificial beings fold in on themselves, into the fourth dimension, back to their home, and out of Smileyland. And thank goodness for that. Kaeloo had no idea what she was going to say.

Outside, the skies are clear. As far as the eye can see, absolutely everything is wet from the rain, but in a beautiful, picturesque sort of way, like any heaven should be. The buddies, from the originals to the additions, all stand as one; there’s small clusters among them, of course, as one cannot expect such a large group to keep track of absolutely everyone at once, and it would be quite ridiculous to attempt to do so, but that does not detract from the fact that they are together.

Petit Mouton crests the hill, sweating, panting. Behind him, Olaf rolls up in a sleigh pulled by Serguei, accompanied by a small army of robot fridge penguins. The older man holds some kind of shotgun-style freezing ray in his arms, looking ready for anything.

“We’re here, we made it,” wheezes Petit Mouton. “Guys, look, I got backup! W– Wait.” He catches his breath. It takes more than a moment. “What happened? Is it over?” He looks all around, as if finally noticing the end of the storm, the end of the game, the end of the story, and he puts his head in his hands. “Aw jeez! I bet it was the coolest ending ever and I missed it! ”

“It’s alright, Mr Mouton,” says Vitamin a little groggily. It’s bad enough having passed out, but getting used to moving at the same speed as the world is awfully disorienting. She leans on Snitchy and Checkout, and they’re happy to share the weight. “It’s all on camera.”

“That’s right!” Mimi cries excitedly. “Oh, can I help you edit it together? Please? Can I make a fancam of myself?” She turns to the others. “You guys get one too, duh! But me first.”

“Alright, but don’t forget who to do second,” says Pretty. She ruffles Mimi’s hair, then looks at Eugly with a grin. “The killer secret underboss of the Game Museum.”

Eugly hunches up bashfully, then thinks better of it and squares her shoulders, smiling proudly. It feels good to be seen.

“Kaeloo,” Moldie pipes in quietly, giving the Guardian on Smileyland a gentle prod. “The, um. That party you said we could have…” She sees the look on Kaeloo’s face and brightens hers to match. “Yo, for real? Like actually?”

Lavenblah claps her hands. “I love parties!” 

“I brought my minions…for a party?” Olaf grunts, thoroughly unimpressed.

“They can help with the preparations!” Kaeloo tells him without missing a beat. “It’s going to be perfect, I just know it. We’re all going to have the best time!”

“Fun for the whole family?” suggests Mr Cat, and Stumpy laughs and shoves him goodnaturedly.

Let’s get started right away, Quack-Quack says, leading the charge down the hill. The others follow, but then one last voice chimes in.

“Just one last thing before we go,” says the girl, tying the string of her balloon to the hook on the back of her mom’s picture frame. She finishes up what she’s doing and looks up to realise she really does have everyone’s attention. “I… I think I’d like it if you could start calling me Violet.” She gauges the reactions of her friends and family, then smiles cheekily. “And can we play another game of Mafia?”