A Gamer's Guide 415 (Patreon)

“Good.” Knife in hand, she went up to Kitty, and by standing on her tip-toes, she was able to get a pretty good angle for her knife. After only a moment’s hesitation, she pressed the tip against the side of his throat, just above Garath’s fingers, and was genuinely surprised to find it instantly and without any resistance whatsoever slip inside his skin. Actually, his skin didn’t even seem to be skin at all. It was much more akin to a thin, tightly stretched fabric, maybe silk or similar. Not even the interior part was any difficult to slice through. As a matter of fact, she couldn’t even seem to feel any flesh whatsoever—it was nothing but maggots. She ended up easily slicing the fabric of his neck, going across the full circumference, not paying too much attention to the frankly absurd amount of maggots simply dropping out of the open bit. 

Eventually, without any real strain whatsoever, she’d cut all the way around his neck, leaving the pieces of fabric completely disconnected, with the maggots tumbling out one by one. Still, Kitty wasn’t falling.

“I think it’s my spine,” he said. “Maybe if you jimmy the knife between my vertebrae?”

“Alright,” she said, pushing the knife inside until she could feel it hitting something more tangible than maggots. After only a little scraping around, she was able to find the spot where the two vertebrae connected, and with a well-aimed stab of the knife, the two slipped apart.

Kitty’s body clattered out of Garath’s hand, maggots spilling out of his open neck-hole, while his head did a similar routine, dropping off the top of Garath’s near-fully closed fist to hit the floor with a strangely satisfying crunch. “Owwie.”

Ignoring him, Rafiloe put every bit of sense she had left into hoping for enough strength to move both Garath and Lett out of the room. Garath’s muscles must have been filled with helium, though, because she was able to move him with far more ease than should have been realistically possible. Outside the door, both Maggie and Prop had been able to pull themselves together somewhat, Maggie sitting with her hands on the back of her head and her eyes pressed into her knees, while Prop sat cross-legged and slack-jawed.

“Don’t come in,” Rafiloe said, depositing Garath and Lett right next to them. “If you come in, you might see something kind of really gross.”

They didn’t say anything in response, but she felt fairly certain that they had heard what she’d said, so she still closed the door on them. For the sake of it, she even slid the big metal beam into place, ensuring that nobody could come in. And then, she turned to look at Kitty. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, holding his own head, frowning at his body. 

“My head’s a bit squishy,” he muttered, not looking up at her as she approached. “I think my skull might have cracked. No idea how I’ll fix it.”

“Doesn’t it heal by itself?”

“No, not anymore,” he said.

“Because you’re—” She stopped herself. Because your second ascension fucked with the system, so your skills are gone. That was why. She knew it. How did she know it? He hadn’t said it. He hadn’t said it last night, either. He hadn’t known until a few hours ago, so…

He turned his head towards her, smiling lightly. “Interesting. Goes both ways now, huh?”

“I sincerely hope not,” she said, taking a seat next to him.

He stared at her intensely. Weirdly intensely. “Aw. It’s not consistent. I was hoping we could have a psychic conversation. Then I wouldn’t have to explain anything and you’d just know.”

Hand over her mouth, she glanced between his body and his head. There were maggots all over the floor, on the bed. Writhing and wriggling. “So,” she said, finally, “if you can’t do your wolverine-healing thing anymore, how are you going to put yourself together again?”

“Oh, uh…” Putting his head in his lap, he gestured at the air as though to pull something out of his inventory, only for nothing to come out. “Ah. Shoot.”

“What is it?”

“I was going to try to sew myself together, but my sewing kit is in my inventory, and my inventory is, it’s…” He gestured futilely at the air. The movement was a little too much though, as his head rolled off of his lap to thump face-first onto the floor. Leaning down, he picked up his own head, a few maggots getting left behind on the floor. “Dang, this is…”

Rafiloe handed him her own sewing kit. “Here,” she said. 

“Thanks,” he said, squeezing his head into the nook of his arm while he accepted the lizard-shaped bag of sewing stuff. Placing it in his lap, between his thighs, he opened it up, pulling out the pin-cushion shaped like a heart, the scissors that looked like a drake (the only acceptable type of sewing scissors), needle, and a spool of thread. 

She watched him prepare everything. “So, it wasn’t on purpose?”

“What wasn’t?” he said, cutting a length of pink thread.

“Becoming your apostle.”

“Not at all. I had no idea you would drink my… bloodmilk, and even if I had known, I didn’t know it would make you my apostle. But! But! Just so you know, it isn’t permanent. Only a temporary thing. Might take a few days to wear off, but once it does, you’ll be a-okay, and your hair will go back to its normal color, and we won’t have to think about any of this ever again.”

Needle prepared, he placed his head on his neck, only to pause, as he evidently realized that it wouldn’t exactly be very easy for him to sew his own head back on. Not saying anything, Rafiloe held out her hand. His gaze hopped between her hand and her face, and after a moment or so, he placed the needle into her open palm. Leaning in closer, she said, “Just hold it in place, okay?” 

“Okay,” he said, putting one hand on each temple. 

Oddly enough, even though his skin felt exactly like fabric, it wasn’t fraying. There were no visible threads to it. Not that she was complaining—it would certainly make her task easier. “So… You wouldn’t want me as your apostle?”

He blinked down at her. “What?”

“I mean… I wouldn’t mind it.”

“You wouldn’t?”

“I don’t think so. I’m not sure. What would being your apostle even mean?”

“In what sense?”

“Like… Being an apostle, for most gods, it’s all about doing their bidding, going on quests, making sure that people follow the desires of said god, spreading the word… All that sort of stuff. Would you demand that I do that?”

“Gecko, I’ve barely even come to terms with being a god at all. I absolutely do not care enough about my divine image or my own desires to demand anything from you.” With one hand pressed around the back of his neck, she pushed the needle through the fabric of his skin, in and out, in slanted lines, pulling them taught but not breaking them. “Which is to say, I guess, I wouldn’t mind whatever you did.”

“Even if I did bad stuff?” she asked, her eyes still on the needle and the thread. “I don’t think either of us know what kind of powers I’d get from this. I might end up a walking nuke, destroying everyone I meet. Literally speaking, those deaths would be on you. Everyone would think so too—there goes the apostle of Hope. What a cruel man! That must mean the god of hope is cruel, too. And they’d be right.”

“Nah, you wouldn’t do that,” he said, scootching a little to the right, letting her reach around his throat. “I trust you, Gecko. You can be a little cowardly at times, but… In the end, you want to do what’s best.” He smiled at her. “You’d do good with an apostleship. Maybe even better than anything I’d do with my powers.”

She frowned to herself. “Fuck, man, how do you always find a way to put yourself down?”

“Sorry.”

“Better be. It’s a nasty habit,” she said. Crawling onto the bed, she finished up doing the back half of his neck. And then, she continued, redoing the stitches, this time at the opposite angle, creating little crosses as she went across his neck. 

He watched her for a few moments. “So, just to confirm, you would like to be my apostle?”

She shrugged. “Well, sure, if you don’t mind it too much?”

“What’s there to mind? You’re my friend.”

“Of course, but, I mean… What if we end up becoming not-friends? Enemies, or strangers, or worse? Apostleship is until death. If you find someone better-suited, you’d have to kill me. And if we don’t stay friends, you’ll have to go around, knowing your one and only apostle is some asshole wanna-be witch.”

“That’d suck, I guess, but I think even if we aren’t friends anymore, I still trust you. It’ll be fine.” He smiled at her.

She paused. His face was so earnest. Absolutely pure and innocent and open. Like the thought of her not being equally earnest was not just unlikely, but down right unthinkable. There was simply no reality in which she was pretending to be trustworthy. Sighing, she smiled back at him. “In that case, I think becoming your apostle would be nice.”

“Really?” he said, genuine excitement in his voice. “I mean—just so we’re clear, it’s fine if you don’t want to. And if you do want to, then it’ll be an equal partnership, okay? God, apostle, those are just titles. We’d be working together to make things good. No orders given, just suggestions. Discussions and such.”

“Sounds good,” Rafiloe said, tying the final bit of thread, fastening it several times before cutting off the line with her wonderful scissors. “There, done. How does it feel?” 

Rubbing his neck, he moved his head about, getting a feel for it. “You’re really good at this,” he said, smiling. 

“My dad taught me,” she said, reciprocating the smile. “Now, mind showing me your arm, too?”