“You met our creator?”

I’m not saying anything to Mickey as he asks me this. He has to sit down, he is getting sick faster, and the madami I am not killing anyone the closer he is to dying. I just feel too upset to talk. I’m thinking of too many things and thinking about what will happen just makes me madami upset but I cannot stop myself from thinking them.

I’m standing in front of him, and my eyes and head are pointed at the ground. I do not want him to see my face, either of them. I do not want to tell him that he will die. I don’t want to tell Chowder… who I-

“I feel thirsty.” I say. All of this thought is making my throat feel dry and sore. I also want to be left alone at the time. tsauder wants me to stay but Mickey says I can go.

I gulp down two glasses of water and sip on the third. tsauder comes into the kusina with me. “I want to know what you found out.” He tells me.

“I… do not want to talk about it.” I say lowly.

“That is not a good reason. You say that you met our creator then you just stay silent. What did he tell you?”

“Will you hurt me if I do not tell you?” I do not know why I feel less afraid of tsauder now. But I begin to feel afraid again as soon as he makes that angry face again. His hands are in tight fists. He might hurt me, and Mickey will not be able to stop him.

“I am not answering that question.” He growls at me. “We sent you there for a reason, and now you are back here with information we could use. Did you find an escape?” I do not reply. I do not want him to know until I am sure of what I should do. “Did the creator tell you new words?” I still remain quiet. “Did he say anything about Mickey?”

My head drops while I cringe. I shakily place my cup down. I am still not talking but tsauder knows. “… What did he say about Mickey?”

He will not leave me alone now. He knows too much about it. Maybe… no, if we try to trick the creator he will use the… arms. “He… Mickey is dying.”

tsauder does not say anything to me for a while after this. In fact he actually leaves the room. I am alone for three minutes. I know the time because I count the seconds. I do this so that I can stop thinking for a little while. I want to think of a plan but the madami I try I just get madami upset, and unable to think clearly. So I count.

When he comes back, tsauder asks me “Did he tell you a way that we can save Mickey?” I nod. I hope he does not ask what the way is. I know what I will have to tell him, and then heh WILL hurt me. He still asks though, and I am not surprised.

“Mickey… his s-soul is trying to keep his body normal, but… his body is turning back to… before, I don’t know what the before is. He can be made well for a while, but it will not be forever. Still… the creator can do it…”

I want him to say that he will fix it. I want tsauder to leave, talk to Mickey. Mickey has to know what to do. Maybe Mickey can talk to the creator. No, of course not. “You were going to say something else, were not you?”

I correct him in my head ‘weren’t you’ but I do not say it out loud. That will just make things worse. So… I walk out. Mickey waits outside and looks over to us. I say us because tsauder obviously follows me, still asking what I was going to say. Once I am evenly between both of them I reply quickly “He sinabi that he would save Mickey if I killed” I have to take a deep breath before continuing. “…killed the person I care the, th-the least ab-bout…”

tsauder sits on the sopa with his hands cupped and pressed against his face. His eyes keep moving everywhere, sometimes looking back at me. When they do, I flinch. Mickey is less stunned but that may be because he cannot get very excited without hurting himself. I know that tsauder is going to ask who it is. It is going to happen at one point, so I might as well say who. “It’s Chowder.”

He looks so… sad now. He isn’t crying but his eyes are closed, his breathing is loud, and he looks… crunched, I think that works there. I do not know how I could have made it better, or sinabi it better. I don’t think I should have sinabi anything at all. I want to tell him that it wasn’t the… truth. But it was the truth. I am not a liar, at least not yet, but should I lie? Should I tell him a lie to make him happy again?

“Then…” Mickey says, sounding out of breath, “I need to die.”

I feel my ears stand straight upward as I turn my head quickly to face him. He wants to die- he’s willing to die? B-but he can’t, I don’t want him to die, he’s been so-

I see Chowder, just a little bit, in the corner of my right eye. Suddenly I feel ill, weak, and… guilty. I do not sit on the couch, I do not want to be near either of them, I feel like I’ve betrayed them both, so I sit on the floor. tsauder was not nice to me, but he was never… he never hurt me, he helped me a few times. Why can’t I care about him like I care about Mickey?

We are not talking to each other. We are not moving either. I do not know what they are thinking about but all that I can think of is how upset I am with myself. At one point though, tsauder says to us “We kill the creator then.”

Mickey and I are both quiet when he says this but he has our attention. “I doubt you care about him as much as you care about me, so why not just kill him? You met him once already. If you get close to him you can kill him.”

I think it over. It’s true I do not like the creator much at all, but… he is our only chance of saving Mickey. “But who will save Mickey? Do you know how to do that?”

tsauder looks down at an angle, groaning and sighing. “Maybe you could get him to tell you? Find him again, talk with him, and see if he tells you. Once you find out you kill him and we fix Mickey.”

“But what if I can’t remember how? He listed a lot of things wrong with Mickey and I do not remember most of those.”

“If… you write it down,” Mickey adds, “then- wait we can’t let her do this.”

“Why not!?” tsauder turns his head quickly towards Mickey.

“What if he tries to kill HER?” Mickey replies. “What if he uses the arms to kill her? She hasn’t killed or beaten those before, have you?” He directs to me.

I shake my head. “I saw… tubes, at the tuktok of it that could… maybe be broken, but I was not able to. If I could stab it with a kutsilyo I might be able to stop it but I am not sure.”

“Well you should keep a kutsilyo either way.” tsauder informs. “For anything.”

“Chowder, why don’t you go?” I ask. “You are much stronger than I am, and you know what has to be done. I don’t want to forget everything and ruin this.”

“You have to go because you are the only one who can fit, and you’re the only one he might trust enough to get close to. And when you are close enough, you kill him.”

“You… you want me to betray him?” I do not like this idea. I do not want to kill anyone and I do not want to betray anyone. I do not know why Mickey has to die or why someone else does instead, it does not make sense to me. I just wish the creator… CROW, would let him live and… let us leave, together, all three of us.

“He betrayed you.” tsauder sounds madami angry now. I guess he is angry at the creator so I am not frightened this time. “He made us didn’t he? Now he’s not even willing to keep us alive?? If he were a real father he would want to keep us safe! If you trick him, you’ll be giving him what he deserves.”

If I tell him that I will not do it, tsauder will just become madami angry-… angrier, so I say nothing. I wish there was something else that we could do. uwak wants to keep his, his resources, but if we save Mickey he will lose some of them. Could I get him madami resources to save Mickey? I guess I will have to wait until I see him again to find out then.

“She doesn’t want to do it, Chowder.” Mickey says with a deep breath. “I appreciate your concern but we can’t make her do that.”

“Someone has to.” tsauder ang sumagot angrily.

“Why? If the creator dies how do we know we can save me?”

“We make him tell us.”

“How do you know he isn’t watching us right now? He could kill us himself right now with those arms.”

tsauder made an angry-sighing sound, crossing his arms and turning away from us both. No one was going to kill anyone, and if no one was going to kill anyone else then Mickey was going to die.

Right now I have to decide on what I am willing to do. Killing the creator will not save Mickey, so he will die either way. It all comes back to the original problem, killing Chowder. I remember fighting with the creature, the one who attacked me. It wanted to kill me. Would I be allowed to kill it? I would have to find it again, and I think I might be able to remember how to get to it.

“I think I know who can die.” I say, breaking the silence. Both of them look at me strangely. “When I was looking for the escape, before finding the creator, I found another house. There was a creature that looked like us. It attacked me, it almost killed me, but I managed to make it unconscious.”

“A cr- were you hurt?” Mickey asks, attempting to stand up but being pushed down gently sa pamamagitan ng Chowder. I do not want to worry them but I suppose they should know. I lift up my sando to my stomach, ipinapakita them the tears on it from the creature.

I feel… strange, doing this, and I quickly pull my sando back down. I look away, still feeling strange, and it is not a good kind of strange. “No, you aren’t going back to that creature.” Mickey tells me.

“I-if I can… k-kill it, this time, it has to count, does it not?” Remembering how terrifying it was fighting the creature, remembering how terrifying it was to feel so… upset and angry with it, makes me feel ill, but I stand still. “I care less about the creature than I care about Ch-“ I stop myself and quickly say “both of you”. I hope tsauder does not figure out what I almost said.

“What happens if you die though?” tsauder asks.

“Then… won’t that count also? Mickey will still live, will he not?”

“That depends on if you care about yourself madami than us or the creature.” tsauder replies.

I am confused sa pamamagitan ng this. I never really thought about how much I care about myself personally. I have always been upset that I have had to be alone, but does that mean I care about me? I… I don’t know. “I don’t know if I do or not. I- I don’t want to,” I have to force the word out “die, but… I want Mickey to live.”

tsauder tells me that he and Mickey need to talk alone so I leave. I go to the restroom and wait inside. It takes six minutos for them to finish… a-and then find me. tsauder opens the door and almost steps on to me, but he jerks back before his foot lands on me.

“S-sorry I thought I-… w-what did you decide?” I stand up.

“You… you will need a weapon and protection.”

“Protection?” What do we use for that?”

“We can bend the metals and make different clothing parts for you to put on…”

“And the weapon?”

“We have madami than enough knives that you can use. Are you sure that you want to do this?”

I am about to think about it but I stop myself. I cannot think about doubt or second-thoughts now. “I just want this to be over and done.”

tsauder nods and walks back to the living-room. I follow. We spend the rest of the araw making protection for me. These plate-shaped things made of metal are found in a drawer. tsauder bends them around my arms. They slip around a bit but they have stick at the ends that I can use to his things with. We sharpen these.

We find other metal plates, one that is a rectangle shape. It is much harder to bend but we are able to fit it around my stomach. Unfortunately I am unable to ilipat well with it wrapped around me, and it is taken off. They get a large amount of shirts and they connect them to mine. If I am scratched at, at least my shirts will be hurt and not me.

At the end my legs, my arms, and my stomach, are protected. I hug both Mickey and tsauder before going. tsauder hugs me back. I tell him that I am sorry for being so upset towards him, and he tells me the same thing. After this is over we can all leave maybe, like we wanted to in the first place. My last words to Mickey are “I will keep you alive.”

I am put back into the ceiling. The arms are not around so far. For some reason I do not think they will be following me this time. So I keep crawling, and crawling, until I reach the house of the creature.

The roof to the area of the creature is not repaired, and I quickly drop down into the room. It is repaired, looking like all the others. I see nothing of the creature yet. I have two knives in my hands, one long and triangular, and the other the same though smaller with jagged lines on it. I keep them in front of me, and constantly turn in different directions in case the creature is near.

The kusina may be the place where it is now. It must be eating so I walk towards it. I feel afraid, but not as afraid as I did before. I am madami prepared and I beat it last time. I hope it will be easier.

I realize that the creature may tackle me if I rush into the room, so I stand to the side of the door and knock on it. I wait for two minutos before knocking again. Suddenly I feel madami stressed. What if this creature was smart like us? What if it knows I am trying to kill it? C-can it smell me? Can it see me? I do not want to go into the room now.

I look around for something that may help me contain the creature. I see the living-room table. If I place that in front of the door then when the creature tries to attack me it will crash into the mesa instead… but the mesa will also make noise. The creature has not attacked me with my noise yet however so… ugh. I feel… irritated, annoyed, stressed. I have to choose something. Either choice may be dangerous so really there is no right or wrong one.

I begin to drag the mesa to the door. At first it isn’t very loud. It makes a brushing sound against the carpet but nothing else, but when it gets on to the wood floor right in front of the kusina door it begins to make a very loud rubbing noise. It sounds similar to a horn, and it definitely has had to catch the attention of the creature.

I lift the mesa up so that it is leaning against the door from tuktok to bottom. susunod I reach over and grab the handle from the side. I slowly turn it, then throw the door open. I can hear it in my head, the mesa slamming against the creature then on to the floor. I expect this to happen so much that I actually almost stab the air after opening the door… but nothing has happened.

I look inside. No creature. The middle-counter is large enough to hide the creature though so maybe it is behind it. I ilipat the mesa aside, and walk in. My knives are out and ready, shaking in my hands. I decide to stand on tuktok of the counter and look down at the other end. The creature is not there either.

For a moment I am able to relax. I decide to get water since I am alone for now. I feel too light-headed not to. After a short drink I walk back out to the living-room. If this house is the same as mine then there will be a bathroom, a bedroom, the work-out roo- the… the bedroom… m-maybe he is asleep…

I start to rush up the stairs to where the bedroom should be, but my large thumping with my feet makes me realize that I need to be quieter. I slowly step now, making long stretches with my legs across the stairs and the upper-floor. I find the bedroom, and once the door is open I do see something inside of the bed. It breathes slowly, and peacefully. It is the creature.

I walk over to it quietly. I do not want to risk being seen so I go to its back. I raise my knives. I… I have to kill it now. I have…

My hands shake so much that the knives fall out of my hands, one hitting the floor and the other landing partially on the floor and partially on my foot. It cuts me but not badly. I do not notice the pain very much, I… I sink into a sitting position on the floor.

I really really really really really really- I don’t… I don’t want to do this, I don’t want to do this I don’t want to “do this!” I’m yelling this now. I am crying again. I know this creature tried to kill me, but it… I still… it hurts. It feels wrong.

I start to breathe slowly, in and out. I keep telling myself that I have to do this, I have so save Mickey. I slowly pick up the knives. I am raising them above the creature. “I have… if I don’t… he… he will…”

I see the creature turning, but the knives are already being pushed down towards him. Screaming. There was screaming.