Liesmith: Book 1 of the Wyrd

Sixteen

The night started out awesome: ice cream, video games, nail polish, and Em. A real girls' night in, doing girly things, to make up for all the time Em had been spending recently with that guy she'd met online. LambChop, or whatever his real name was.

It was just at the pinkest part of dusk, and Wayne was in the kitchen, fetching food while Em lounged around on the couch, newly painted toenails up in a foam thingie. They were a good hour into their main activity for the night, replaying Remnant World 2: Red August without saving (or dying) in order to unlock the final costume. It was about three hours of gameplay, if they took the short route (which they would). Em was working through the "normal day" intro scenes, up until the opening of the August Room, after which she would hand the controller over to Wayne and spend most of the rest of the evening hiding behind a pillow.

It was that sort of game.

Wayne was adding choc chips to their ice cream when she heard, "Wayne! Cutscene!"

She hurried back into the lounge room with the bowls, just in time to watch Carol rip the red tape off the August Room door. Wayne had played RW2 at least five times already, and the scene was still creepy as hell. Watching Carol walk into the featureless corridor, Wayne silently chanting Go back go back Carol go back as the latter vanished farther and farther into the blackness, knowing what she'd find on the other side, the room full of—

The lights flickered.

Distracted from the screen, Wayne looked up at the ceiling before sharing a glance with Em. They weren't that far along, but . . .

"Is it still raining outside?"

"Nah, I think it's cleared," Wayne said. On the screen, Carol came to the end of the Black Hall and opened the First Door.

Em opened her mouth to reply, but it was about then that every single light in the house went dark.

"Uh . . ."

The click-whirr of the Inferno and the TV restarting happened first, then all the lights flickering back to life.

"Aurgh!"

They both curled up, covering their ears against the roar of static coming from the TV. Em lunged for the controller and started dialing down the volume. The little bar on the screen was filled all the way to the right, which was totally not how they'd left it.

Also, why was their digital TV playing static? And why wasn't the Inferno coming back online?

"What the fucking Christ was that?" Em said as soon as they could hear themselves think above the white-noise roar.

Wayne had scooted in front of the TV and was poking at the console. The lights were all on, but it didn't seem to be spinning the disc.

The TV flickered as Em tried cycling through the channels: a flash of blackness followed by another burst of static, over and over again.

"What the hell . . . ?"

"Is it fried?" Wayne peered at the TV screen.

"Something like that." Em sounded thoughtful. "I can't see how, though. Every channel is dead."

"Yeah. Inferno's gone too . . ." Wayne stood up. Whatever was wrong with the thing, poking at it wasn't going to help.

"Hell of a thing to happen, tonight of all nights."

"Creepy," Wayne agreed, just as the lights flickered again. Em flinched, but Wayne pretended not to notice.

"We should check the other TV." Em tapped her toenails, checking whether the polish had set. Then she pulled out the separators. "See whether it's just the one in here that's screwed."