Ahndrian Archives

With four days come and gone, Malcolm’s social media feeds were stuffed with reactions to his competition announcement. Now that Monday was here and he was off to school, he decided to open up submissions. He set everything up on his computer to automatically open submissions at ten and he quickly snatched up his backpack and headed out the door.

Once he was on the street, he glanced down at his watch, “Seven-thirty. I’ve got time to grab a cup.”

He headed off in the direction of the truck stop. It was a couple blocks off the path to school, but with forty-five minutes to be on the grounds, he decided it was worth the risk. He took his favorite path, cutting through the small alleys between the shops.

The streets were much livelier in the day light. The smell of freshly baked bread from Mrs. Clare’s Bakery was mouthwatering. The soft scent of freshly cut flowers at Perdita’s Petals was soothing. However, the roar of the engine in Mr. Dietric’s truck was enough to wake the entire town. As he pulled up to the garage of his mechanic shop, Malcolm could swear the windows of Perdita’s were shaking.

Malcolm ducked through the last alley and rubbed his hands together with excitement as the truck stop came into view. He stopped just before he walked out the other end of the alley. His thoughts flashed back to the strange man who had walked past him the other night when he left the alley near the clock tower. He didn’t know why, but his gut was telling him that he was nearby.

He took a deep breath and looked towards the truck stop. From out the front door walked Seela, carrying two cups of premium sludge. Malcolm sighed and with a smile he leapt from the shadow of the alley and raced across the street to meet up with her.

“Yo, Seela.” Malcolm called out.

Seela turned towards him and raised both her arms with a big smile on her face, “There you are. I’ve been going in and out of this place for like fifteen minutes. It’s cold as hell out.”

Malcolm looked up at the cloudy sky and shrugged. He hadn’t even noticed the cold, but now that he was paying attention, he could tell she was right. Even for late fall, it was incredibly cold in Tracton.

“Ah, we’ll survive. Where’s G?” Malcolm asked.

“Who knows. He said he’d meet us at school when we talked last night. Figured you’d be coming here before you headed in, so I thought I’d meet up with you.”

Knowing Giovanni wasn’t coming meant the second cup in her hand was definitely for him. He swiped it from her with ease and took a big gulp.

“You know, you could’ve asked first,” Seela smacked his arm just as he pulled the cup from his lips, “asshole.”

“No G means it’s for me. Besides, how’d you even know I was gunna be here?”

“Oh please. First day back to school after break means you probably had your outfit picked out by...Saturday?” she pinched her chin between her fingers like she had put a lot of deep thought into her answer.

Malcolm made a honking sound, like a buzzer on a game show, “Wrong. It was...definitely not walking into that one. Either way, thank you for the coffee, but if we don’t get going, we’re both gonna end up late.”

“Shit!” Seela exclaimed.

They both took off towards the school, their feet slapping the pavement with every step. They laughed off their mistake and ran together, full of energy despite the early morning.

As the school came into view, Malcolm looked down at his watch again, “Eight-ten, we’re gunna make it.”

Seela thrusted her fist in the air, “Woo!” She closed her eyes for a brief second as she cheered, and still running. Her foot caught the curb and she stumbled forward. Malcolm grabbed her bag before she could faceplant onto the pavement. He held her still for a moment, suspended in a diagonal position and left to contemplate her decisions.

“So, we’re just gunna not tell Giovanni about this one, okay?” She whimpered.

“Absolutely not, scout’s honor.” Malcolm replied, doing his best not to laugh at her.

He lifted her back to her feet and they both jogged the last few feet and into the front door as the bell rang. Malcolm leaned against the nearest wall and huffed as he tried to catch his breath. Seela, not so elegantly, dropped to the ground and propped herself up against the wall.

Just as they were finally breathing normally again, Giovanni slumped around the corner, looking more down in the morning than usual.

“Sup, Zombie.” Seela teased. Giovanni was never a morning person. Even when he and Malcolm were in elementary school, Giovanni was the kid most expected to sleep during early morning classes. Nothing changed throughout middle and high school.

“Ha-ha, it’s only funny cause you two somehow wake up like the damn Energizer bunny.” he reached out and took the cup of coffee Seela held out towards him. It had gotten much colder since they ran there and Seela had already drank more than half of it, but Giovanni was just grateful to have something.

“Hey, I know what will make you feel better.” Malcolm interjected.

Giovanni raised an eyebrow and Seela turned around and stared daggers at him, but he took no notice.

“Seela damn near wiped out. Right in front of the school.”

Giovanni choked on a mouthful of coffee and tried just as hard as Malcolm did to stifle his laughter.

Seela stood up and stomped in front of Malcolm. “Did I not just ask you not to tell him?”

“Oh, come on. You knew I was definitely going to tell him.” Malcolm shrugged.

“Yes, but I figured you’d at least wait longer than five minutes and pretend you tried!”

The three of them laughed and headed off to class. Things felt normal. They felt calm and Malcolm enjoyed that.

The rest of their school day passed by in a breeze. Malcolm, Giovanni, and Seela met by the front door. Malcolm was the first one there. He nestled himself against the same wall he rested on that morning. His pocket had been buzzing all day, but he didn’t want to get into it until he could read everything.

He reached in his pocket and slid his phone out. Every social media page he had was full of notifications. A mix of emotions flooded the timeline. Some were pissed off because of the short time submissions were open. Others were laughing at their pain or sympathizing. Then there were the relieved few that officially got their submission through. Just one minute. That’s how long the submissions were open before every slot had been filled.

Malcolm stared at his phone in disbelief. He knew his popularity was high, but he couldn’t believe people were so involved in his silly tournament. The only prize he really guaranteed was his worthless stamp of approval. Even at his level, he couldn’t offer them much cash.

“So, seems like the contest is pretty popular.”

Malcolm jumped at the sound of Seela’s voice. He was so engrossed in the comments that he hadn’t heard them coming. He put his hand on his chest and did his best to bring its erratic beating back to normal. As he took deep breaths in and out, he realized that this was the first time all day his heart was racing. Even though he ran most of the way to school. He shook it out of his head and figured he just simply hadn’t noticed earlier. There was no way he could have run that distance and his heart wasn’t beating faster.

“So, is it?” Seela asked, breaking his daze.

“Oh, yeah. Submissions filled up in just a minute. Everyone’s going crazy.” Malcolm answered.

“Wow, at ten a.m.? I’m surprised more of those kids weren’t at school.” Giovanni joked.

Malcolm shoved him and laughed, “Shut up. Most of my fans aren’t kids. I probably got some pretty big indie studios submitting. Haven’t actually checked out the submissions yet.”

“Well, if you need some special guest judges,” Giovanni leaned back and motioned repeatedly between him and Seela, who just stood there rocking on her heels. “Come on. You know your fans love it when we’re on.”

“It’s just a bunch of dudes talking about how hot Seela is. Actually, a lot of them talk about how hot they think you are too. There’s some weird fanfiction out there with us two.”

Giovanni walked forward and put his hand on Malcolm’s shoulder, “This is gonna start out sounding really weird, but do you have the links to those fanfics?”

Malcolm cocked his eyebrow and stared silently at Giovanni’s face. He didn’t know how to feel about the question. Giovanni’s face was incredibly serious all of a sudden.

“I’ll shoot you a link later...I guess.” Malcolm responded.

Giovanni nodded, turned, and started out the front door. Seela looked at Malcolm and they both shrugged, Malcolm swore he heard Giovanni whisper “I’m famous.” to her before he walked out the door.

The time had finally come. The rest of the month raced by in monotony while he waited to begin his livestreamed competition. His followers had bombarded him with so many questions about the submissions, but he didn’t have any answers. He decided to wait until he could play them instead of looking into them beforehand. He was ready to dive in blind with the rest of them and just the thought of what awaited him made his heart race.

He slid into his computer chair seconds after he barged into the house. He sent out a notice that he was going live in an hour and the moment he sent the post he was up again, making sure everything was prepared and ready to go perfectly.

Once he was ready— new outfit, all his lighting, hair fixed, entire visible room space cleaned, and of course his crown for whenever he did something ‘awesome’— Malcolm logged into his stream and let the countdown begin.

“What’s going on everybody! King Mac is back!” Malcolm cheered his own arrival with the slew of viewers flooding his chat.

One message in particular caught his eye.

SeelieQueen: Maco*

“I see some of my IRL friends decided to join us tonight. One of them thinks she’s funny,” he flipped off the camera— just for Seela. “Now, I’ll breakdown how this is gonna play out...”

He had only decided on the structure of the tournament yesterday, but he figured it would play out how he needed it to. He decided he’d stream the first round for five days straight. Four games a day, an hour per game, and then he’d tally up points in different areas for that hour. Any game he was able to beat too quickly was getting chopped immediately. Everything else was centered around art, story, mechanics, and other specifics he encountered in the game.

“...if everyone’s got it, then let’s jump right in,” Malcolm opened the submissions box for the first time and his face lit up. There were submissions from at least five big indie studios. The rest of them were names he had played games from before or simply he’d heard of them and knew the game was in development and had been waiting to play it.

However, he didn’t recognize one of them, nor did he know the developer whose name was tacked onto it. Still, it was the very first game submitted. They clearly meant business when giving this to Malcolm. He clicked on it and tapped a few installation prompts, skipping over the usual notices. Once the game installed, he dragged the window onto the recorded screen and jumped in.

“So, the first game we’re playing is coming from some nobody who was stupid eager to get this game submitted in time,” It was the truth...kind of. “It’s called Hunter. That name is kind of sick, I like it. The developer’s name is R, less than sign, P, R. Kind of a stupid name there, but I’m guessing you’re supposed to say that like reaper, so that’s what I’ll call you. Let’s dive in and see if it’s worth my time.”

Malcolm clicked the screen once more and the title screen popped up, along with the sudden accompaniment of loud music. The music itself was nothing special— the usual ghostly wailing style of most horror games. He put his hands up and put on a show of feigned fear before laughing at the generic music choice.

He shook his head and clicked again. The room seemed to drop drastically in temperature all at once. The chill that ran through Malcolm was sudden and confusing. He looked over to his window, but it was shut tight, and he could see the trees, unwavering, on the other side of the glass.

He shook it off and looked back at his computer screen. An image of a knife on top of a sheet of paper with the words ‘Hit List’ written at the top was now on display. There were letters down the side of the hit list: G, N, S and an M. Beneath all of it the ‘Start Game’ prompt flashed continuously as though it was begging him to click it.

“I’ll give it to you, Reaper. This is actually some spooky shit. Let’s hope the gameplay holds up.” Malcolm scanned the list again and again, wondering if it would have some deeper meaning in the grand scheme of the game.

He decided to click the start prompt and as the screen began to change, his concentration broke when he saw a message pop up in his chat.

R<PR: Let the game begin.

The chat flooded once more as his viewers took R<PR’s words the same way Malcolm had. That was a challenge. Malcolm thought to himself, the slew of messages echoing his thoughts. For the first time in a long time, someone was directly posing a challenge to Malcolm, and for some reason...he felt something else behind that message. Despite it having no tone to read whatsoever, he felt an edge in those words.

He took a deep breath and looked away from the chat. He realized that he could hear a bell ringing— tolling in the background. He looked back at the game screen and saw the picture of the list had been replaced with the image of a clock tower. Though it wasn’t just any clock tower, it was the one in Tracton. The exact same one.

The chill ran through him again and this time, his breathing became a little more erratic. He closed his eyes and tried to get it even. It’s just a coincidence, he told himself. Once his breathing slowed, he could hear the bell toll more clearly. It wasn’t coming through the headphones. He looked over at the window and pulled the headphones off his head. He could still hear it, the ringing of the bell.

He walked over to his window, the ringing growing louder with each step. Once he opened it, that’s when he could no longer deny it. Clear as day, the ringing came from the direction of the clock tower. His clock tower. The same one that hadn’t rang in over 60 years. Every person he could see from his window was stopped, wherever they stood and listened to the haunting clang of the bronze bell.