𝐌𝐄𝐓𝐀𝐍𝐎𝐈𝐀 - TMR, Gally ¹

𝟢𝟢𝟨，𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬

CH. SIX
┗━━━━━༻❁༺━━━━━┛

The last job she had to keep herself busy with were The Bricknicks. They repair things. Builders built, they repair, and according to Gally's sloppy work, they have quite a lot to repair.

But it's boring, because The Keeper doesn't really speak except for telling her what to do... which was handing him all kinds of things. Just like she had to do with Gally.

"Hey, where are you going?!" The keeper yelps from his place up a ladder, where he's repairing something in the roof of The Homestead or whatever.

"Hell." Joan makes her way to the wood, where she steals a block wood, knife, and axe from the Builders. Walking back with the heavy stuff in her hands, she sits down on the same trunk and starts her work.

She cuts the wood in four pieces, taking one of them. That one, she start carving in. Once the shape, after at least half an hour, is to her liking, she steals sandpaper and scrubs it all over the wood.

"Explain what you're doing now?" The Keeper peeks at her work.

"What does it look like?" She holds the thing up. "Do we have rocks or anything?"

He sighs. "Over at the lake. Center of the woods."

And she vanishes again, carrying her tool with her in case someone decided to be funny and steal it. It's the start of a hammer. A better one, but she will somehow need to carve rocks in the right shape too, if she wants it to work.

On her way to the lake—the mossy smell telling her where to go—her eye catches something in the corner.

The Deadheads.

Nick.

Curious, she moves toward the weird statues that stand there. Made with branches and skulls, some kind of... animals? Whatever, it's creepy.

Below that, there's multiple names carved into multiple blocks of wood. A specific one catches her eye.

Let Nick be a message, no escaping through the box.

Her breaths stagger for a second, but she recovers fast and looks at the other names. Stephen, George, Justin.

A fast whoosh of air behind her makes her spin around, and her eyes wide.

Fire. It's everywhere. The trees are burning to the ground, the rotten smell of the corpses behind her makes her wince, and the sun's shooting flares at the area.

That's where it's coming from. The sun that had been so giant in the kitchen has now exploded, and everything's on fire.

It can't be real. Three seconds ago, everything was fine and— was it? She wasn't paying attention to see.

Eventually, she decides not to start yelling for help and walks back to the lake to collect a big stone.

The lake is beautiful, though. The trees around it haven't burned down. There's a few flowers and interesting green plants, and the water is clear. Perhaps she'll come here more often.

With a good rock in her hands, she also takes a few flowers and plants that give her a faint recognition... as if they're good for something. It itches her brain. Did she know more about all of this in the past?