Hollow Mask

The body laid in the grass. It was dead and cold. Well, not exactly dead, it was more like just being inactive. But for most people the body would be dead. It had laid out in the cold for hours now, without breathing or a heartbeat.

A small drop of water fell from a nearby tree on the skin on the forehead. Although many nerves had fired beforehand, these signals managed to get deeper into the brain.

A very basic and small part of the brain activated again. It registered a few things. First, it was alive. Second, there was no heartbeat or breathing. Third, it was cold. Fourth, the consciousness was inactive.

Signals were sent into other parts of the brain and finally relayed into the body. The heart began beating again and the lungs filled with fresh air. Like a machine the body activated part for part. Warmth spread through it.

When every organ was working nominal the small network of neurons decided to proceed. It activated a larger part of the brain. It moved on from checking the body to checking the brain.

At first all things were nominal. That was, until it encountered a few holes. Specific memories could not be accessed. They were still there and active just not accessible.

As this was not critical for the brain to function the mechanism moved on. It crashed into a wall of errors when it tried to activate the consciousness. There was none. A black hole of nothingness where normally the thinking mind would reside.

The active part of the brain wasn’t really intelligent, merely a collection of instincts and programs imprinted into the brain, so it couldn’t panic but it tried. Signals raced through the brain, trying to do anything.

Suddenly it found something. A consciousness but out of place. It resided in a smaller part of the brain, usually responsible for background information but utilized the whole brain like a normal consciousness.

The mechanism did what it was made to do and activated it.

The woman woke up with a start. She gasped for air while moving into a sitting position. After a few coughs and overcoming the initial surprise that she was somehow alive, she looked around.

The park was small. A tree was standing right beside her. The rest of the park was almost empty, beside a few flower beds.

She looked around but didn’t recognize the area, so she activated her magic. The level of her mana reserves was dangerously low and they weren’t regenerating. Sparing as most as she could, she cast a simple location spell. The results were instant. She was back home. Or, at least, in the same universe.

“Not possible,” she muttered. The first words since she died.

She stood up and activated her SEP-field. The field didn’t require much mana energy, in fact you could power it with a normal flashlight battery for months, so it was the best option. Still, it would drain her in about 24 hours of continuous use, which put her mana levels in perspective for her.

The woman decided to find out where she was and walked out of the park. She entered the city around the park. The signs told her where exactly she was. It wasn’t a place she could find in any of her memories but she knew how to get to the house from here using the signs.

It was not really her house, depending on the point of view, but if she was here, so would he. It was pure luck that she had reappeared so close to it.

Without problem she used the subway to get into the right district. The SEP-field worked as intended, the conductor's eyes just skipped over her. From there it was only a few minutes until she stood before the door. A door that she had never seen but many memories from.

After disabling the SEP-field she touched the frame with a nostalgic sigh, then knocked three times.

“I’m coming,” said a raspy, deep voice from inside. It belonged to a man, she knew very well. She could hear footsteps on the other side before the door opened.

The man stared at her for about a minute. His hair and beard were long and unwashed. He looked malnourished, pale and his breath stunk of alcohol. His eyes scanned every part of the woman, who tried to interpret his expressions. Her suit was mostly clean, aside a few dirty or wet spots.

He finally spoke, “I’ve been wondering when you would turn up.” He smirked and blocked the doorway.

The woman sighed, “I’m as thankful to be alive as you are. It looks like, you neglected yourself a lot lately.”

“Why can’t you never just say hello, Olivia?” The man stepped aside and let Olivia in.

The Librarian walked in and found herself in the living room. The room was a mess; empty and full bottles laid around, most of them had or still contained alcohol. Despite the mess, no food laid around.

Olivia walked in the kitchen and opened the fridge. It was empty.

“You know, some people eat to stay alive,” she said. The man had followed her around. He just huffed.

“I haven’t eaten anything in the last month. Don’t know why but it told me that at least some part of the last two month where true. Were it two months? Can’t really recall,” he whispered.

“Well, that applies to me aswell, although I'm used to it,” Olivia quipped. They moved back in the small living room. Olivia sat on the couch and tried to relax while the man sat down in a small arm chair.

“You know, the last few months weren’t the nicest,” he suddenly said, “I mean, all these ponies and stuff and all the crap about dealing with evil and stuff. I’m just tired now.” He moved up his arm, which now held a revolver Olivia hadn’t seen before. She looked at the gun disinterested.

He held it against his temple, “Sometimes I just think; ‘Why not pull the trigger? Why not just end it?’ And sometimes I even do it - ” The gun clicked as the hammer hit against nothing “ - But I just can’t bring myself to load the gun. It’s just a nice feeling. The cold metal against my head. The certainty of death. Why not just end it, Olivia?”

“Because we still have a job, Hunter.”

The man yelled, “Pah, I don’t even remember my old name and I doubt you do. I’ve been living here for a MONTH, Olivia. I don’t need to eat, don’t need to drink. I just continue to exist. I died back there and you say we have still a job. A reason to live. I’ve nothing left, Olivia.”

“I still remember my name,” whispered Olivia. She wanted to curl up and sleep but she could allow herself to show weakness.

“If somebody or ‘somepony’ still cared for us they would have turned up by now. There is nothing left for me,” he sighed, “We should go and find a skyscraper to jump off from. You know, go up and look down. Then we rate the sight on a scale of one to ten and we jump off the best one. What do you say?” The gun clicked again.

“Give them a week or so, they might still come. Then we can go sightseeing all you want,” Olivia said defeated. “They will come,” she reassured herself in an almost inaudible whisper.

The man smiled and pulled the trigger again. The Librarian laid down on the couch and drifted off into sleep. Her mana was almost depleted now. Compared to her usual reserves the amount of magic needed for a SEP-field is almost unnoticeable but in the last hours she had drained almost half of what had been left. The sleep would regenerate a bit of it, not much, but hopefully enough.

For hours the silence in the apartment was only interrupted by their breathing and the clicking of the trigger.

Olivia didn’t know how long she had been asleep when a knocking on the door woke her up. She quickly checked her mana pool and found it still almost empty. For her, it was like seeing the battery indicator jumping from ‘0.1%’ to ‘0.11%’. Almost nothing.

She opened her eyes. Hunter was already moving towards the door and opened it.

The voice was raspy, dry and deep, “Hello… Hunter.”

Olivia could see how Hunter narrowed his eyes. She was now curious and stood up.

“Who are you,” asked Hunter.

The voice hesitated before answering, “It was a long time ago, that I visited this little ball of stardust. They called me many names. Pick one.”

Olivia was now close enough to see who stood there. He was at least 2 meters tall and incredibly thin. His skin was snow white, the bones clearly visible everywhere.

His hair was the same color as his suit; a black so deep, it seemed to darken everything around it. The red eyes burned through the air.

Olivia knew this man. Memories which had been suppressed, surfaced again. She remembered his name. Her face paled.

Her boss was here. When she said his name, it was loud enough that Hunter heard it, but still a whisper.

“Lucifer.”