“Ashcan” Pete

I scratched Duke heartily behind the ears and wiped some of the blood off his muzzle with my shirt sleeve. “Good boy, Duke,” I whispered. “Now, what do you say we find Preston and get out of here?”

I was surrounded by an unfortunate number of corpses, but I reasoned that – aside from Calvin, whose death was not my fault at all – all these other corpses were reanimated dead, and so it wasn’t quite the same as killing a person. They were under the control of this General Ambrose person, who thankfully, didn’t seem to be making any appearances here. Aside from these three “soldiers” in this alleged army, we didn’t see any other beings that I had to get Duke to take care of for me. I decided to take the gun out of Joe’s hand before we left, just in case.

Regardless, I was certain at this point though that Duke was a far better weapon than any gun or even any of the weird alien technology that I was seeing in the room. That was because every single enemy I had come across so far had been inherently afraid of him. Good. That made them slow and weak, and only made Duke more confident to go in for the kill to protect me. I had never known Duke to be quite this aggressive, but I think he too sensed the severity of the situation. He wanted this nightmare to be over as much as I did. The major difference was he had a lithe body to jump on people and ferocious jaws to rip their throats apart.

Preston had disappeared from view before any of this had even started, so I didn’t know where he was. I assumed he had to still be in this room, probably cowering in a corner somewhere. I had to be quiet and watchful as I searched for him, as I didn’t want to spook the poor thing. Weirdly, I hadn’t heard any sound from him this whole time, but Duke ripping up three zombies while I backed him up with a metal pipe I found on the shelf next to me would have made him more than enough noise to mask any other commotion.

“Preston,” I called out across the darkened room. “Preston, where are you?”

No reply. This may be more difficult than I hoped it would be. I didn’t want to stay here too long. But there was no way I could bring myself to just leave Preston behind at this stage.

I went up and down each aisle of weapons, hoping to find him hiding safely somewhere. For a while, I didn’t see anything. I started to think that maybe he had somehow managed to slip out the armory altogether. That’s when I saw it.

“Damn it, Preston.”

I found him, but…

An entire rack of spears had fallen over onto him, impaling his entire body multiple times over.

I jerked my head away. I didn’t want to look at this any longer.

“HOW DID HE MANAGE THAT??” I screamed into my arm, trying to muffle my outburst. Was it an accident? Or something more sinister? Knowing Preston, I was inclined to believe he probably touched the wrong thing and now this shelf of spears fell over on top of him. But… this place was full of mysteries. I didn’t have time to stay nor did I care to. This mystery was going to be left unsolved.

I shook my head and whistled for Duke.

“Come on, boy. We got to get moving.”

 

Alive (Ranking)

  1. Wendy
  2. Pete
  3. Jenny
  4. Finn

 

Eliminated

June 25th: PRESTON, impaled by a toppled shelving unit of spears in the Armory

June 24th: MINH, transported via a portal to Arkham in the year 3007

June 23rd: ZOEY, electrocuted by the metal globe in the Arcane Chamber

June 22nd: AGNES, merged with High Wizard Arianna in the Arcane Chamber

June 21st: CALVIN, shot dead by reanimated Joe in the Armory

June 20th: URSULA, impaled through the head by The Sullied Crown in the Throne Room

June 19th: ROLAND, shot dead by Finn in the West Room

June 18th: YORICK, transported to Carcosa

June 17th: SEFINA, transported alive via a portal to Arkham

June 16th: MARK, devoured by an abomination in the West Room

June 15th: SILAS, succumbed to earlier poisonous gas exposure while in the Book Room

June 14th: AKACHI, succumbed to poisonous gas in the East Room

June 13th: RITA, woke up alive in Arkham

June 12th: LEO, shot dead by Finn in the South Room

June 11th: REX, torn apart by byakhee in the North Room

June 10th: MARIE, fell into the chasm in the South Room

June 9th: CAROLYN, head smashed by Lola in the Button Room

June 8th: JOE, shot himself in the Lust Room

June 7th: SKIDS, dismembered in the Greed Room

June 6th: JIM, possessed by Ambrose in the Lust Room

June 5th: DIANA, possessed in the Lust Room

June 4th: MATEO, drowned in the Sloth Room

June 3rd: DAISY, shot dead by Roland in the Gluttony Room

June 2nd: NORMAN, disintegrated in the Envy Room

June 1st: LOLA, abandoned in the Button Room

 

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