Chapter 5
Ben groaned, rolled over onto his back, and found he was looking up at the ceiling of the workroom. Not far away was the mirror Stacy had been in.
He froze in place as his eyes widened and gazed upward. Expecting things to explode, go wrong, catch fire, or the world to start shaking again.
Yet everything seemed as it should be.
The ceiling was attached and undamaged the walls were up and not torn down, there was no giant monster tearing the building open. Things weren’t being turned to dust and smoke.
“Shit,” whimpered Ben, his body unclenching when there didn’t seem to be a colossal monster destroying the building like it was a doll-house they didn’t like anymore.
“Yes. I would also be willing to accept ‘fuck’ as an operative word,” Stacy muttered from the mirror. “We were just barely able to escape that. I severely under-estimated the danger as well.
“We’ve survived, but we didn’t shake it entirely. We gained distance, you could say, but we didn’t truly break contact with it. We’ve shifted out of the plane it was in entirely and into another.
“Though we had to move into a plane that was in a similar… volume. A similar echo, you could say. A state of being that was conducive to us shunting into the space.”
“Uh… what?” Ben asked. He didn’t quite understand. “I assure you Ben doesn’t know where it is at all times. Ben does know where he isn’t, but that sure as hell ain’t helping.”
“I… alright… we are in the same position we were in, in your world, but now in a different world, that we made happen through an equivalent exchange of positions, with a similar enough, replacement,” Stacy said.
“How about if I was five years old and suffering from a lack of sleep,” Ben muttered and then sat up. “Are you saying you just Truck-kun’d me into another world? Did we just get Isekai’d? A whole building?”
“More or less,” Stacy confirmed. “It was the best I could manage for us.”
“Well… good job Stacy. I’m your number one fan. I’ll write your damn player number on my back and root for you at the next home game,” Ben grumbled and pressed his hands to his face. “So, where did you isekai us?”
“I… don’t know, Ben,” Stacy confessed. “I don’t know, I don’t care. We’re safe.
“Beyond that… I really… I need to go recharge. I’m spent after getting us away from that death sentence, but all I’ve done is move it into a position that might as well be called the sword of Damocles.
“It hangs above us waiting to end our lives. Ever there.”
“I mean, that’s kinda what being alive is, Stacy,” Ben said with a snort and got to his feet. “You’re always dying in one way or another. Sometimes slower, sometimes faster. Alright. I’ll… clear the building… or whatever, then see where we are.
“The tablet works now? All the things Mr. Leery wanted to happen, happened?”
“Yes, much as I dislike it,” Stacy got out in a flat and bored sounding tone. “He did barter extensively for what he wanted though and paid in full. So even if I can’t give the resultant product to him, I still need to follow through the task so it’s done.
“The tablet will do all that he wanted and more.
“Now… we have a Chaos Eldritch chasing us, we’ve left the world you’re used to, and realistically speaking, we’re somewhat on a budget.
“I can certainly summon food, water, and power for you, or others, but it’s something we’ll need to talk about in more detail later. My powers aren’t unlimited without an exchange.
“Whether it’s by empowering me through bartering with me directly, sacrificing things in the cages, or converting resources directly into power, we’ll have to do something.”
“Got it… you’re a giant piggy bank, and I have to make sure you get coins,” Ben paraphrased. It was a goal, at the least. “Make that Stacy rattle at any hip-shake.”
“Just so,” Stacy affirmed. “Beyond that, I don’t know where we are, what this world is, or what we can expect. I only know it was somewhere I could put us to escape. Which… I’ll have to do again at some point.
“Realistically you should plan for a life of shifting planes until that Chaos Eldritch gets bored. Which it should eventually. That or just get hungry enough and it’ll move on.”
“Errr… so… this is a survival community setting, we’re on a scavenger clock, we need resources and… probably people to make this easier,” offered up Ben as his brain grappled with the situation.
“An astute way to state the situation. For now though, you’ll need to figure out the tablet to get a better understanding of our situation. In addition to that, for now, you’ll have to figure it out for yourself, I’m sorry.
“I’m spent. Truly so. I’ll return later. Don’t die, Ben. Curiosity killed the cat, after all.”
There was a whooshing noise that came from the mirror followed by the silhouette of Stacy disappearing from it. Leaving Ben alone in the workshop.
“Right. Don’t die,” Ben muttered and picked up the tablet then held it up in front of himself. “No lions to feed me to, either.”
Looking over the tablet Ben found it was different yet again.
This time though, it seemed very reminiscent of the first time he’d looked at it.
The entirety of the building was presented to him in a two-dimensional way. From the basement floor to the roof each floor was present.
Though this was apparently the ‘south’ side which was the entrance.
Finding a rotation button in each corner, Ben tapped at it and found the whole building spun once each time he pressed it. From south, to west, to north, to east, then back to south.
Given that there were no internal apartments and every single one had a window, that meant he could look into every single apartment with this.
Touching a ‘3d’ button in the bottom right, the building moved into an isometric view with a cutaway appearing on the basement floor.
Where he was now.
He could in fact see himself.
He could see the workbench, ‘Stacy’s Mirror’, and the entirety of Mr. Leery’s apartment. Including Mr. Leery’s corpse, which was still laid out in the dinning room.
“Oh yeah,” Ben muttered to himself. “Sorry Mr. Leery. For now we’ll just… put you in a cage. Just in case.”
Ben went and retrieved his very dead and unaware benefactor and carried him into one of the ten cells. Just to make sure he didn’t randomly turn into a zombie.
When done, Ben leaned against the altar and began to slowly move up the building with the tablet and inspecting everything.
Looking into every apartment one by one to see if there were people here, which was unlikely given it was Mr. Leery’s building, or zombies.
Eventually, Ben reached the roof.
There was nothing in the entirety of the building.
No zombies, no survivors, no rats, nothing.
Cold and silent as a tomb from bottom to top.
Ben felt great about the situation the moment he’d confirmed there wasn’t anything in the entirety of the building.
Yet he didn’t believe it.
He went back through the building, checking every floor, every room, in every closest, under every table.
There was truly nothing.
Nothing at all.
The building was actually empty.
His earlier escapade down the stairs and the shouting had brought down everything. There was no zombies left in the building.
The ones on the roof must’ve taken a swan dive rather than stay up there.
Letting the victory of it, the quiet of the building exist, the joy in being safe and alone linger, he just sat there.
Then he finally tapped into himself on the screen.
The screen that came to the front was the same one as the previous he’d seen. It looked a lot like a character screen for a video game.
His clothes were listed out, that his pockets were empty, that he and that he was still healing from the two bites he suffered in the medical window.
In the status window was a new box, however.
It read off as ‘Brimstone Bound’ and the subtext when he clicked on it read off as ‘Contract with an Infernal’ and nothing more.
Ben couldn’t deny he was curious if there was some type of passive ability attached to that, or if it was just noting that he had a status ailment. That it was neither positive nor negative, but there.
He tried pushing into ‘Stacy’s Mirror’ and it gave the subtext of ‘The medium for ‘Stacy’. Information was being provided, but it was also information it felt like he would know already.
Ben moved to the ground floor and pushed on a discarded piece of luggage that’d been knocked under the desk.
It came up as ‘ownerless luggage’.
With a click of his tongue he realized that until others joined his building, he likely wouldn’t be able to test out the ability to gather information with this tablet.
Except as he had the thought, he realized he had agreed completely with Stacy. With what she’d suggested.
Their goals, for the time being, aligned one for one.
He needed to plan for the future until the Chaos Eldritch got bored of them.
That meant resources, people, and getting a handle on where they were as far as the local world and situation.
A community.
Resources.
People who can make things go better, be better, or just are better.
Stacy mentioned this place was just like the old world.
Does that mean it has zombies, too?
If so… that helps.
It helps because I can offer safety.
Clean water, food. Stacy mentioned those already.
If I can keep people safe here, if I can give them a place to call home where the virus can’t kill them or take them over, then… it can be a lot.
A lot for a community.
Food and water can be scavenged as well to expand our repertoire.
Maybe even grow things, even.
The real victory though is the prevention and curing of the zombie virus.
The bites and scratches… that’s what killed groups from the inside out. Someone would bring it back, it’d tear out the heart of the people involved, others would cover it up, and the whole thing would fall apart.
That’s what we kept hearing from others.
From people who talked about other groups.
That they’d been somewhere else, with other people, and then someone turned.
Someone brought in someone infected and they bit someone else.
Just like what happened to me.
Nodding his head Ben decided to take a look at the world around from the rooftop. He hadn’t missed it when the tablet had shown him a defensive perimeter around the building that included about ten feet above the top of the building’s highest point.
Which meant there was an overlook he could use to see the situation they were in with some comfort. Without putting himself at risk, at least.
Because looking out a window could work to a degree, but the view would be horrifically limited.
Leaving the building would give him a much better view, but put him at risk.
If the building was phased out just as Stacy had claimed, and as the tablet showed, then the roof was a perfect point to see what was going on around him.
Holding onto the tablet, Ben began climbing the stairwell. Endlessly walking upward for the second time today.
He went slower this time, didn’t rush it, and wasn’t too anxious, either.
Because the building was secure.
Ben was safe for the first time in a long time.
Even if he had to make a deal with a literal demon to make that happen, he was safe.
Whatever this Chaos Eldritch was, it was beyond him, and up until last night, Ben’s biggest worry was zombies.
“Dying to a fucking kaiju demon shadow monser isn’t that much different than getting pulled apart and turned into raw hunks of meat and devoured by zombies,” Ben grumbled to himself as he pushed open the roof door.
He wedged it open this time to make sure it wouldn’t be closing on him. That he wouldn’t be locking himself away up here on the roof and without a way back down or into the building.
Then he looked out to the world around him.
Strangely, he felt as if he’d walked out into a set-piece for a medieval fantasy movie. One that had a number of non-human races and magical beings on some sort of epic and glorious quest.
Long looped curtain walls the enveloped a rather large city with more walls surrounding a stone castle at the center. The whole location looked like it’d be a nightmare for an army to try and take by force.
Despite that, this place looked like it was already in the middle of having a serious issue. Outside of the city in nearly any and every direction were wandering zombies.
Shambling along in the fields, trees, buildings.
If there was anyone alive outside in the buildings surrounding the city, they were playing the most hardcore game of hide-and-seek Ben could ever have imagined.
With perhaps a few people hiding and hundreds seeking in a small area.
Shaking his head, Ben now understood exactly what Stacy had meant.
They had indeed moved to another location. One that could take the apartment building as a whole without an issue and trade places with it.
When he’d looked down, he’d found that the footprint of the apartment building fit rather snugly into a position that seemed to have been rather large. Almost akin to a garrison, a prison, or some type of massive communal hall.
There was some room on one side, as if the other building had been a bit bigger, but it didn’t seem to be a problem.
Ben noted that there were people near or about the building that’d come close, then would veer away. As if repelled in some subtle way and not wanting to continue in the path they were walking.
“Well shit,” whispered Ben. He hadn’t expected to be in this type of a location but it was certainly better than where they’d been.
Since the Chaos Eldritch wasn’t here.
Yet.
“I should test this. Test how it works and… and… oh! The zombie!” Ben thought and snapped his fingers. He looked to the distant castle, tucked the tablet under his armpit, and went back down.
All the way to the basement and then into the holding cages.
Upon reaching the ten cells he looked to the cage that’d held the zombie previously.
It was still there, standing in the center of the cell, looking at Ben and growling once again. An older man in his thirties and sporting a bite mark on his hand.
“I wonder if Mr. Leery pulled you in for testing,” mused Ben. “But if he did… how did he manage to get you in there. Is it… a… transfer thing?
“Or did he use Stacy to help facilitate it? Probably Stacy, now that I think about it. Or some type of… spell… configuration… thing.
“Ugh, I really need to get her to teach me how to go that engineering stuff. Or was that all bullshit.”
Ben pulled up the tablet, tapped at the red cell, and waited.
A series of options appeared.
He could transfer the zombie to another cell, kill it outright, sacrifice it to Stacy, eject it from the building, or leave it alone.
If I can sacrifice it to Stacy, doesn’t that mean she’d be in my debt? She’d have to pay me back in some way?
Hell, I have no idea how any of this works.
We’ll hold off on sacrificing it, but this gives me a good idea of what I’m working with. Now I just need to… uh… well… unphase… the building.
Then see about allowing people in, or not at all.
Because until I do that, I’ll have no idea what to expect with this.
I can just phase the building again, right?
Flicking the view to the Home-view, Ben looked to the top and saw that amongst the buttons there was indeed the phase/unhphase toggle.
Taking in a short breath, Ben held it, then hesitated.
This was risky.
Very risky.
It was where a cat would get killed for it’s curiosity.
He’d rather Stacy yell at him with a power-hangover then get killed, which meant he needed to go play nice-nice with the demon spirit.
Going over to Stacy’s mirror he hesitated, then gently knocked on it with his fingertips.
“Stacy, I’m sorry for bothering you, but there’s a zombie in the cell. If I sacrifice that to you, would that help you out? I’d be willing to do that if you could give me some assistance in return. No powers just… information,” Ben tried, feeling somewhat odd. It reminded him of waking up drunks and trying to get them to drink some water before they even started moving.
“Nn. Zombie?” growled Stacy. Her voice had the same feminine edge he’d come to expect, but there was a hunger to it. “Zombie. Yes. Yes! That’d help. If you sacrifice that to me, I’d be willing to provide information.”
Ben nodded, lifted the tablet, and immediately sacrificed the zombie to her.
“Done. I did it without a contract or an agreement as I think you and I will need to be partners in this to avoid that Chaos Eldritch or whatever,” Ben stated honestly. It was the truth. Stacy wasn’t technically on his side, but she was more on his side than whatever the monster was that’d torn open the building.
“Ah… ah, yes you did. Thank you, Bernard,” replied Stacy, suddenly sounding a lot more like her normal self. “Foolish of you but… I respect and understand the reasoning you did it.
“In the same vein, I’ll do my best to provide you with information as you requested. What was it you wanted to know?”
“What are the exact boundaries of the building? Is it the sidewalk and entry out front? Does the little planter box count? Is it the fence line where the trashcans go? Or is it the building wall itself?” Ben asked. “The image didn’t show the sidewalk, fences, or trashcans, but they’re all here?”
“A very good question. The boundary point for direct control is the fence. The protection line for entry and dismissal is also the fence,” Stacy answered. “The healing effects are at the boundary to the building. The phase is the entirety of the property.”
“Great. If I unphase the building, I assume I can speak with people at the fence line. Can they act aggressively to me? Can they like… shoot an arrow at me? A gun? Throw something?” Ben asked.
“They most certainly can, though it wouldn’t do much,” admitted Stacy with a high pitched laugh that was almost a giggle. “Unless they’re using a missile, true explosive, or a tank shell, it’s not going to crack the defenses. I’m actively holding them, you realize.
“They’re not invincible, but it would certainly take more than most could put forth to break the defenses before I shifted us off the plane.
“The building as a whole is just that suited to being phased through reality and alternate planes given the markings you put up and were already existing.”
“Got it. Okay… so… I could theoretically go to the fence, unphase, speak with someone and… invite them in?” Ben tried. “And if I invited them in, could I kick them out, too? Could they try to harm me while they were inside the building?”
“You could most certainly invite people in. You could kick them out without a concern as well,” Stacy confirmed. “It would only take the thought of them being kicked from the building.
“As to harming you… as if I’d allow someone to harm my contractor. Unlike my contract with Mr. Leery, upon your death, I would be ejected from the world. I most certainly wouldn’t like that at all, as there’s a Chaos Eldritch just waiting for me, or you, to make a mistake. Like you dying, or me leaving.”
“So… let’s… see what the neighborhood is like, because whether we want to be here or not, we’re here.
“That’s the simple answer. We didn’t choose this location and that’s just reality. Doesn’t mean we can just ignore the new neighbors. We’ll need to see if anyone wants to talk.
“Hell, maybe we can barter for things that we’ll need. Because… because I can’t do this all by myself, can I? I’ll need other people and goods. At some point, you’ll run out of power and can’t feed me, right?”
“That’s right. You can’t do this all on your own,” Stacy agreed. “You will need others. Need help. Need resources. While I’m not eager to ‘scout the neighborhood’ as you are seeming to think of it, but we must.
“We cannot remain locked inside without external influence or assistance indefinitely so you are-you’re correct. We must scout the area.”
“Right. So… let’s see who’s out there and if we can’t barter with the populace,” Ben suggested. “Right? Maybe we can offer to cure people of the bites? Dispose of corpses?
“Or maybe-oh, I was going to suggest showers or baths but the plumbing is wrecked now, right? We moved the building. You mentioned having water and power though?”
“Water and power are both functioning. Showers and baths would be doable and with heat.
“However, the control would be through the tablet as it would consume resources,” Stacy interjected with a chuckle. “Part of the deal I made with Mr. Leery was keeping water and power functioning at minimal costs. Though you’ll need to sacrifice a few people or zombies a month in an exchange but… zombies are plentiful.
“I could recommend also finding and raising chickens or something of that nature. Anything that is living could be sacrificed, even insects, though the numbers of such a thing become astronomical very quickly.
“People work best. People are more plentiful than chickens, however. People would be worth a better conversion than chickens or zombies.”
“Right. Anyways,” Ben mumbled, not really wanting to talk about the conversion rate on people. “Power and water can be provided by you. You mentioned food previously, what can you provide?”
“Well, I can do basic foodstuffs,” admitted Stacy. “Very basic things. Apples. Carrots. Lettuce. Cucumber. Any vegetables, really. I can also provide legumes. Beans. Those would provide much of the protein you’ll need.
“Since we’re discussing such things, I can also expand what sort of thing I can provide as well in exchange for other things.”
“Yeah? Like meat? Because vegetables are great for some things, but humans are omnivores,” Ben muttered. “There’s a reason people end up living on vitamins and supplements when their diet lacks the meat building block.
“How do I get meat back on the menu.”
“I could certainly—”
“Boys,” Ben interrupted her in a mutter. Unable to not add that single word after his statement.
Stacy sighed, most likely at being interrupted.
“I could certainly be persuaded to put meat on the menu for you,” Stacy confirmed. “I’d even be willing to make this a simple exchange to test the waters for us.
“And before you fret or get worried, we’ll just say beef. Beef you could get at the supermarket for burgers without any issue. Let’s just call it the eighty-twenty patties that you liked when you were younger. Those have good calories, fat, and protein content.
“Since my interest is your health and longevity, I have no reason to try and harm you. I say this as a reminder. I may try to take you in the details, but never to your harm or detriment.”
Ben paused at her mention of his past. Of his life before all this.
He wanted to push on that, but he felt like this wasn’t the right time. That it’d just set him on edge.
“Okay… and what would you want in exchange for me getting meat?” Ben asked.
“I get to pick who you invite in first,” purred Stacy. “Whether to stay for a while or even if just temporary, I get to pick.”
With that simple statement, Ben had a sinking feeling.
But he also knew he didn’t have a choice.
He would need meat on the menu.
“Let’s go find someone to talk to then,” he answered. “You’ll tell me who by tablet I assume?”
“Oh yes, I’ll speak directly through the tablet by text,” Stacy confirmed. “As you’re my contractor I always have an awareness of you, but I cannot speak, reach out, or interact with you. That’s a preset condition to protect you from… me.”
“Oodle-lally golly what a day,” intoned Ben gravely and blew out a breath.
Then he put his tablet under his armpit and walked out of the building.