The room is small and dim. The stone floor is damp under the man's cheek.

He does not remember this. He does not remember anything. This realization brings a splitting pain in his head, bittersweet and familiar. You're dead, says something in him, some jittering animal fear. You died and this is your shitty afterlife. Pick a direction and run.

But dead people don't get headaches, right? Right, agrees some more sensible part. And: You can figure this out. Investigate the situation. Ask questions.

"I do like questions," he mumbles into the cold stone floor. The man peels himself upright and sits up, blinking in the light of their one flickering torch.

Not ten minutes in, the man is still shaking out his burned fingers: reaching directly into the fire wasn't the smartest way to get the key, but it worked. He put a pellet between the eyes of his own cutout with an unsettling lack of hesitation. Now he's puzzling over the note in the center of the room, brows drawn together in heavy thought.

He's a bloated alcoholic with unruly mutton chops and uncombed hair. His outfit is a nightmare of sequins and tassels. He has not moved any slower than a brisk jog since peeling himself off the floor. And now, with that same dogged energy, he's rounding on you.

"Compliment party," he declares, with the confidence of a man who has no idea what he looks like. (You don't want to know, chimes some deep instinct.) "Tell me how good I look and we'll be free to go."

The man has stripped naked in the changing room. He holds up a towel, considers for way too long—Tuck it around your waist. That's a safe bet until you know the etiquette.—It's called skinny dipping! Let it all hang out.—then finally shrugs, slings it over his shoulder, and strides into Chrono fully nude.

Disgusting, mutter the bathhouse walls. Indecent as always.

"Come on, man, it's a pool party," he says to the nearest wall, as though this is a normal conversation.

[ Choose your own! ]