Kenny followed the bloody hoofprints down the tiled hallway. One of the four hooves seemed to belong to a broken leg; that print dragged where the others stomped, creating a ghoulish image of an unfinished hunt: clack clack drag clack … clack clack drag clack … A hunter leisurely chasing down a wounded beast. Closing in.
He followed them up two flights of stairs, where they turned left down a new wing.
They led Kenny to room 333, which was unlocked and quiet.
The hoofprints continued under the door and into the room, which was filled with art supplies and half-finished paintings on easels.
In realspace the canvases were high school art projects, all trying to depict the same bowl of fruit, apples on oranges on pears, with varying degrees of success. In gamespace the canvases bore images out of the bowels of hell. Ruben’s Massacre of the Innocents, as told in the Gospel of Matthew. Goya’s horrific vision of Saturn devouring his own son, for fear of being surpassed by his own children.
A man was in the shadows, tending a fire that sparked and illuminated his face. It was wild with the eyes of the believer. His long beard was unkempt, from days of travel over harsh terrain.
“Father?” a voice came quietly from the shadows.
“Yes, my son?” the man near Kenny replied.
“The fire and wood are here. But where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”
Near to Kenny, Abraham answered softly, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.”
Abraham was building an altar.
Kenny reached forward, his hand passing through Abraham’s face. He could hear the fire crackling and almost feel the heat.
Abraham bound his son, Isaac. There was no struggle. Kenny couldn’t understand that. He wanted to yell to Isaac, Fight back. Why are you letting him do this? Isaac was a child. His eyes were wide. Abraham laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.
It came down furiously toward the little boy’s head.
“Stop,” Kenny yelled.
An angel of the Lord called out from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
“Do not lay a hand on the boy,” the angel said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.”
Kenny heard a bleating from the distance.
Where the hoofprints ended, a ram was caught by its horns in a thicket.
Abraham went to the ram and held the knife to its neck.
He turned and said to Kenny, “Your phone is about to ring.”
Charlie climbed out of Alex’s window, feeling worse than when he’d gone in.
No police had come. The coast was clear.
But Alex was guilty. Charlie was sure of it. And Alex was slipping into a bad place.
Charlie got into his car and his phone buzzed. It wasn’t a text message or a map this time. A video was waiting for him.
The grainy security-camera feed was from one of those black orbs on the ceilings of banks and casinos or, in this case, a parking garage. A chipper techno beat was playing, and the footage was crudely but happily edited, zipping forward in superspeed, reversing to the sound of a needle skimming off a record, then replaying in slow motion, jump-cutting to the beat.
In the footage Charlie saw himself from above, running across the garage, scrambling at his car, his foot stomping down on the hand grabbing at his leg. When it came time for the sickening snap, the screen and music froze, and a cheerful caption flashed across the screen:
OH SNAP!!!!
Watching it, Charlie felt ill,.
The video kicked back to life and the foot came down, the wrist of the unseen assailant bending into its unnatural V. A canned WAV file said, “Oh, no, you didn’t!” saucily, and the video zipped backward, the foot raising up, the wrist unsnapping, folding back into unbroken shape. The music paused, then powered forward, the wrist breaking again.
As the unseen person writhed in pain, cradling the limp hand and pulling back under the car, more words appeared across the screen.
Who are you to judge?
The shame coursed through him. Charlie closed the God Game’s taunt and texted his friends. He had to convince them to quit the Game. It was making all of them crazy, doing things they shouldn’t—wouldn’t—have ever done before.
Channeling his inner Peter, he wrote:
Tech Lab. Midnight.
Maybe if he was fun, if he mirrored Peter’s text that got them into the Game, he could lure them back out. Then, just to show them he still had a sense of humor, he added:
No candles this time (Peter that means you)
Maybe if he didn’t seem like a total nag, they’d listen to him and stop playing the amazingly fun game that was leading them all off a cliff.
No sooner had Abraham made his prediction than Kenny’s phone rang in his pocket, making him jump.
“What the fuck did you do?” the voice on the other yelled. It was Eddie. He was irate, madder than Kenny had ever heard him. “The computer’s fried. I can’t even get it to turn back on.”
“I have no clue what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, bullshit. I know you have those hacker friends. What did you do?”
“Nothing.”
“This is destruction of school property. You can’t just wash this off a wall.”
“Whatever. I didn’t do it.”
“I bet you think you stopped me. But you didn’t. I lost my article, but it’s all in my head. You slowed me down, that’s all. This is coming.”
The line clicked dead.
Abraham knelt before Kenny. “You do want my help?”
Kenny paused. “Yes,”
“Then you must do something for the Lord.”
“What?”
“You must mark the door of this house.”
Kenny looked down at his bandaged fingers.
Abraham shook his head. “You will not hurt yourself anymore.”
The old man stood, towering over Kenny and walking to the rows of supplies in the milk crates stacked floor to ceiling. Abraham’s eyes went to the cans of spray paint.
A voice filled the room, not Abraham’s:
“The blood will be a sign for you, on the houses where you are, and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike.”
Abraham lifted a can from the shelf, and Kenny had to look over his glasses to realize it was only an illusion, and the real cans remained where they were.
Abraham stood before Kenny and placed the virtual can into his hands. “We shall call this place The Lord Will Provide. You will deliver a message.” In the corner, an unbound Isaac hugged himself and rubbed his wrists, whimpering quietly and not meeting anyone’s eyes.
Kenny looked at the large man before him, then down at the paint. “What do I have to write?”
The Game told him.
Kenny shook his head. “I won’t do that.”
The characters in front of him didn’t react. Abraham and Isaac just stayed in place, breathing, otherwise still.
“I’ll sacrifice myself. Let Eddie get me. I’ll take the fall. Let my friends go.”
Abraham unpaused to smile and say, “Do what you’re told.”