Kano sprinted inside, arresting her momentum by grabbing the frame where her door once stood. The usual junk that filled the room was in disarray, and more blood was spattered about the interior. But other than the mess, the room was empty. Kano ran up the stairs to her room.

It was hard to tell given its usual state of chaos, but it, too, had been ransacked. Feeling completely drained of energy and motivation, Kano went back downstairs to find Urick standing amidst the debris.

She was crossing the room to leave when Urick spoke. “Where are you going? Aren’t you going to investigate?”

“Why? I already know who did it.”

“Who?”

“Shorin. Or rather, people who used to work for him.” No one else would cross her like this.

“Oh.” The ghoul hurried over and followed her outside. “So, we’re going after them?”

Kano shrugged. “You can. I’m going to get a drink.”

“A drink?” For some reason, the strange little man sounded shocked. “What for?”

Kano gave him a look, which she hoped conveyed the exceptional depth of his stupidity. “Because I want one. At least to start. I’ll probably want more than one.”

Now that she’d made her decision abundantly clear, Kano headed for Aru-Aru’s. There was nothing that elevated it above countless other grimy purveyors of intoxicants. Except for one crucial element: It was the closest to Kano’s house.

Stepping through the flimsy, often-replaced door, Kano was greeted by a familiar olfactory assault. Blood, vomit, and other forms of excrement blended together with countless chemical odors to produce something of singular putridity. The owner was even gracious enough to greet her by cowering behind the bar. That was fine by her. She didn’t come here for the service. Leaning across the bar, she grabbed a bottle of oily green liquid.

Apparently taking that as a sign that she wasn’t here for him, the fat man behind the bar got to his feet. “Err, do you happen to have any money?”

Kano unscrewed the cap of her new acquisition and sniffed. It wasn’t a smell she was familiar with, but it made her eyes water, so it had to be worth drinking. “It’s a possibility.” She took a drink and swirled it around in her mouth. The taste was foul and foreign, but she could already feel her mouth going numb. Perfect.

The first swallow burned on the way down, but Kano was confident that she’d get the hang of it eventually. Urick followed her in and sat down beside her. He even had the good grace to wait for her to finish the bottle before he started talking. “Okay, you’ve had your drink. Now shouldn’t we go out and do something?”

Kano looked at him, trying to focus through the blur. “I’ve only had one. What do you care, anyway? Wouldn’t you rather sit here and watch me drink rather than…” She tried to think of what other course of action they might be pursuing, but none came to mind. “Other stuff.”

“There are so many other things I’d rather be doing. Like finding out what happened to the rest of your people.”

“Fine,” Kano said, eyeing the shelves as she searched for her next choice. “Then go ahead and search for them.”

“I doubt I’d get very far without you. Besides, I can’t just leave you here.”

What nonsense was he spouting now? “Yeah? And why is that?”

Whatever that green stuff had been, it must be crap if she was still able to understand what Urick was saying. She needed something stronger. If there was anyone who could help her with that, it would be Aru-Aru, yet she couldn’t see him anywhere.

“Because you’re my master,” he uttered the word with such contempt it sounded like an insult rather than a title, “and you need help.”

“Help?” Kano laughed. “The only thing I need help with is deciding what to drink next.”

“You’re just going to abandon them so you can sit here and drink?”

Turning away from Urick, Kano grabbed the nearest bottle. Whatever it was, it would do. “Pretty much. They’re not my problem anymore. I’ve done enough for them already. They can figure this one out on their own.”

While Urick tried to formulate a reply, she gulped down her drink with great enthusiasm.

“How can you say that? Don’t you care about them? Even if you don’t, I thought you’d at least put a little effort into helping them.”

Kano set her drink aside. She couldn’t let this stand. “A little effort? Do you have any idea how much work I’ve already put into helping them? They’d all be dead if it weren’t for me. Probably many times over. And I’m sick of it. Sick of looking after them or dealing with necromancers and everything they make. I never should have gotten involved with any of them. Not Nove, the necromancers, or the children.” Maybe then she’d have some sanity left, and she’d be free to die without worrying about it or anything else.

“Do you really believe that? You make it sound like you’d have been happier if I’d killed you when we first met.”

“Yeah, well, maybe I would have been.” Things had so much simpler when it had just been her and Nove.

Urick sighed. “Look, I know you hate talking, and this is out of line, but it kind of seems like you need to.”

Suppressing her impulse to destroy him then and there, Kano considered his suggestion. There might be some truth to it. Her head did feel terribly full right now—that was a large part of the reason why she’d rather be comatose. “Talk about what? I’ve said all I need to say about the children and Nove.”

“Then we can talk about something else.”

“Like what?” Kano was already getting bored of this.

Looking frantically around the room like he was going to find a topic written there, Urick said, “Uh, why don’t you tell me about what you want to do in the future?”

Kano blinked. “What I want to do?”

“Yeah, you’ve said plenty about the things you don’t want to do, but there has to be something you do want, right?”

Kano lifted her drink from the counter, staring at the liquid within the glass with a pensive expression. “I want to journey to the void found only in the bottom of a bottle.”

“You already said as much. Is there anything else?”

“Like what?” What else was there? It wasn’t as if she had any sort of future. Could anyone really say differently? They were all dying, just at different rates.

“I don’t know. Hopes, aspirations, anything you’re looking forward to.”

Kano laughed. “Like I have anything like that. You really are an idiot.”

“There has to be something. I can’t believe you would’ve gone through all this without something driving you. It just doesn’t seem possible.”

Was it really so hard to grasp? Maybe it was for him. Obviously the reason she’d done all this was that… Why was it again? She couldn’t quite remember. There was something, right? Did blind hatred and a love of wanton destruction count? It would’ve made for a glib answer, but she didn’t think there was much truth to it. Some part of her still wanted to take action, she just didn’t know why.

“I guess there is something. It’s stupid, but maybe I think I’ll be able to find something better for myself. And for the world. Or at least, I used to think that.”

“What about now?”

“How could I still believe that? I don’t know what madness took root in my brain before, but I’ve been shown the error of my ways.”

But despite her words, she still felt some vestiges of hope. It was an appalling malady, but it was nothing she couldn’t remedy with a liberal application of intoxicants.

She had her beverage halfway to her mouth when Urick knocked it out of her hand. It struck the counter and shattered. Dismayed, Kano watched it drip onto the ground before switching focus to Urick. He just didn’t know when to quit.

Fine by her. Kano was in the mood for some senseless violence. It wasn’t quite as good as rendering herself senseless, but it would do for now. With a nasty little smile, Kano grabbed Urick by the collar. He blanched, but he stood his ground and said, “So that’s it, then? You’re going to kill me like you did the others?”

Kano’s grip tightened—his offer was mighty tempting. A brief interlude was all it would take, then she’d be free of the last of her dependents. Free to… do what, exactly? Slip into chemically induced oblivion? Sighing, she released her hold on the ghoul.

Maybe he was right. He was still an idiot, of course, that point was never in doubt. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t say something worthwhile every now and again. “Fine, I’ll look for them.”

She didn’t much see the point, but she couldn’t quite let them go, either. Their petty needs and troubles seemed unending. Hadn’t they already brought her enough hardship? Why must they persist? Though she couldn’t come up with any answers, she still left the decrepit establishment to search for them. There was probably a good reason for what she was doing, even if she couldn’t figure out what it was.

Disappointingly sober, Kano worked her way toward the citadel, which stood at the center of it all. If Shorin had ordered them taken them, as he must have, this is where his people would have brought bring them. Assuming they were still alive. Maybe it was just her mild intoxication talking, but Kano felt like they had to be. They wouldn’t die so easily, not when they could remain a pain in her neck instead.

Seeing a pair of ghouls on guard, a man and a woman, near the base of the armored structure, Kano waved at them and walked over. It occurred to her that they might have orders to shoot her on sight. They were Shorin’s creatures, after all. But beyond the expression of alarm she’d come to expect when she encountered minor figures of authority, they didn’t react.

“Hey,” Kano said, trying to sound cordial, but it came out as more of an annoyed whine, “do either of you know if they brought an abomination and a pack of little ghouls in here?”

“Uh, no,” the rightmost ghoul said, adjusting her grip on her rifle. Her compatriot did not seem to have anything to add.

Kano coughed and went back to her usual tone of voice. “Then I’ll just go in and take a look.”

She tried to step past, but they moved to block her way. “No one’s allowed in until Shorin gets back,” the tiresome woman droned, clearly repeating something she’d said many times before.

“But he’s not coming back.”

“What’re you talking about?”

Had they really not heard? Kano supposed they were only lowly ghouls. People probably didn’t tell them anything if they could avoid it. And even if they did, it was hard to say if they’d remember. “He’s dead.”

“Dead? How do you know that?”

“Uh, because I killed him. Duh.”