Written by Mac Sitko

Decades of keeping my head down have made me invisible even here. Nobody wants to look at me. They’re afraid. Even you struggle. (Unless you need me.)

So guards barely glance my way when they count us. I like it this way, but sometimes I’d lick their fucking ears just to remind them there’s still a person behind these eyes. Still warm. Still capable.

Each morning, my brain predicts the clank of keys, boots trampling concrete, the spasm of lights overhead. The cell is damp the way I like it, but I miss the blood-iron scent, and that’s a bummer. It’s quiet and too safe without it. And safe is how you rot.

A sharp pain knifes into my left ear. I clamp my fingers over it, and something is moving inside my ear canal, skittering down against my eardrum.

Wow, wow. This is going to be wild.

The pain pulses hot and insistent. I rock my head from side to side, willing it to stop, but also curious, so I’m damn conflicted.

My skin behind my ear crawls, and I slide my palm back to the spot. I feel a tiny heartbeat under my skin.

With one motion, I pinch at the flesh, and something pops into my hand with a wet splat.

In my fist is a tiny, malformed copy of myself, covered in a slimy birth discharge, connected by a cord. It’s no bigger than my palm; its skin looks waxy and pale. Its arms and legs are twisted knots of bone and flesh, with its face melded together. One eye is wide open—my eye—staring up at me, accusing.

Look at me.

I laugh. It’s fun to see myself out there. It’s only fun because it’s sick, and if I don’t laugh, I’m gonna start screaming, and that’s embarrassing.

It stands up, gazing at me—suddenly less pale, more normal.

I hold the cord with my hand; it seems to connect my doppelganger to my eardrum, and I wanna let the little guy go.

So I pull.

And my eardrum comes with it, bleeding onto the floor. I can’t hear anything in my left ear now. The silence is instant, like someone slammed a door inside my skull.

I chuckle anyway.

He waves at me while I’m bleeding from my ear. He waves a thank-you sign, like a polite little parasite.

“You’re welcome,” I tell him. “You little fuck. You cost me my hearing.”

The tiny, sharp voice responds: “Worth it. An investment.”

And he jumps down and fucks off under the cell bars.

The cell door clicks and opens a little. Now it’s open.

Or it always was.

Or you opened it because you like it when I move.

So I burst into the corridor, get out of my rusty cage, and blood pumps in my ears—well, one ear—and my stabbing ear pain vanishes. I thank God for that; everything He does for me is almost too much.

Blitzing and cutting through the hallway, I feel a haze of adrenaline and disbelief. Just how many times could I have walked out like that unsupervised?

The air is thick with the clamour of bells, alarms, and terrified shouts.

I hear distant screams echo down the hall and smile, hopping and humming a song like a bunny.

Guards shout. They’re far off, distorted, but real. Someone else wails in pain. I’m glad somebody is in pain. The world needs pain—it’s what makes me feel at home, what gets me off.

All your fault, by the way—making me like this. So you wanna work with me, or somethin’? Let’s see how this all fares.

My feet crunch on broken glass and debris as I hop past an open doorway, a swarm of faces huddles in the darkness beyond: dozens of prisoners pressed to the barred gates, lips pulled back, screaming. They stare at me, pleading with vacant eyes. Then I’m past them, and the vision is gone.

tap-scratch, tap-scratch—right under my feet.

And without warning, the floor beneath me splits open, and I drop.

A dark tide of liquid surges up around my ankles.

I scream, but in an energised, hopeful way, throwing my arms wide for balance. The substance is slick and stinks like iodine and pennies.

I yank one foot free; the goo clings to my boots. The sludge sucks at my clothes, seeking to drag me down.

My body drops through the floor, legs dangling. Hands come up from below—too many hands—scratchy, tap-scratch hands—picking up my feet like I’m laundry.

They try to pull me down, but only manage to pull my shoe off.

I slam my palms onto the concrete and haul myself out of the floor’s maw. The “liquid” shivers, as if it’s annoyed it didn’t get to keep me.

What the hell was that?

Just fuck that liquid floor, man.

I think I need aspirin to stop all this madness. Yeah. Sounds about right.

I reach up anyway—same gesture as always—toward the ceiling in anticipation of delivery. I ask God to send me some, like last time I begged for help, but kept moving anyway.

The wall perforates, giving birth to small pills that squeeze through, landing on my outstretched palm. Feels like practice.

Ten pills of aspirin. Perfect.

Thanks, Lord. Always there for me. Always there to help.

Unlike you.

You’re only there when you need somethin’.

I swallow all ten in one go.

The acetylsalicylic acid passes through my homunculi: the first swallows, then the next, and the next—a chain of little me’s hidden inside me, turtles all the way down.

And it’s all done.

Time hiccups. Tick-tock.

The light normalises. Sound slowly returns to normal. My head throbs, blind spots dancing at the edges of my vision. I taste blood. Good. It never tastes like theirs anymore, and that’s how I know time is passing.

The corridor is now silent and still around me; there are no alarms, no shouts, no people.

My ear is back on. The eardrum’s back. Like it never tore. Like nothing came out of me.

Like you edited me.

My hands press against the cold tile walls, and every cell on both sides is empty, doors yawning wide. The silence is broken by my heartbeat thumping in my ears.

I look at my reflection in a metal door. I’m pale and filthy. The ache behind my ear has vanished, and there is no hole, no sign that anything was removed. The small copy of me is nowhere to be seen.

I step forward, and the only sound is a drip from a pipe and the buzz of the fucked-up blinking lights.

My boots leave footprints on the polished floor, and each cell I pass is clean and empty—NADA. Nobody here anymore. Every scream has evaporated.

I alone remain.

But you say you want me to be your errand boy, eh? Promise me things. Promise.

Okay, okay. I hear ya.

Gotcha. I’ll count my fingers.

So there’s Drew. One. There’s Jayson, Clyde, and Antoine. That makes four. Then there’s Dave—five, Grampa Walt—six, and Jane—seven.

I guess I gotta do something about them, or you’ll evaporate me again, like the last time I didn’t do thy bidding. But you’re not gonna let that happen this time, are ya? We’re cool, huh?

Maybe I’ll be Drew. It’s usually enough to feel like someone to become them in reality. That’s how it’s been so far, at least for me.

I can compose myself. I can be normal if I need to be. I’ve done it before. I can make my face behave.

At least let them think that—like the last time at that hearing about the nineteen-year-old girl I gutted. Otherwise, I’ll end up in some loony bin again, and that’s contrary to my best interest.

There’s simply so much more to be done in a real prison.

Especially with you.

Oh yeah, with you!

Do we have a deal?

I look at the concrete wall in front of me, and an O blooms as dust peels away.

A moment later, a K appears beside it.

Then an A.

Then a Y.

And I smile like I’ve been chosen, a messiah, even if that’s not the craziest thing about me. Not even close.

Far down the corridor, the lights flicker. In that new spill—past an infirmary gate—an old man drags a sagging body.

He doesn’t look up. He just keeps going.

There you are.